Posts by Tsung

'Windows 10 nagware: You can't click X. Make a date OR ELSE'

What date is good for you?

Maybe an option would be to set the date time so far into the future it wouldn't matter?

Yesterday: Openreach boss quits. Today: BT network goes TITSUP

More like 3 hours than 3 days, solved already by BT Service page

Trebles all round: The BBC's won this licence fee showdown

Been saying it for several years

The TV licence will be changed into a TV & Internet licence (as if you can get internet you can access catch up services). On one hand I think we should just be done with the TV Licence, every household is going to have to pay it soon so just add it to the council tax bill. Think of the saving by not having to send out horrible letters or pay a firm to manage the collection. On the other, I think the BBC should be forced to content protect everything (I-Player, TV broadcast) and only those paying the licence fee should be able to gain access (no need to enforce, criminalise or go after non-payers).

Sky / VM are able to do it with their channels (Movies / Sports) I cannot see any reason why Freeview / Freesat can't ? Only reason for not doing it is to keep the TV Tax cash cow alive.

Ditch crappy landlines and start reading Twitter, 999 call centres told

Going to state the bleeding obvious here..

Why not make it an app?

Make it part of the default phone install so it cannot be removed by un-installing it (contract phones), and available for free from all the stores.

Emergency services app., select it, select service required, it could send GPS -> Mobile Number -> other details directly to the call handler. Connects to call handler via best connection method available. Added advantage, it could connect to the right service depending on the country the phone is in.

Location + mobile details would be known so any abuse could be handled swiftly. Seems obvious, rather than relying on a txt / twit or facebook message.

City of birth? Why password questions are a terrible idea

You're all forgetting the rules...

Not only do they ask these "stupid" question but they set rules on the answer.

Where where you born? Bath

*Sorry please enter an answers longer than 5 characters.

Resetting by SMS is a nice idea, but I still work in an area of the UK that has zero mobile coverage. When my bank started using a 10 minute SMS message to grant access to my on-line account I was locked out from work. Very frustrating...

100s of Virgin Media customers hit by handset repair glitch, telco admits

On another note..

An employee had a Nokia 635 phone where the screen failed (nothing would appear). The warranty repair on that was extremely quick/efficient from Microsoft. Phone collected Tuesday, returned fixed and working Friday.

VM are constantly sending me large letters with offers for their mobile service (junk mail I never requested and asked several times for them to stop sending). It all goes in the recycle bin now.. unread.

Massive TalkTalk data breach STILL causing customer scam tsunami

The other problem is...

The call centers are usually located in other countries so when a call comes through you are not suspicious of the withheld number nor the slightly non-native English person talking to you. They sound a bit foreign, but they have all my details, fair enough must be genuine.

I had this recently with Barclay's who decided (without prompting) to call me regarding an upgrade to the company online banking system. I refused to to talk to the person, she had all the details but without any indication from Barclay's they were doing this, I wasn't biting. Later on I find out the call was genuinely from Barclay's.

Talk talk should be held liable for any customer who is caught out and should be made to pay back any money lost. Then on top of that, a big fine for failing to protect customer data + failing to properly notify customers of the breach.

Transparency thrust sees Met police buying up to 30,000 bodycams

"Goodier said the equipment and storage costs would be fronted by the police, "

Oh good at least the tax payers wont be footing the bill.... oh wait....

Virgin Media takes its time on website crypto upgrade

Re: And they have a ludicrous mandatory weak password policy too

Agreed, it's comical..

Must be 6 to 8 letters long, Numeric, Upper and Lower-case only. No symbols, no spaces. Rules out any use of password managers for a decent password. I don't understand the restriction (except laziness on their part) ; I thought they were using a re-skinned g-mail client.

The BBC wants to slap a TAX on EVERYONE in BLIGHTY

I'm confused by the comparison to Apple?

Comparing the BBC to Apple is like comparing Apples to Oranges!

Is he saying that the BBC should become a private company; raise money by encrypting the output and then charging accordingly? or does Apple charge us a tax every year regardless?

I still believe the BBC had the perfect opportunity to change when we all went digital; but decided not to. Maybe they didn't want to get off the licence fee gravy train they were on at the time.

If the BBC is that good and important it should be able to stand on it's own two feet; I say abolish the licence fee, encrypt the channels and offer a pay for service. People can choose to pay for access to your content. No need to send nasty letters out threatening court action, or sending inspectors to people's properties. So there is a saving right there!

Samsung: Our TVs? Spying on you? Ha Ha! Just a joke of course

What's the point of Voice Recognition....

If you have to push a button on the remote first?

New way = press button, "channel one please.."

Old way = press channel 1 button.

New way = press button, "turn down the volume please"

old way = press the volume down button

New way = press button, "turn off please."

Old way = Buy a TV without all this smart crap built in.

The only reason I can think of having voice control on a TV is to put a microphone (and camera for skype) in every living room. :/

Landlines: The tech that just won't die

With Virgin Media you can have a broadband line wtihout a telephone. It might look more expensive that the "bundle" option, but the bundle prices rarely include the £16.99 (i guess) extra line rental fee.

Once you add that back in, you're back to or exceeded the broadband only cost.

I don't have a land line, it's great no cold calls at any time.

FIVE Things (NOT 10: these are REAL) from the WINDOWS 10 event

I don't get Cortana either!

How is it going to work in an office? Even if you choose to use it, Cortana will need to know the person talking to her/it is the right person and not an overly loud person sitting near them or indeed someone going thro' the office saying "Cortana shut down PC".

Even in the home environment I think it will have limited use, maybe we just need to get use to talking to our computers. Again, really needs Cortana to be intelligent enough to accept direction from the correct person. (So someone on voice comms/skype or a TV in room cannot trigger it).

However, for people who have difficulties typing it might be a godsend. So include it, just allow people to disable it.

Space Commanders lock missiles on Elite's Frontier Devs

Re: As much depth as TOWIE.

I had a go at mining, after a lot of trial and error with the cargo scoops (mainly due to the aiming cross hair not allowing for the ship getting in the way) I managed to scoop 4 tonnes of "stuff". Took it back to station, worth the sum of sweet fa.

I like the fact your computer doesn't know the system name unless you explore it, and yet you had to select the system "by name" before you made the jump. Illogical really!

Take these complaints to the ED Forums and you will get shot down. Complaining about travel time, and you get "space is big" returned at you. Or you're a newbie who wants it too easy.

Trouble is "time" (as in real time) is precious; and I just don't have to patience to sit 10 minutes waiting for the star-field screensaver to end whilst traveling.

Re: No offline? Screw you guys, I’ll play with myself instead.

You have solo online mode for that, which is pretty much what the game is currently.

On a separate note :-

I cannot help but feel those who complain about lack of single player offline mode are more interested in being able to "copy" the game rather than buy it. They have the bandwidth to download it (it isn't available in shops) but lack the bandwidth to play it!

Flawed masterpiece?

Open play is totally flawed at the moment, you can play with other random players but try meeting up with any friends and you find you are on different islands* (so you both can be in the same area of space, looking at the same station but not actually seeing each other). Whilst both of you can see other random players (yeah great, thanks Frontier).

Open play docking is also flawed, with luck of the draw at busier stations and no queue system in place. If you happen to request docking at the right time, you get in, otherwise you have keep requesting over and over until you get lucky.

Missions can end up be exercises in futility, go here find this item (black box), bring it back. Involves going there, flying around for 10mins at a time, waiting for an unidentified signal source, locking on, arriving, not finding the black box your looking for, repeat.

Fines, for anything, everything, fines. Pick up cargo in space, get caught with it, FINE. Go do a mission involving picking up some cargo, get caught with it, FINE. Having a battle, a stray shot hits another ship, fine + wanted status. Get bored trying to do mission with no success, cancel mission, Fine.

There is a good game here somewhere, but try as I might to like it, I am struggling to enjoy it. The demo at the launch event where one player took on a big ship and called in the help of two friends, this feature does not currently exist, there is no easy way you and friends can play together.

It's the biggest single player MMO out there at the moment.

*Even in group play (where you setup a group with friends first, no randoms) does not ensure you and your friends are in the same instance near a space station.

Hipsters ahoy! Top Ten BOARD games for festive family fun

Betrayal at the House on the HIll

Betrayal is a great game, starts off co-op scooby doo style, friends exploring a house together. Ends up with one player Betraying the others! With 50 different scenarios, and a random house every time, plenty of re-playability can be had. The betrayer / the event and the house are all unknowns at the start, also when the haunting happens, the betrayer has their own set of rules, the heros (remaining players) have their own set of rules.

DeathRing: Cheapo Androids pre-pwned with mobile malware

"Lookout says DeathRing is the second significant example of pre-installed mobile malware it has found on phones during 2014"

The first was Lookout which was shoe-horned onto my mobile by EE. Of course it was the basic version, with prompts to update for £x a month and no way to remove it.

Amazon DROPS next day delivery amid Cyber Monday MADNESS

So does this affect Amazon Prime Members?

If it does... then they have paid for a next day delivery service which they wont be getting...

Move over, Apple Pay: Tesco trials PayQwiq phone-flash pay app

What a silly system!!

". When you select your payment option, you can now choose PayQwiq and run the app, sign in with a PIN and choose which card you want to pay with. This produces a QR code on the screen of your phone – you wave this at the machine to pay."

Whats the point? the whole process takes longer than paying with a debit/credit card. Waiting for people to count through change is bad enough (but understandable in these hard times) last thing I want is to be waiting for someone whilst they are playing with their mobile.

Still my Tesco's don't even have contact-less payment option yet :(.

Forget bonking, have ONE OFF THE WRIST with Barclaycard's bPay

Only £20.. a time.. However, automatic top up, means a stolen bpay band could be used to buy a lot of alcohol / cigarettes before being stopped. In a day, if auto-top up is selected, at the lowest amount £100 could be stolen the maximum amount £600.

(4 tops up x £20 + £20 on the band already )

or

(4 top up x £100 +£200 on the band already )

Ok it's unlikely, but still possible.

eBay promises to refund seller fees after latest MASSIVE OUTAGE

To counter sniper bids, ebay should reset the countdown timer to 1 minute every time someone bids within that last minute. This ensure the seller gets the best price, and there are no benefits to sniper bidding.

Ok the auction would end a bit later, but so what?

Amazon rekindles e-readers and Fire OS without weeks of whack-a-leak fun

Wait for reviews...

The Kindle Voyager is pretty expensive; I also wonder if this page press actual works or if it will automatically be turning the pages when I'm holding the kindle? (I don't think I pinch hold the bottom corner of the kindle like they do in the adverts)

"PagePress is a custom-designed force sensor made of carbon and silver, which reacts to a subtle increase of pressure, triggers a page-turn and provides a haptic response only your fingers can perceive."

I really love my original kindle (with keyboard), I'd like to get one with a built in light but the whole touching the screen to turn the page to me seems unnecessary.

Europe prepares to INVADE comet: Rosetta landing site chosen

When it comes to landing...

I expect their console to display the lunar lander game from the early 80's.

something like this..

http://moonlander.seb.ly/

Slap my Imp up: Bullfrog's Dungeon Keeper

If you are after a modern day version.

War for the OverWorld is shaping up rather nicely.

http://store.steampowered.com/app/230190/

Google extends app refund window to two hours

Preloaders...

All developers will have to do to get around this is have pre-loaders and in app purchase for the game. You get the pre-loader for Free.. (It could even be a trial version of the game, if the developer is feeling generous). To unlock the game you have to make an IAP, which I guess does not have a 2 hour refund window on it.

Problem solved..

Nokia Lumia 530: A Windows Phone... for under £50

Like the 630 review before it..

WHERE can you buy this phone for less than £50?

The price on Nokia's website (sim free) is £90.

With a Pay-As-You-Go lock in it's £70.

The same issue plagued the Nokia 630 phone, where reviewers said it was less than £100, but in actual fact the price was £140.

Samsung Gear S: Quick, LAUNCH IT – before Apple straps on iWatch

Time on my phone, time on clock at work, time on my computer screen. I haven't bothered wearing a watch for many years. Nowadays, watches are mostly novelty fashion item. Couldn't really see a need for this one (or the apple one if it exists).

Maybe if the watch can monitor for medical conditions and notify emergency services if needed. (eg. the wearer is having a heart attack, or stroke) it might be worthwhile. I certainly wouldn't wear an expensive watch for exercise.

Déjà vu: Virgin Media jacks up broadband prices

Re: Junk Mail gets me everytime.

Oh Yes!

Junk Mail gets me everytime.

I've even requested they stop sending it. They claim to mark your account "no junk" and yet sure as mustard, I get the marketing crap from them at least twice a week.

As for putting prices up? they seem to do it whenever without reason. It does seem strange they are now trying to offer me their full tv services + phone line + highest speed broadband for less than what I pay for broadband (£35 a month is the offer, apparently*).

*I'm sure that excludes line rental at whatever they like to charge for that.

Six of the best gaming keyboard and mouse combos

Indeed the prices..

A decent enough mouse for gaming.. Try looking up Redragon on amazon. Decent mice, fraction of the price, still got the frilly bits (color customization, switchable dpi, profiles and programmable Marco's). I have the Lava-wolf mouse a mere £13, and it performs brilliantly.

As for keyboards, yeah Cherry Switches really is great. However I hear great things about the I-Rocks K10 keyboard currently £22 from Amazon. So for £35 mouse + keyboard combo for gaming on a budget.

Termination charges drop smacks Vodafone and EE in the WALLET

EE Lost me as a customer

It was the amount of forced apps they insisted on putting on my phone (Galaxy S3 at the time) which finally did it for me. I didn't want Free Games, Lookout Basic and all the other tosh they forced onto my phone. OFC. there was no option to delete this shovelware and the phone ended up running like toffee.

Contact ended, I terminated it, and went else where.

BOOM BOOM: Dixons fires the human cannon

Re: Fewer staff

To hound customers don't you mean?

I play store pac-man; avoiding the "helpful" staff where-ever possible.

Hello Moto... It's the Nokia Lumia 630

Where is it sub £100?

The reviews suggest it's going to be released at £90 RRP, the website (Nokia & m$) have it priced at £129. So what has happened here? I have two cynical theories.

1. Nokia lied about the price to the reviewers; they review the phone based on the fact it is a £90 phone and it get's rave reviews. Nokia releases the phone at the true price of £130.

2. Nokia did intend to release at £90 RRP but when the phone got excellent reviews they decided to add another £40 to the price.

Before anyone says VAT to me, the RRP doesn't include VAT, thats rubbish. £90 + VAT (@20%) = £108. That's a long way from the £129 actual price.

Anyways, the review should be revisited based on the new RRP of £129. It might still be excellent value for money, or it might now not be so great against one of the competition.

Motorola Moto E: Brill budget blower with one bothersome blunder

No Front Camera, not a deal breaker!

Just buy a mirror!

Netflix FREEZES prices for existing UK users to stop them quitting vid-streaming service

What are you playing virgin for?

I'm the opposite, I don't buy any TV services from Virgin, only broadband. Netflix is amazing, for a measly £6 a month there is no end of content available, I haven't even bothered to use DNS / VPN hacks to access USA content. There is no need. The UK services is fine with plenty of content available to watch,.

I have used Amazon Instant but found the whole service terrible. The Amazon player is awful; sometimes it was hit or miss for content availability. Once it decided I wasn't a subscriber right in the middle of a show and just stopped playing.Oh and it wouldn't play on my PC becuase my monitor wasn't compatible!

Oh well, carry on Netflix, I've been a subscriber for over a year, and really happy with the service :)

Selfies are so 2013. Get ready for DRONIES – the next hipster-cam-gasm

Only thing I noticed about that video was the guy couldn't afford a matching pair of shoes.

Twitter rejigs layout, opens wide to swallow SLURRY OF ADS

If twitter wants to make money

Maybe they should charge the celebrities and companies that use twitter accounts a monthly fee to use them. Also anyone who has more than X (100?) friends on twitter who is using it a endorsement platform . If they are using and benefiting (financially or popularity) from the service, make them dam well pay for it.

Molyneux: Working at Microsoft is 'like taking antidepressants'

We're doomed!!

"Molyneux told GameSpot last week that he believes the fate of the God game genre itself depends on the success of Godus."

To be honest the first version was a terrble click fest designed for mobiles, the second attempt is not much better. I think Peter has forgotton that games are suppose to be fun; players don't really care about the "little" people in the game. But peter SO wants us to care!. As a "god", I expect them to worship me, and/or fear me.. In this game (at it's current stage) there is nothing.

He admits the industry runs in cycles, so whilst at Microsoft he clearly was protecting himself from the "non"-indy game cycle.

Every little helps: Dirty MOLE BANDITS clean out Tesco ATM from BELOW

Re: Ah for £86k I'd soil myself too....

And cost way more than £86k. The preps did Tescos a favour*

*assuming that Tescos wanted a hole new way into their shop.

Blighty goes retro with 12-sided pound coin

Re: I'm not happy unless I'm complaining.

Isn't there a going to be a competition? If so I'll submit a picture of the Queen, a sure winner :D

ISIS Security

Immediately made me think of Archer ( http://archer.wikia.com/wiki/ISIS )

As for fakes, the images must be fake, the coins are dated 2014, but won't be available until 2017.

Mastercard, Syniverse target holiday payment security with mobile verification system

I think the banks are totally over-engineering on this project. Simple changes could make a big difference to card abuse. Changes like.

Allow customers to have a pin that can be 4,5 or 6 digits long.

Allow customers to set daily/hourly withdrawal limits on the card. For instance, I never take out more than £20 from a cash machine, so why can't I set a limit of £20 a day or hour?. Attempts to withdraw more without speaking to the bank could result in the card being held.

In a similar vein have an upper spend limit on a credit card (set by the customer). Day to day, I doubt I have a single transaction ever exceed £50, so why can't I set this?. Then if my card is stolen, and the thief try to splurge out on a shiny new toy, they wont succeed.

Finally, if going abroad give the customers an easy way to inform the bank, we are going to be in country X between Y and Z.

Tbh. banks aren't interested in making it too difficult to splurge your money. When spending many months out of the UK, I received a bill for £1000 for a credit-card I had previous cancelled, in branch (and cut it up and handed it too them). Despite me cancelling the card, the bank decided not to.:/

Battling with Blizzard's new WoW expansion and Diablo revamp

Diablo 3 Expansion.

Diablo 3 was a total let down; being forced to play on super easy mode, then easy mode up to still insane mode killed any enjoyment to be had. I have friends who stopped playing it well before they even reached the higher levels, because the game was ultimately boring.

Why on earth would anyone buy the expansion is beyond me?. Better games have come along since, Path of Exile for instance is totally free to play and you can build any sort of toon you like. Even Van Helsing was a 1/2 tidy game with some tower defence elements thrown in.

My love affair with Blizzard is over; a few years ago I would defend them. Warcraft 3, is superb, with excellent mod support (bring us games like DOTA). Early WoW was great fun, thou' I'm not a great fan of the new talent tree. It's like they are dumbing their games down as much as possible to appeal to the widest audience.

I've hope for Heros of the Storm, it looks good and will be the next game I would consider getting.

NHS England tells MPs: 'The state isn't doing dastardly things with GP medical records'

Opt out, isn't really opt-out at all.

I thought when you opt out it doesn't actually remove your data in any way. Instead they "tag" it with a "code" that means "don't look at me". Anyone who wants to use the data for "other" purposes isn't going to give too hoots about the opt out code. If anything it will make your record more interesting as you clearly have something you want to hide!

Crafty French hackers tweak 'My Account' page, slurp 800,000 Orange users' details

Tweak page?

If all the "hacker" done was tweak a page to gain access to other users account details, I would say that Orange are just as guilty of leaking it's customer data. Don't worry, rather that take any responsibility for protecting customer data we will blame the "hacker".

It sounds like the Hacker done something "trivial" to gain access to other customers records, probably stumbled over it by accident.

'Maybe we haven't been clear enough about med records opt-out', admits NHS data boss

Re: Radio 4 this morning

I agree I heard that very same interview, in the same sentences she was saying the data was anonymous and yet has a unique ID (NHS ID) that links back to you. But it's OK they have no plans to sell it to private companies. The explanation was as clear as mud, she had no idea what she was talking about. As for the coded bit, I guess she means something similar to hash tags on twitter.

Another question I have to ask listening to this interview, she said they have been doing this for the past 25 years. So I'm not sure why they needed a new system now? sounds to me like opting out is a wise choice.

A BBC-by-subscription 'would be richer', MPs told

Here comes the TV & Internet Licence fee..

I don't pay for a TV licence, my TV isn't tuned for any channel, I watch Film & TV Series from Netflix.

However, one of my biggest annoyances with the BBC is the technology exists to encrypt the channel and deliver it to just those who pay for it. The big digital switch over was the perfect time to incorporate this technology. Instead they would rather make out people who choose not to watch broadcast TV are criminals. I'm certain the "long term" goal for the BBC is this..

"We cannot possibly monitor everybody who uses I-Player and we cannot issue usernames / passwords for those who pay the TV licence so our only option is an TV & Internet Licence fee."

Lets see if it happens...

Ho, ho, HOLY CR*P, ebuyer! Etailer rates staff on returns REJECTED

Not suprised.

Bought a laptop from them, it was faulty, they wouldn't even entertain a return until I had phoned up and spoken to Lenovo technical support. Spoke to Lenovo tech support they agreed the laptop was faulty, and then ebuyer finally agreed to accept it back for refund.

Makes me very wary of using them again especially for expensive items.

Gift-giving gotchas: How to avoid Xmas morning EMBARRASSMENT

Good Advice

Setting up accounts is great advice, also if the product contains a downloadable code it's well worth downloading in advanced.

Last year my nephew got a VITA with FIFA13. The game was just a download code and about 2.8gb in size. Luckily his parents gave me the console first, so I was able to set up his account, charge the console and pre-download the game. This allowed him to play the game on xmas day rather than sitting there looking at a "downloading" bar.

This year it's BF4 on the Xbox, again they don't have the quickest internet so I've stole his Xbox, installed BF4 + downloaded all the patches and returned it. Come Xmas day, he will be able to open the present, pop the disc into his console and play (the way games use to be). Rather than waiting for all the patches to download.