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Archive of Meetings - 2007

Monday 10th December 2007 - Christmas Quiz

Monday 10 December was our quiz night again compiled by Tony Hawes, as every year. As usual Tony started the proceeding by assuring us that by popular request the questions were easier this year. At the end not one of us was of the view, as the results demonstrated. The quiz consisted of twenty questions with four possible answers. While the papers were being marked we had our coffee and hot mince pies. We waited anxiously for the results. The winners were: First Ric Evans, Second equal Paul Kuzmin and John Childs and Third Chris Kuzmin. I will go no further down the list to avoid embarrassment. The great thing about this quiz is that all contenders get a prize. The super prizes were kindly donated by manufacturers including Microsoft, Corel, Symantec, McAfee and others. To them we are all very grateful. This ended our 2007 series of meetings. The questions and correct answers are available to download on the Xmas Quiz page.

Monday 12th November 2007 - Lexmark X4550

On Monday 12 November Tony Hawes demonstrated the Lexmark X4550 All-in-One, this is a combined printer, scanner, copier and fax machine which also has a built-in 802.11g Wi-Fi for wireless printing. With multi-function devices fast gaining popularity among home users most printer manufacturers have a range of similar All-in-One Multi Function Devices (MFDs).

The Lexmark X4550, first available about April 2007 at over £120 can now be purchased for slightly less than £70. This was demonstrated using a USB connection rather than with the use of the Wi-Fi facility as Tony had found difficulty in establishing a reliable Wi-Fi link between his notebook and printer. First he showed the capability of the flatbed scanner including a simple Copy using the X4550's front panel button; this was particularly quick with an accurate copy of the original emerging within seconds. He then showed how well the optical character recognition (OCR) software (Abbyy FineReader 6 which is bundled and installed by default from the installation CD) worked, this impressively scanned and converted a magazine article into a Microsoft Word document in very short order - ideal if one wants to copy an article and extract content for later editing in Word. Other features demonstrated included the normal scan of a photo for saving to one's hard disk; using the Import function for importing files from a memory card and how to use the quite comprehensive editing features of the installed Lexmark editing suite.

In normal use the printer uses two cartridges, one colour and one black. For higher quality colour photo printing it's possible to install a separate Colour Photo cartridge. Colour printing using only the basic cartridges was demonstrated and the quality was considered to be more than satisfactory. Digital media memory card slots (SD and CF) let one print direct from the card without a computer being connected. The provision of a PictBridge socket alongside the memory card slots allows the connection of a digital camera with a PictBridge connection, in this way photos can be printed directly from the camera. The fax facility, of course, requires a fax modem in the computer.

The basic cartridges cost about £15 each. An interesting all-rounder for the price.

Monday 8th October 2007 - Excel/Access

Francis Jacques, our treasurer, enjoys cycle racing in his spare time and combines this with his computer knowledge to organise cycle races of various lengths with up to 120 participants. On Monday 8 October he demonstrated how the documentation is prepared using Access 2000 and Excel 2000. All the potential competitors have to enter with a form giving name, address, club,date of birth, past best time for this length of race, etc. From this information he sets up an Access database with additional fields for handicap, start time, likely finishing time and order of start. From this database he produces a Query to extract the additional information from the tables in accordance with criteria such as the formula for determining handicaps, the likely finishing time and order of start. The data is then transferred to Excel in order to produce the start sheets to be distributed to the competitors prior to the race and the result sheets afterwards. An Access report is used to print the competitors name, address and competition number on envelopes which are fed directly into a printer. A very interesting evening.

Monday 10th September 2007 - Symantec Ghost 12

On Monday evening 10th September Tony Hawes demonstrated Symantec Norton Ghost 12.

Ghost as a file transfer / back-up program was created in the late 1990s. GHOST is the acronym for "General Hardware-Oriented System Transfer".

In ROM Aug/Sept 2007 Tony reviewed this latest version of Ghost designed to work with Windows Vista and XP. The previous version, Ghost 10 was reviewed in ROM Apr/May 2006. An "official" version of Ghost 11 was not released by Symantec; they instead released Norton "Save and Restore" compatible with Windows XP and Windows Media Centre Edition. "Save and Restore" is essentially an enhancement of Ghost 10, with the addition of features to allow backup and restoration of individual files. Symantec released a Vista compatible version (Save and Restore 2) earlier this year to coincide with the release of Windows Vista. However both "Save and Restore" versions are less well featured versions of Ghost 12 that was demonstrated.

As Tony explained, every computer, no matter how carefully maintained is still subject to disaster, whether by viruses, Trojans, a faulty file, hard drive failure or some other catastrophe. A regular back up routine should therefore have a high priority. Tony demonstrated by backing up his laptop's hard drive to an external hard drive and proved how easy it was for Ghost 12 to backup files, folders or the entire internal hard drive including the operating system and subsequently be recovered.

By booting from the Ghost 12 CD that comes with the program, he demonstrated how the system could be booted into a reduced Windows interface with a Ghost recovery application, from which it's possible to choose a backup recovery point that allows backups to be recovered even when the computer could not be otherwise booted up.

He also gave a demonstration of Seagate's FreeAgent Go. This is a small external 160GB hard drive which includes software that lets you download from your desktop computer your working files like Word, Excel etc., carry them around and work on them elsewhere. Later these updated files can be synced to the appropriate files on your main computer when you return to base. To keep your data safe FreeAgent Go includes an application that offers strong file encryption to protect your content, and allows you sync your files from several PCs - an interesting concept.

Monday 9th July 2007 - Survey Results/DVD Home Moviemaking

The first part of the evening on Monday 9th July was devoted to a presentation by Laurence Fenn of his ROM Survey of how members use their PC's. The result of the Members Survey can be viewed on this Web site and will be included in the next issue of ROM.

This was followed by a tutorial DVD presented by Tony Hawes on "DVD Home Moviemaking - A Beginners Guide". Tony explained that the DVD was applicable to all the main home moviemaking programs including Pinnacle Studio Plus, Ulead Video Studio and Adobe Premiere Elements. The tutorial covered the subject from basic concepts to a professional standard in chapters covering such subjects as, DVD standards, shooting your video, transferring home movies from camera to PC, video editing, adding sound and special effects, adding stills, and burning to disc. I am sure that this introduction to the subject will encourage members to think seriously about acquiring a camcorder.

Monday 11th June 2007 - Paint Shop Pro Tutorials

On Monday Tony played some of the Lynda.com tutorials that come with Paint Shop Pro XI Photo. They cover everything from the basics of photo editing to the more complex procedures. We saw how to rotate your image, adjust the levels to compensate for lack of flash, correct skin blemishes, whiten teeth, remove objects and crop images ready for printing. The woman doing the voice over had a strong American accent which took a while to get used to but she didn't use too technical terms in her descriptions. Some of the subtle changes were lost in viewing the files using the projector (as opposed to watching it on screen), but the technique will be of tremendous help to those who use this cheaper alternative to the more expensive and complex Photoshop. An informative evening.

Monday 14th May 2007 - XP to Vista and Clickbook

On Monday 14th May Tony Hawes started off the evening with an interactive demonstration showing how to upgrade your operating system from Windows XP to Windows Vista. He explained that both operating systems had a number of versions and whereas Windows XP offers different editions of the operating system based on the type of computer using it; Windows Vista offers different editions based on the features users want on their computers.

The demonstration was based on the initial chapter from the "Windows Vista Ultimate - Professor Teaches" from the "Professor Teaches" series of training courses on DVD. This augmented the article he wrote for the April/May version of ROM and was a very clear explanation of the operations and processes to be considered when upgrading to Microsoft's new OS and the more obvious visual differences between Windows XP and Vista.

The evening ended with Tony explaining and demonstrating a printing program that he has been using since version 2 in the mid-1990s by Blue Squirrel software called ClickBook. This is a very easy to use program which will turn anything you can print into a booklet format (and others). ClickBook will take any of the many varieties of computer and Windows application documents such as Word, Publisher, PDF, HTML, text etc and shrink the pages or rotate the layout to fit the output format you have chosen. It will print both sides of the paper and always maintaining the book page numbering. Tony demonstrated this program by printing the latest 16-page long ROM, a MS Publisher (.pub file) as an A5-size booklet which needed just four sheets of A4 paper, thus saving paper and ink or toner and perhaps creating a more convenient format for reading and storing. Now up to version 10, ClickBook is available for download from the Blue Squirrel site for about £25 from: http://www.bluesquirrel.com/products/clickbook. This ended an interesting evening.

P.S. Tony has confirmed that titles in the Professor Teaches series of computer based training packages are currently on offer with useful discounts from Electric Software, the UK's distributor. Discounts are only on offer until the end of May so pop over to: http://www.shop.electric-software.co.uk for further details.

Monday 9th April 2007 - AGM

Individual committee members explained their past years' activities and the treasurer presented the accounts. The Chairman (Tony Wood) mentioned that the past years' activities are recorded extensively in the April - May 2007 edition of ROM, the Group newsletter and members were directed to the Group web page to download a copy if they had not already done so. Overall we have had a good year with p resentations and demonstrations at most meetings, but membership remains static and existing members are encouraged to recommend potential new members from among their friends or colleagues emphasising that new members are always made very welcome. The committee welcomes suggestions from members as to how we can raise awareness of the Group and make computer users in the area aware of our existence.

The Treasurer (Francis Jacques) presented the accounts of the group; these showed we are still in the black; this is accounted for by the decision made at last years AGM when it was decided that the Group newsletter (ROM) would no longer be printed and posted to members, but only available as a download from the Group web page, thus leading to substantial savings. The Treasurer mentioned that on the assumption that membership remains at the current level or higher there is no need to raise the membership fee beyond the current £20 pa. Copies of the accounts were handed to members.

The Editor of ROM (Tony Hawes) said it was still an uphill struggle to get input for ROM, but he was very thankful for the assistance made by those members who made regular editorial contributions.

The Membership Secretary (Maxine Bushell) was absent but she considered (in a separate contribution) that with ROM now only available as a download, the necessity of recording individual postal mail addresses and printing the labels for despatching ROM by post was no longer a task that need a separate member of the committee. It was agreed therefore that the post of Membership Secretary would be allowed to lapse. A list of members is available from the Treasurer who records their details when they pay their subscriptions.

The committee then stood down and election of new committee took place. Unfortunately there was no volunteer for the post of Chairman, which is currently in abeyance. However, the former Chairman agreed that he would remain the registered Group key holder for the keys to the hall. The positions of Treasurer, Editor of ROM, Secretary & Public Relations and Web Master remain with the current incumbents who were elected unopposed by members present. Contact details of Committee members will appear in the June / July issue of ROM.

Monday 12th March 2007 - DVD

Our talk on Monday evening was by our audio/video expert Laurence Fenn on DVDs; and a very comprehensive review it was. It took the form of a specially produced DVD he had designed to detail his talk and provide illustrating clips. It started by outlining the history and capabilities of video recording systems from the Laser Disc invented by David Paul Glegg in 1958, through the Video CD with all the "rainbow book standards" of CD, Super VCD to the present DVD specification announced in 1995 and finalised the following year. A detailed specification of the various forms of the DVD was then given and the features supported. The reasons for regional coding was explained and a map of the world regions shown. Recordable DVDs with the five different recording formats for recording one's own material were discussed and the data capacities shown. The application of DVDs for games with interactive facilities was discussed with illustrations. The presentation ended by discussing the future of video recording with the now immerging Blu-ray and HD DVD specifications for the support of high definition 1080p. Throughout the talk snippets of program material was show to demonstrate the points being made. Copies of the demonstration DVD were available after the talk. Members of club were much appreciative if the large amount of work Laurence had put in to the preparation of his talk and demonstration DVD which will cover "everything you want to know about DVD" for a long time to come.

Some links relating to the software used:

DVD-lab Pro 2 was used to author the Demo DVD, and is available from Mediachance at www.mediachance.com.
VideoStudio 10 was used to create the video titles, and that's available from Ulead Systems at www.ulead.com.

Crazy Talk was the software I used to create the Ozzy Talks video clip, animated lip syncing from a digital photo. Available from www.realllusion.com.
DVD Shrink is used to 'backup' your DVD films from a dual layer original to a single layer copy. A free download from www.dvdshrink.org.

P.S. Copies of the Demo DVD are still available to members. Just email me to request a copy and pick it up at the next meeting. Full details of the disc are available here.

The Presentation Notes are available as a PDF download.

Monday 12th February 2007 - Photography

On Monday 12 February we had a memorable evening. Our John Childs, also the Competition Secretary for Digital Images at the Farnborough Camera Club, gave a comprehensive talk on digital photography; his hobby. He explained that almost all the work at the Club was now digital rather than film. Although certainly not cheap, professional digital equipment was now available at a more reasonable price. He did however subtitle his talk "A discourse on the wisdom of spending a small fortune on one's hobby". Laid out on the table he had many examples of his work; mounted A3 prints, which were quite outstanding. He started by considering the range of cameras available from the "point and shoot" (perhaps part of a mobile phone) to the SLR with interchangeable lenses and showed his two Canon SLR cameras and the assortment of lenses he had available. He discussed the 5 sizes of sensors which are incorporated in various cameras and their merits, mentioning that Canon was the only manufacturer to incorporate a full frame sensor such that a 20mm lens behaves as 20mm. He mentioned the advantages of prime lens over zooms and the stabilising of the image. Most cameras can record the image as RAW (uncompressed) or JPEG files although the actual specification of RAW seemed to vary between manufacturers. He outlined the advantage of RAW although the file size is about 4 times that of JPEG. He then went on to demonstrate the type of corrections that can be made using PhotoShop before processing into the TIFF format. He emphasised, however, the importance of preserving the RAW image on, for example, a CD, for future reference. He ended his talk by describing how he had calibrated his monitor using the Gretag Macbeth calibrator system, which costs about £180 and by always using Epsom inks and Jessop's glossy paper had profiled his Epson A3 printer, thus avoiding a lot of abortive guesswork in producing prints which matched the image on the computer screen. An outstanding evening.

Monday 8th January 2007 - MP3

On Monday 8th of January for our first meeting of the New Year we had a sound evening presented by Tony Hawes. He started by discussing MP3 (Mpeg 1 layer 3). MP3 is a compression system and the one used in the popular iPod and other MP3 players. It can have a variety of compression ratios based on bit rates of between 32 and 320 Kbps. and was a result of work carried out for the development of the DAB broadcast system. 320 Kbps represents basically no compression being applied, 192 Kbps very good quality and 128 acceptable. The sampling frequency can be 32, 44.1 or 48 KHz. with 44.1 being the most common. Tony demonstrated transferring a sound track from a commercial audio CD on to his laptop using Windows Media Player and "ripping" this on to his Acer MP340 (similar to a iPod). The track was then relayed on to a number of speaker arrangements. Examples of tracks at 32, 128 Kbps and 192 Kbps were demonstrated. Although accurate comparisons could not be made because of the acoustics of the room, the 192 Kbps sample played via the Logitech Z2200 with its hefty sub-woofer was obviously much superior.

A very small Logitech transmitter and receiver was demonstrated working on 2.4 GHz/s carrying the output from a MP3 player fed into the transmitter module, the transmitted signal being received up to 300 feet away by the small radio receiver which was connected to the amplifier of the Logitech speakers at the other side of the hall.

Another small transmitter was demonstrated, this time working on a number of frequencies in the FM VHF band such that an iPod or similar device could be relayed on to a FM car radio. This test involved the FM signal being received on Tony's portable FM receiver which again was at the far end of the hall. Such a low-power FM transmitter device only became legal a few weeks ago in early December 2006.

Overall, considering the size of the players, transmitters and receivers, the quality was surprisingly good. A dedicated audiophile would probably consider the sound not of the quality he would expect from a dedicated and expensive HiFi, but considering the cost of the products shown and from comments made after the demo, most of those present thought the demonstration provided a welcome introduction into the possibilities of using MP3 players in alternative and different ways, rather than just hearing them through a set of ear-buds stuffed into ones' ears.

We had a very interesting evening.