Lock up your networks!

No one likes it when other people leech onto their open WiFi signal to do things like download large files which tie up bandwidth and slow browsing speeds. So many folks already secure their home wireless networks. Yet most of us at one time or another have probably been guilty of accessing an open WiFi network somewhere without the owner's permission. After all, we NEED to check our email, and it isn't really hurting anyone, is it?

Well, now you may expect even more people to begin securing their home or office WiFi. Why? A court in Germany has ruled that the owner of a WiFi network was responsible for illegal activities conducted over his network, even though he didn't even know what was happening.

Yes, that's in Germany and this is the USA. But often times in cases without precedent, judges look to examples from outside the country to see how similar cases have been decided.

Here's some more information about the German case.

New Product: Senao/EnGenius EUB-9701EXT2 Wireless USB Adapter with DUAL SMA ports

At Rokland we never stop looking for the newest and greatest wireless equipment for our customers. And we don't stop negotiating with suppliers and manufacturers until we can bring you this technology at an affordable price. We are excited to be offering the newest long range wireless product from Senao/EnGenius- the EUB-9701EXT2. This is a new wireless USB adapter that is 802.11n draft compatible and also features not one but TWO external SMA antenna connectors.

Senao/EnGenius is a name folks have come to trust in wireless networking going back to the launch of the NL-2511CD PLUS EXT2 PCMCIA card years back, one of the first WiFi PCMCIA cards to feature dual antenna connectors. Now they have launched the EUB-9701EXT2, one of the first WiFi USB adapters to feature dual antenna connectors. But the best part is, as noted above, this is an 802.11n draft compatible adapter, so when used with an 802.11n draft router, you can achieve speeds up to 300 mbps (that's almost 6 TIMES speeds you get with standard 802.11g devices) and markedly increased range as well.

Click here to view the item on our web site and see more details about the product and some pictures as well.

The value of the admin password...

A helpful tip for those in the market for a used Apple Macintosh computer. Whether you are buying from a retailer or individual seller on eBay, be sure to ask if the seller knows the computer's admin password before buying.

The admin password is needed on most all Macs to install a number of hardware devices including wireless adapters. You will be prompted for this information during the installation process, and if you do not have it, the only way you can reset it is with the Mac OS installation disk (which is usually not included with used computers). If the seller is the first and only owner of the system they should be able to provide you with the information. If the seller is a retailer of many Mac systems, if they do not know the password they should be able to reset it for you using an install disk before shipping your system.

FireFox visits exceed 30%

While the official market share numbers for Mozilla's open source FireFox web browser stand somewhere around 19-21%, we have noticed an interesting trend in visitors to our own web site Rokland.com.

Vistors using a version of FireFox have constituted 31% of our total page visits going back to March. There seems to be steady growth as well- the numbers have climbed each month to a peak of 33.6% so far for July.

While analysts expect FireFox's share to continue to grow vs. Microsoft's Internet Explorer (which stands globally at about 74%), the question is, will it ever become more popular?