Former Google employee Sanmay Ved

Google, after losing and regaining ownership of Google.com, paid some amount of cash last fall. Now the company has revealed how much the slip-up cost.

Former Google employee Sanmay Ved purchased Google.com for $12 at 1:20 a.m. ET on September 29. He bought the domain name on the Google Domains registration service website after the company somehow lost ownership of it.

He owned Google.com for one minute. The transaction was reversed when Google sent Ved a cancellation order, which returned ownership to the company.

Conflicts over domain ownership aren't always settled amicably or cheaply. So-called domain squatters often try to get ahead of potential, hypothetical products and register domain names with the hopes of netting a big sale to the company that needs the site.

In this case, it seems Google may have missed a deadline to renew Google.com, creating an opportunity for someone to slip in and nab it. Neither Google nor Ved has publicly revealed exactly how the domain name became available.

In a security blog post, the company revealed that it wanted to give Ved $6,006.13. which ironically looks closely like the word google(600613) -- in numbers. smart isn't it?

Google doubled that offer after Ved said he would donate the money to charity, both the company and Ved neither specified the exact figures afterwards.

Google's payout ended up going to the Art of Living India foundation, which runs free schools for children in poverty-stricken areas of India.

Ved, whose LinkedIn account describes him as an MBA candidate at Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, detailed the incident in a post there last fall. He noted that Google was able to reverse the transaction because it owned the Google Domains registration service.

Meanwhile.........

Microsoft bumped into a similar issue in 2003 when it lost ownership of the Hotmail.co.uk website, The Register reported at the time. The software giant failed to cancel the transaction. However, the person who bought the domain name returned it the same day.

Windows 10's user share passed the 13% milestone last month, with a month-over-month growth spurt second only to August's explosive increase. 

 Credit: Net Applications

Windows 10's user share jumped in January by its second-largest one-month increase since its launch, data from analytic vendor Net Applications showed yesterday.

At the mid-point of its first year, Windows 10 powered approximately 196 million systems. Microsoft's current claim of 200 million machines was made in early January.

The jump in user share, an estimate of the portion of all personal computers worldwide that ran the OS was an impressive 1.9 percentage points, second only to the 4.8-point gain that Windows 10 recorded in August, the first full month of availability. January's increase was almost double that of December's.

While Net Applications does not attribute cause to an operating system's changes in user share, one obvious explanation for Windows 10's growth would be from recently purchased new devices that were put into service in January. Those new PCs replaced Windows 7 systems for the most part: The 2009 stalwart's user share plunged 3.2 percentage points to 52.5%, the largest one-month decline in Net Applications' tracking, which goes back to the operating system's 2009 launch.

Windows 10 accounted for 11.9% of all personal computer OSes and ran 13.1% of all Windows devices: The second number is higher because Windows powered 90.6%, not 100%, of all systems tallied by Net Applications.

The 13.1% mark of Windows 10 meant that the new edition had not yet supplanted Windows 8/8.1 as the second-most-popular version of Microsoft's OS. Windows 8/8.1's combined user share in January was 14.5% of all Windows devices.

Another data source, Ireland's StatCounter also showed that Windows 10's growth increased in January. StatCounter, which tracks global usage share, a proxy for activity rather than users, pegged Windows 10 at 13.7% for December, a 1.8-point gain. That was the largest single-month increase since September, when StatCounter booked Windows 10's growth at 2.3 percentage points.

Windows 10's resurrected growth put the new operating system slightly ahead of the pace that Windows 7 exhibited after its first six months on the market, according to Net Applications. Windows 7 had accumulated a 12.8% share of all Windows PCs through its sixth full month.

With about 200 million PCs running Windows 10, Microsoft is one-fifth of the way toward meeting its self-set goal of putting the OS on a billion devices by mid-2018.

Still presumably to come: Microsoft; three months ago said it would begin to automatically serve the Windows 10 upgrade to most consumer and small business Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 PCs in early 2016. While Microsoft outlined the plan in late October and at the time said the two-part scheme would kick off "soon" by adding the Windows 10 upgrade as an optional item to Windows Update, the precursor to listing the upgrade as an automatic download by all evidence neither step has yet been taken.

After many years using android phones, I decided to switch to iphone. While I must admit that the 
experience of using an android phone is immerse but I've come to appreciate what a great job apple has 
done. There are a lot of differences but the key ones are listed below

1. The iphone user interface is much more polished. For example, when I type on the iphone, it 
shows the letter I am trying to type more often, even though the screen is smaller, am guessing 
this is better software at work

2. The iphone app ecosystem is markedly better. Google play and the apple app store both have 
about 1 million apps, and most major apps are available for both platforms but new apps and 
updates comes out first on iphone

3. IOS is stronger at the technical detail level. E.g., when you use an Iphone with a car, Bluetooth 
streaming audio works properly, you can control which contacts get synched to the car over 
Bluetooth, and if you have both Bluetooth and a wired connection to the car active, the iphone 
smartly sends phone audio over Bluetooth and streaming media audio over the wire, so both 
work. (In fact, google experience Android gets this right too but the Samsung user interface 
breaks it.). This might be fixed by an upgrade

4. The iphone camera is just the best, beautiful pictures and great features like high dynamic 
range, which both compensates for some limitations of simple cameras, and can create 
attractive images that reminds me of a painting.


Although android phones has got some good qualities too, lets look at some of them

1. Durability: I always notice that people with iphones often have there screen broken or worse, the 
reason is because iphone is shrouded in glass compare this to phones like Samsung galaxy note 3 
which can drop 30 times with no issue, no crack.

2. Cross platform nature makes it more flexible:  Apple IOS is fairly hostile when it comes to other 
platforms and requires developers and companies to submit an application for a service they 
want added to its OS, so it can be vetted first. The firm has a very strict policy that forces 
developers to play by its rules if they hope to get any software onto IOS

3. Multiple prices for devices: With so many manufacturers using Android there is a huge 
opportunity to differentiate on price. This means you can get good quality device without 
weeping as u pay for it.

What are you experiences? Let us know in the comment box below.

5 Fatal OE exceptions and VXD errors

Fatal OE exception errors and VXD errors are often caused by video card problems.

These can often be resolved easily by reducing the resolution of the video display. Go to

* Start-Settings-Control Panel-Display-Settings

Here you should slide the screen area bar to the left. Take a look at the colour settings on the left of that window. For most desktops, high colour 16-bit depth is adequate.

If the screen freezes or you experience system lockups it might be due to the video card. Make sure it does not have a hardware conflict. Go to

* Start-Settings-Control Panel-System-Device Manager

Here, select the + beside Display Adapter. A line of text describing your video card should appear. Select it (make it blue) and press properties. Then select Resources and select each line in the window. Look for a message that says No Conflicts.

If you have video card hardware conflict, you will see it here. Be careful at this point and make a note of everything you do in case you make things worse.

The way to resolve a hardware conflict is to uncheck the Use Automatic Settings box and hit the Change Settings button. You are searching for a setting that will display a No Conflicts message.

Another useful way to resolve video problems is to go to

* Start-Settings-Control Panel-System-Performance-Graphics

Here you should move the Hardware Acceleration slider to the left. As ever, the most common cause of problems relating to graphics cards is old or faulty drivers (a driver is a small piece of software used by a computer to communicate with a device).

Look up your video card's manufacturer on the internet and search for the most recent drivers for it.

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4 Hard disk drives

After a few weeks, the information on a hard disk drive starts to become piecemeal or fragmented. It is a good idea to defragment the hard disk every week or so, to prevent the disk from causing a screen freeze. Go to

* Start-Programs-Accessories-System Tools-Disk Defragmenter

This will start the procedure. You will be unable to write data to the hard drive (to save it) while the disk is defragmenting, so it is a good idea to schedule the procedure for a period of inactivity using the Task Scheduler.

The Task Scheduler should be one of the small icons on the bottom right of the Windows opening page (the desktop).

Some lockups and screen freezes caused by hard disk problems can be solved by reducing the read-ahead optimisation. This can be adjusted by going to

* Start-Settings-Control Panel-System Icon-Performance-File System-Hard Disk.

Hard disks will slow down and crash if they are too full. Do some housekeeping on your hard drive every few months and free some space on it. Open the Windows folder on the C drive and find the Temporary Internet Files folder. Deleting the contents (not the folder) can free a lot of space.

Empty the Recycle Bin every week to free more space. Hard disk drives should be scanned every week for errors or bad sectors. Go to

* Start-Programs-Accessories-System Tools-ScanDisk

Otherwise assign the Task Scheduler to perform this operation at night when the computer is not in use.

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2 Bad Ram
Ram (random-access memory) problems might bring on the blue screen of death with a message saying Fatal Exception Error. A fatal error indicates a serious hardware problem. Sometimes it may mean a part is damaged and will need replacing.

But a fatal error caused by Ram might be caused by a mismatch of chips. For example, mixing 70-nanosecond (70ns) Ram with 60ns Ram will usually force the computer to run all the Ram at the slower speed. This will often crash the machine if the Ram is overworked.

One way around this problem is to enter the BIOS settings and increase the wait state of the Ram. This can make it more stable. Another way to troubleshoot a suspected Ram problem is to rearrange the Ram chips on the motherboard, or take some of them out. Then try to repeat the circumstances that caused the crash. When handling Ram try not to touch the gold connections, as they can be easily damaged.

Parity error messages also refer to Ram. Modern Ram chips are either parity (ECC) or non parity (non-ECC). It is best not to mix the two types, as this can be a cause of trouble.

EMM386 error messages refer to memory problems but may not be connected to bad Ram. This may be due to free memory problems often linked to old Dos-based programmes.

3 BIOS settings


Every motherboard is supplied with a range of chipset settings that are decided in the factory. A common way to access these settings is to press the F2 or delete button during the first few seconds of a boot-up.

Once inside the BIOS, great care should be taken. It is a good idea to write down on a piece of paper all the settings that appear on the screen. That way, if you change something and the computer becomes more unstable, you will know what settings to revert to.

A common BIOS error concerns the CAS latency. This refers to the Ram. Older EDO (extended data out) Ram has a CAS latency of 3. Newer SDRam has a CAS latency of 2. Setting the wrong figure can cause the Ram to lock up and freeze the computer's display.

Mcft Windows is better at allocating IRQ numbers than any BIOS. If possible set the IRQ numbers to Auto in the BIOS. This will allow Windows to allocate the IRQ numbers (make sure the BIOS setting for Plug and Play OS is switched to 'yes' to allow Windows to do this.).




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Fatal error: the system has become unstable or is busy," it says. "Enter to return to Windows or press Control-Alt-Delete to restart your computer. If you do this you will lose any unsaved information in all open applications."

You have just been struck by the Blue Screen of Death. Anyone who uses Mcft Windows will be familiar with this. What can you do? More importantly, how can you prevent it happening?

1 Hardware conflict

The number one reason why Windows crashes is hardware conflict. Each hardware device communicates to other devices through an interrupt request channel (IRQ). These are supposed to be unique for each device.

For example, a printer usually connects internally on IRQ 7. The keyboard usually uses IRQ 1 and the floppy disk drive IRQ 6. Each device will try to hog a single IRQ for itself.

If there are a lot of devices, or if they are not installed properly, two of them may end up sharing the same IRQ number. When the user tries to use both devices at the same time, a crash can happen. The way to check if your computer has a hardware conflict is through the following route:


* Start-Settings-Control Panel-System-Device Manager.
Often if a device has a problem a yellow '!' appears next to its description in the Device Manager. Highlight Computer (in the Device Manager) and press Properties to see the IRQ numbers used by your computer. If the IRQ number appears twice, two devices may be using it.

Sometimes a device might share an IRQ with something described as 'IRQ holder for PCI steering'. This can be ignored. The best way to fix this problem is to remove the problem device and reinstall it.

Sometimes you may have to find more recent drivers on the internet to make the device function properly. A good resource is www.driverguide.com. If the device is a soundcard, or a modem, it can often be fixed by moving it to a different slot on the motherboard (be careful about opening your computer, as you may void the warranty).

When working inside a computer you should switch it off, unplug the mains lead and touch an unpainted metal surface to discharge any static electricity.

To be fair to Mcft, the problem with IRQ numbers is not of its making. It is a legacy problem going back to the first PC designs using the IBM 8086 chip. Initially there were only eight IRQs. Today there are 16 IRQs in a PC. It is easy to run out of them. There are plans to increase the number of IRQs in future designs.

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