BBC 198 kHz longwave closure date?

[cc333]

LW beacons in the US?

I've heard one on 405kHz beeping out M O G in Morse Code. As best as I can tell, it's in California somewhere.

c

 

[CTListener]

LW beacons in the US?

I've heard one on 405kHz beeping out M O G in Morse Code. As best as I can tell, it's in California somewhere.

c

It's on the list linked to by Mediafrog. Montague, California, running 50 watts.

 

[K.M. Richards]

It's easy to avoid if you simply keep using what works. For example, I still use Office 2003 because it does everything I need.

That makes two of us. Three, if you count KRKE's owner.

 

[cc333]

That makes two of us. Three, if you count KRKE's owner.

Make that four.

I still use a 2013 MacBook Pro because it still does what I want (albeit slowly), and I still use Windows 7 and XP on occasion to do things that newer versions are overkill for.

To be honest, I'd still be using my old 2009 MacBook Pro or my 2007 white plastic MacBook if I could!

Using older PCs is actually easier.

A few years ago (sometime around 2020 or 2021), I set up my old Pentium 4 PC with Windows 2000 and some open source projects that allow newer software (such as the then-current version of Firefox) to run on the old Windows version.

It was not fast, but it actually worked quite well for a then-18 year old PC running a then-20 year old operating system.

c

 

[fybush]

And here we see the difference between hobbyists and anyone who has to work with professional broadcast software for a living.

In my new professional life selling Myriad software, I've developed a keen understanding for why our company requires Win 10/11 to run our software.

It's already a challenge in a global company to make sure our software provides a consistent and consistently functional experience, 24/7/365, as a mission-critical piece of a radio station. We have to support a wide variety of audio cards and the underlying SQL database that powers our system in a variety of environments depending on what else is running on the same PC or server.

Our small but mighty support team has to be on constant alert for all the ways Microsoft messes with audio settings every time it sends out an update. That's doable when they're only keeping track of current Windows versions that still have MS support. It's an impossible task if they're also charged with keeping an obsolete Win 7 or XP environment functioning.

And that's all assuming the machine that's running 7 or XP is fully and properly air gapped from the public internet. Running either of those versions on anything exposed to the Internet is just begging for malware and infections, and once they get to one machine, they can spread to an entire network.

It's not a security risk any competent IT professional would take in any sort of business environment these days.

 

[DXingRadio]

Is DIW from Dixon, NC still on the air? Caught that way more often on 198 kHz than BBC Radio 4.

 

[Mediafrog+]

Is DIW from Dixon, NC still on the air? Caught that way more often on 198 kHz than BBC Radio 4.

Beacons below 200 kHz are now gone. You can check the link in my post #78 on this thread.

 

[K.M. Richards]

And that's all assuming the machine that's running 7 or XP is fully and properly air gapped from the public internet. Running either of those versions on anything exposed to the Internet is just begging for malware and infections, and once they get to one machine, they can spread to an entire network.

I can speak to how my PC is configured. It runs Win 7 Ultimate (which, as you know, is the 64-bit version). Believe it or not, despite Microsoft swearing up and down that they provide zero support for it, I still get regular database updates for Windows Defender; apparently they kept the malware database in the same format for subsequent versions.

I also scan the machine once a week with a second anti-malware program, just as a precaution.

I have both Windows Firewall and the firewall in my router enabled. I also know better than to click on e-mail attachments coming from anyone I don't know personally and were not expecting to receive. Not only do I laugh at the ineptness of most phishing attempts, I forward them all to the APWG.

And here's another thought that has occurred to me, Scott. Given that so many people buy into the "upgrade because we won't support the old version" that Microsoft has been exploiting for as long as there have been versions of Windows, I suspect the hackers have moved on to the challenge of the newer OS's and could not care less about machines running 7 or XP.

In fact, the only real problem I have is that too many websites are changing their HTML code to meet the new "security protocols" that only the latest and greatest versions of Windows will support, and I can no longer upgrade my version of Firefox to one that makes them happy.

I'm glad you're making money from all this, but I am incensed at the way us legacy users are being abandoned just because we won't play the game. I guarantee you that my machine is every bit as secure as one running Windows 11 -- because I know what I am doing and how to avoid being hacked into -- but try explaining that to the geniuses at Mozilla, who are brainwashed by Microsoft's BS. I already have to resort to downloading some of my financial statements via my phone, which I hate having to do because I consider it to be more vulnerable than my PC.

So thanks for the advice. I find it of little personal value, but maybe you'll keep someone who knows considerably less than I do from getting into trouble. Which would be a good thing.

 

[cc333]

thanks for the advice. I find it of little personal value, but maybe you'll keep someone who knows considerably less than I do from getting into trouble. Which would be a good thing.

What @fybush was explaining are best security practices, and any reputable corporate or educational environment will follow those practices, for better or worse, because that's the way things are.

Small businesses, freelancers and hobbyists, however, generally have some flexibility to run pretty much whatever they want, as long as it does what they need and they can keep it secured and maintained without too much fuss.

That said, I'm pretty much with you.

I also generally run Windows 7 Professional or Ultimate where I can, but I have bought a few Windows 10 IoT Enterprise LTSC licenses (10 IoT E. LTSC is supported until 2032), to see if I could make it work.

It took some doing (did you know that elements of the traditional Classic theme still exist in even the latest versions of Windows 10 and 11? With the proper tweaks, one can make 10 look and feel almost identical to Windows XP or 7), but I did make it work (and as luck would have it, just as I got it working smoothly, the computer's motherboard died. Coincidence? I don't know).

So, I tried out the future, and I think I can live with it, but until I get that computer fixed or replaced, I'm stuck with my old 2nd-gen Intel-based backup, which really runs best on either XP or 7 (I'd run XP, but then most of the software I use wouldn't work because most of it dropped XP support years ago, if it ever had it to begin with).

I suppose I could try running 10 on it to see what would happen. Maybe it'd run better than I think....

c