Networking

Mario downloads music and he wants to know if he'll get sued or arrested for it. Leo says that when he's sharing or downloading, law enforcement doesn't know who he actually is because it's all based on IP addresses. Both the recording industry (RIAA) and the movie industry (MPAA) often have phoney torrents in order to find out what IP addresses are downloading them. Then they have to find out who owns that IP address from the ISP.

Michael wants to back up all his images onto CDs for safe keeping. He used to use Nero, but it doesn't work on Windows 7. Leo says that Windows may be able to burn it natively. He'll want to format the CD and then drag the files onto it. Then he can select "burn," and it'll be done. Leo says he doesn't put stuff on CDs anymore, he uses the Cloud instead. And with Flickr by Yahoo offering 1TB of free image storage, it's a good option. Also, just having one backup isn't really a backup. Backing up to the cloud is a wise idea.

Rob bought an old church and he's remodeling it. He wants to install Ethernet to create a network in home. Leo says that if Rob wants Internet everywhere, the ideal time to lay down ethernet cable is when the walls are open. However, pretty much everything we do now is wireless. For music, he'll want to do wirelessly. A simple Wi-Fi analysis will show him whether Wi-Fi in his home is crowded or not. If it is, then going back to wired connections is a great idea.

Leo says the problem with new routers is that the software has all sorts of security issues. Since this is the first thing on the network, it's important that it be a secure line of defense.

DD-WRT and Tomato are more secure firmware alternatives to what comes on the router by default. These are both open source, very well written, and are kept up to date. So it is a good idea to replace the router's firmware with DD-WRT, if his router supports it.