One thing to mention is that grounding yourself isnt always good. You have to level yourself with the chip you handle, a good way to do that is to always touch the tower if you are handling the hardware of your computer.

Another source of ESD is when ppl clean their computers, vacuum cleaners and compressed air is used and it actually creates static electricity. you can clean it with less risk with ionized air. but then again, some things becomes too complicated and at the rate ppl switch out technology these days we hardly use it long enough to see it break by ESD.

I also noticed Darren drinking a PBR! Darren if you want something with a little more flavor just let me know and I can send you some homebrew, yes beer brewed at home.

I am new to the Hak5 channel so I have a lot of catching up to do this show is to awesome. I have already added Prey project to protect my dell mini.

I did notice it seems to slow the machine down a lot after you report it as missing.

Seriously, email and I can drop off many bottles of home brew. Ferguson, MO is my home town.

Thanks
Digitizer

the card numbers are ‘PCI-5S, and PCM-5S’

Last I saw, the closest the “fast/low resource” router software packages could do is SNORT (which itself is a hog – pardon the pun) and mail (SMTP/POP3/IMAP) relaying with scanning. I think I’ve seen some success in hooking SQUID and/or SOCKS with AV Scan, but don’t recall anyone releasing that into production yet either. If you know of any that can, please forward it on to me. I love checking out new stuff and have no loyalties to pfSense or Untangle (I’m a former LEAF Bering fan for example).

from a nic to a nic (another computer or server) i’ve never had to use a crossover cable..

anyways..

untangle is only good for a pass-through box.

You have to use crossover cat5 cables going from nic to nic on any computer/router or server based setup because the wires are not crossed automatically to make the proper connection…

Here is a regular (straight through/T568b) cabling wire setup..
Wo/O/Wg/B/Wb/G/WBr/Br

i.e. WhiteOrange/Orange/WhiteGreen/Blue/WhiteBlue/Green/WhiteBrown/Brown
(whites are white striped with a color)

Crossover cables are as follows on a separate end (uses 568b for one end, and 568a for the other)
T568a – Wg/g/Wo/B/Wb/G/Wbr/Br
The greens and the oranges are swapped for the other end. On higher end routers you have what is called “auto mdix” which will test and change each wire internally to reflect what the proper connection should be if there is a miswire but standard computer nics will not do this for you… This should DEFINITELY be in the show Darren, because a LOT of people who will try this will only fail when they don’t know about the cross over cables needed.

I ain’t mad, just that I felt it was a little something that should not have been missed you ole’ network monkey

IME, retailers often don’t bother with ESD. I once bought memory from a guy at PC Club who gripped the sticks while ungrounded. When confronted, he explained (a bit surprised I would even bring it up), “The carpet is anti-static,” which would have been fine if he wasn’t wearing rubber soled shoes. One time a Fry’s sales guy took a motherboard out to show it to me, on the sales floor! I bought that model… from the back of the shelf. Don’t get me started on eBay sellers whose photos show their computer parts laying on carpet!

Back in 1998, I had ESD training as part of the Apple repair certification. But before that I worked for an electronic component reseller where ESD precautions were a normal part of business. Seeing as how chips and components keep getting smaller and more complicated, I would assume that preventing ESD is even more important nowadays. Am I wrong? Gosh darnit and shoot, I wanna know!

BTW/FYI, ESD often times only weakens electronics, so the effects may not be immediately evident and the parts may fail after their warranty period. I like my parts to last long after that.

And what about grounding? In a sweet setup like the plexi mount, where’s the ground? Is it even necessary? (I believe grounding has to do with electromagnetic interference or something.)

So am I just uninformed, or does no one care about the longevity of their computers? I need answers, yo. Sorry for the novella.

BTW, awesome stuff, Hak5 crew. Your shows keep my hacker side happy. I have no use for most of the stuff, but knowing about it just adds to my charm.

- Sushi

(If anyone cares, I came across this: http://www.wikihow.com/Ground-Yourself-to-Avoid-Destroying-a-Computer-with-Electrostatic-Discharge )