Carbon Based Error

If you’re trying to set up or fix HP ePrint and you get the message “unable to check for firmware update” You’ll be happy to know it’s very easy to fix.

Stop using internet explorer, use firefox instead.

HP will try and talk you through changing to a static IP and using external DNS and all sorts of rubbish that won’t work. The simple fix is to use a different browser because their stuff is kinda crap. So – before you go crazy, try it in a different browser. Also remember to manually update firmware before proceeding, because you can’t trust a browser based session to get it right.

Nice work, HP.

Many users have a very straight-forward retention policy: KEEP ALL THE EMAILS. Which is great and in theory should be just fine. In the real world, it isn’t. The simple solution is to split the emails into several differing PST files – but if outlook is already struggling under the load, that can be a lengthy and painful process.

Happily, there are tools to help. PST File Splitter does what it says on the label – breaks up one monolithic PST into several smaller ones. There’s also a paid, pro version that does more stuff.

Mailscavator is another tool, completely free, that will split PST files and allows simple filtering. Awesome!

Virtual Router is a free little application that will let you use your laptop of PC as a wifi router. Handy!

Oracle’s VirtualBox has been updated to version 5. Among other things it has better drag and drop support as well as support for USB 3.0 devices. Nice! You can grab it at the official VirtualBox site.

So it looks like the U.S. has exhausted their supply of IPv4 addresses. Time to get more interested in IPv6…

Things are about to get all draconian, so it’s time to start ensuring you can carry on as usual. Torrentfreak have done a fairly solid job of reviewing several VPN service providers to find out which ones value your privacy and which ones will roll over and rat you out for watching Game Of Thrones without the ads.

Just in case you’ve been living under a rock: it’s become horribly apparent that Sourceforge, once a great home to FOSS projects (and thus a great resource for FOSS tools) can no longer be trusted. There have been some great writeups by large projects like the Gimp; here’s a wrap up from howtogeek that is nice and easy to read.

Google cardboard is a low-tech way to get into VR using only your Android phone and…. carboard. This post on reddit is an excellent introduction; for less than $2 you too can get vertigo wherever you sit!