As holiday season approaches, lots of new sellers are appearing online, especially on EBay and Amazon, listing most popular software for as little as $25 to $200 per copy.  Is the product genuine or counterfeit?  How do you know you are getting best for your buck?

Recently, one of my friend purchased Microsoft Office 2013 Professional from a seller on EBay. Prior to purchasing this product, she emailed close to dozen sellers about authenticity of their product and only few responded back to her inquiry.  Listing on EBay suggested that seller was based in US and product was based in US as well.  Once purchase was finalized, to her surprise, tracking number posted with purchase was for carrier in China and it would take 10 days to arrive.  Upon inquiring with seller, come to find out that even though seller posted content was based in US, it was being shipped from their warehouse in China which did not make sense.  This means seller was falsifying information.

Seller assured that product was authentic and no need to verify with software giant Microsoft.  Microsoft Office 2013 Professional arrived on 10th day as listing suggested.  Click on Read More below to read entire article...

Recently, in my lab environment, I upgraded IOS on cisco 1841 router from version 12.X to 15.X. After upgrade, I lost SSL VPN access and started receiving following vague error message…

“The secure gateway has rejected the connection attempt. A new connection attempt to the same or another secure gateway is needed, which requires re-authentication. The following message was received from the secure gateway: No assigned address”

"AnyConnect was not able to establish a connection to the specified secure gateway. Please try connecting again."

After researching, issue turned out to be SSL VPN Address Pool.  Apparently, after IOS upgrade, SSL Pool statement was removed upon reload.  Below is Cisco Bug reference: CSCtx92190

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On July 29th 2015, Microsoft launched its latest weapon out of arsenal, Windows 10, globally to public.  As this new operating system being pushed out to current registered users of Windows 7 and 8 via windows update, there are some lingering issues on privacy with past and current operating systems and how far Microsoft is going to collect information from end users.  More...

If you are current users of Windows 7 and 8, here are some recommendations…

1. Uninstall and hide following recommended updates from your computer.

Windows 7 users, left click on "Start" button, Open "Control Panel", Double click on "Programs and Features", click on "view installed updates" on left tool bar.  Search for following installed updates (KB3068708, KB3022345, KB3075249, KB3080149) and uninstall them.

Windows 8 users, right click on "Start" button, Open "Control Panel", Double click on "Programs and Features", click on "view installed updates" on left tool bar.  Search for following installed updates (KB3068708, KB3022345, KB3075249, KB3080149) and uninstall them.

Next time these updates appears under recommended updates, right click and hide them.

https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3068708
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3075249
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3080149
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/kb/3022345

2. Add exception to host file to prevent following URL from communicating with Microsoft.
    vortex-win.data.microsoft.com
    settings-win.data.microsoft.com
More...

If you are Windows 10 users, adjust/turn-off "Privacy Settings"... More...

As wireless technology emerges and thing are getting faster, cisco Aironet 1130 series access points are still cost effective and reliable alternative. Cisco Aironet 1130AG Series IEEE 802.11a/b/g access points provide high-capacity, high-security, enterprise-class features in an unobtrusive, office-class design, delivering WLAN access with the lowest total cost of ownership.  With high-performing dual IEEE 802.11a and 802.11g radios, the Cisco Aironet 1130AG Series provides a combined capacity of up to 108 Mbps to meet the needs of growing WLANs.  More...

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Inter-Vlan routing is a process of forwarding network traffic between VLANs using layer 3 device or a router.  Compared to conventional software based routers, Layer 3 switch routers process more packets faster by using high-speed ASIC hardware instead of microprocessor-based engines.  In today's networking, as layer 3 switches are becoming more powerful and affordable, more enterprises are using layer 3 switches to perform Inter-Vlan routing while router will continue to route WAN traffic.  If you are considering implementing multiple Vlans or need for better performance and security within your current network, you will need layer 3 device or a router.

In my Inter-Vlan routing video, I am using ROAS (Router on a stick) to perform Inter-Vlan routing. This scenario works best for small to medium business where funds are limited but security is still a concerned.

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Much like Windows XP and Office 2003 became end of life last year, clock is ticking for Windows Server 2003 product line.  Microsoft announced end of support for Windows Server 2003 last year.  This means after July 14th, 2015, Microsoft will no longer release weekly security updates and patches for Windows server 2003 via Windows Update.  Also, Microsoft will no longer offer paid or free support.  User can continue to use Windows Server 2003 product line on their own risk but as time goes by, your system is more susceptible to security risk.  Attacker may exploit existing or new vanurability and figure out what problems the patches fixed and then launch attacks against unpatched systems which leads to down time.

Needless to say, majority of business neglect to migrate from older system while support is still available resulting in last minute risky migration.

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Is it better to dual boot or virtualize? That would depend on your need. My personal opinion is to virtualize. Advantage of virtualize is that you can run multiple systems at same time without having to buy additional hardware. I am a big fan of open source product and VirtualBox is one of them. VirtualBox is feature rich and high performance product for general home use or in business environment.

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As time goes by and popularity to Linux system increases, I've decided to create a video on how to install Ubuntu 12.04. This video is design to guide user on installing user friendly and absolutly free operating system.  Even though, this operating system is completely free, I do encourage people to consider donating whatever you can.  You can download Ubuntu from link provided below.

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What does this mean for user?

Last year, Microsoft announced end of support for Windows XP and Office 2003 product line.  This means that after April 8th, 2014, Microsoft will no longer release weekly security updates and patches for Windows XP and Office 2003 via Windows Update.  Also, Microsoft will no longer offer paid or free support for either products.  User can continue to use both products on their own risk but as time goes by, your system is more susceptible to security risk.  Attacker may exploit existing or new vanurability and figure out what problems the patches fixed and then launch attacks against unpatched systems.  This also means that Windows XP users are more susceptible to adware, spayware, viruses, trojan horses, and worms.

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