On disabling voicemail on the iPhone

If Steve Jobs says the iPhone comes with Visual Voicemail, the iPhone really comes with Visual Voicemail. We simple users of the device don't get to disable it. That is unfortunate for those of us who travel internationally, because voicemail is really expensive when roaming abroad. The problem is that phone networks are also really dumb. All calls have to go through your home country, where they're forwarded to the roaming network, incurring international charges. Then, when the roaming network decides your call needs to go to voicemail, it sends the call back to you home network—incurring international charges a second time. You would normally call your voicemail box for the hat trick, and most of the time, the message is "Can you call me back?" or, after a long story, "I'll just e-mail you." (Can you tell that I'm not a big fan of voicemail?)

With Visual Voicemail, the first two steps and the last one are the same, but the good part is that you normally don't have to call voicemail: it's delivered to your iPhone where you can admire it in full visual glory. It turns out that the iPhone downloads voicemail messages over its 3G (or 2G) data connection, but not over WiFi. So, when I was in Dublin (where I turned off 3G data roaming to avoid the insane data roaming fees), I was presented with a badge on my phone icon that told me I had a message. But because the iPhone couldn't, well, phone home, it couldn't download the message—or even tell me how many messages I had. The badge was just a sad, empty circle. Strange.

However, if I had investigated a bit more, I would have known that even though the iPhone GUI doesn't let you disable voicemail, you can do this using industry standard GSM codes. If you look here or here you can find long lists of these codes. Experimenting with these codes shouldn't be harmful, except for one thing: you may "unregister" your voicemail forwarding in a way that it's not possible to manually enable it again unless you know the number. (The iPhone will probably do this for you if you restore it, but I didn't test this.)

The first thing you want to do is discover the number of your voicemail box. You can do this by typing *#61# and pressing "call." The iPhone will now tell you if voicemail is enabled and the number of your voicemail box. Copy down this number and keep it in a safe place.

Now that you know your voicemail box number, you should be able to forward all calls to it using Settings - Phone - Call Forwarding. This is—among other things—useful when roaming internationally: because this type of forwarding isn't conditional, the incoming calls don't have to go through the network where you're roaming, saving you a lot of money. (This is all in theory, and your milage may vary.) However, this didn't work for me. In fact, I was unable to set up call forwarding at all, regardless of the number.

And now, finally, disabling voicemail on the iPhone: type #004# and call. Enabling it again is done with *004# and call. I made two contacts for these numbers and made them favorites, so I can just "call" "VM disable" and "VM enable" from my list of favorites. You can also forward calls to a different number, or selectively enable/disable diverts for no answer (61 rather than 004), not reachable (62), or busy (67), and there are some other tricks as well. See the lists linked above.

Post scriptum: These codes generally work on all GSM-type networks, but there are no guarantees. I asked Jacqui, our fearless editor, to try this on her AT&T iPhone in the US, and it didn't work for her. Deactivation seemed to work, but both the "activate all conditional diverts" (*004#) as well as the individual ones (*61#, *62#, and *67#) resulted in errors. Despite all this, her voicemail kept working. Apparently, AT&T (and other US carriers) don't let their users disable voicemail—the only way to get this done is to call customer service. 

Free Custom iPhone Ringtones using only iTunes

Create free ringtones for your iPhone using only iTunes and songs you already have on your computer (This method only works with songs that are DRM free. To create ringtones using DRM protected songs please use this method). This method has been tested and works with iTunes 7.7.1 and iPhone 2.0.1 firmware.

To create custom ringtones using only iTunes:

1. Right click on the song you are going to make into a ringer and select “Get Info.”


2. Go to the options tab and go down to the “Start Time” and “Stop Time” check boxes. Check both boxes and input the time you want your ringer to start/stop. The ringer has to be 30 seconds or less. Click OK when you’re done.


3. Right click on your newly “clipped” song and select “Convert Selection to AAC.” The song will be re-encoded using the start and stop times determined (If your menu item does not read “Convert Selection to AAC” and reads “Convert Slection to MP3″ (or some other format) please go to iTunes > Preferences > Advanced > Importing and change the “Import Using” drop down menu to “AAC Encoder”).








4. After the song is done encoding navigate to your iTunes Music folder, locate your song, and drag it to your desktop. After the song is on your desktop go back to iTunes and delete the clipped version from you iTunes library (It won’t delete it from your desktop, it will only remove it from iTunes).


5. Go back the song on your desktop and right click on your song and chose “Get info.” Go to the name and extension section and change the extension from .m4a to .m4r (or you can just change the extension right from your desktop)


6. After the extension is changed simply double click on the file to add it to your iTunes library under the ringtones section. Sync your phone with iTunes and you’re done!

Remember to go back into iTunes and uncheck your custom start and stop times for the original version of your song.

Create Ringtones for free with just iTunes

There are a few different ways to create ringtones for your brand new, shiny iPhone. While some bystanders might find the playing of your favorite song annoying, it can quickly inform you to exactly who is calling without taking the phone out of your pocket, purse, or man-bag. For instance whenever Clint Ecker hears the song Gin and Juice, he knows that that it's Ars Technica's Managing Editor Eric Bangeman on the other end, and he can ignore the call accordingly.

The Apple Blog offers a way of creating ringtones sans Garage Band or any other third-party software, and all it requires is an up-to-date copy of iTunes and a little time. It uses the start-stop time feature in the audio file's Get Info area, and requires you to cut the track down to the specific 30 seconds you desire. After that, you just convert the clip to AAC, drop it on your desktop, delete the file from iTunes, change the extension to .m4a or m4r, and then drop it back into iTunes. It's not the easiest process, but at least it is free.

Of course, there are more methods of doing this for free in addition to third-party applications that automate the process for a price. Either way, it's cheaper than paying Apple almost $2 a pop.

AudiKo is by far the best way of creating them. Easy and quick and most of the work is done for you if your fave tune is there anyways.

Over 100 bug fixes baked into Apple's Mac OS X 10.5.5 Update

For the second time in as many weeks, Apple has handed developers a new pre-release build of an upcoming maintenance and security release for Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard and asked that they spend the weekend testing the software.



Mac OS X 10.5.5 build 9F9 comes exactly one week after the Mac maker began widespread testing of Leopard update by privately distributed build 9F5 to its vast developer community.



Since then, the Cupertino-based company has implemented two dozen additional code corrections to bring the total number of bug fixes expected as part of Mac OS X 10.5.5 to more than 100, people familiar with the latest build say.




Among the more notable resolutions were fixes to Address Book printing, out-of-order replies and display problems with Mail app IMAP accounts, and syncing issues with both Address Book and iCal.



Those with knowledge of the ongoing beta test say Apple is also using build 9F9 to broaden developers' focus area from 18 core system components to 24. Some additions from last week's build include Directory Services, Fonts, mDNSResponder, Screen Sharing, and X11.



Unlike the previous build, however, Apple is no longer advising developers to abstain from installing the pre-release software on Macs that include integrated graphics cards.



Mac OS X 10.5.5 is presumed for a release by October, at which point it is expected to ship with support for a new generation of Macs that will include redesigned MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks.

FILE EXTENSIONS NOT SHOWN IN WINDOWS

hey every1.

facing a problem like windows not showing the file extensions of ur files ????
jst chill here r the few ways to c ur xtensions....

1. Now Open My Computer > Go To Tools > Folder Options > View Tab >
Uncheck "Hide Extensions For Know File Types". close folder options
n u r done..


STILL NOT WORKING ??? DN'T FREAK OUT TRY OUT THIS...

2. Go To Start > Run > Copy And Paste this as it is in run.
copy n paste this------>

cmd.exe /c ( reg query "HKCU\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced" /v "HideFileExt" >DH.txt & reg query "HKLM\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced\Folder\HideFileExt" /s >>DH.txt) && start DH.txt

----after u paste the above code hit enter a notepad window will pop up
showing all this...

! REG.EXE VERSION 3.0

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\
Advanced
HideFileExt REG_DWORD 0x1


! REG.EXE VERSION 3.0

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\
Advanced\Folder\HideFileExt
Type REG_SZ checkbox
Text REG_SZ @shell32.dll,-30503
HKeyRoot REG_DWORD 0x80000001
RegPath REG_SZ Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced
ValueName REG_SZ HideFileExt
CheckedValue REG_DWORD 0x1
UncheckedValue REG_DWORD 0x0
DefaultValue REG_DWORD 0x1
HelpID REG_SZ shell.hlp#51101

-----now again Open My Computer > Go To Tools > Folder Options > View Tab >
Uncheck "Hide Extensions For Know File Types". close folder options
n u r done..


3. one more way through the registry

Start > Run > regedit > Navigate To

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\Advanced

On The Right Pane Double Click On "HideFileExt" And Put The Date Value
As 0

Check If Extensions Are Visible !

njoy..

Error Message :Registry Editor Has Been Disabled By Administrator

how to enable registry editor??
If u r getting an error msg like
Registry Editor has been disables by administrator
then here a a few ways to enable REGEDIT.EXE

Many times when working on a computer that has been infected with a virus,
trojan, or piece of spyware I find myself with my most important command,
Regedit, the Windows Registry Editor being disabled. Virus creators
like to disable the Registry Editor so it makes solving the problem
and removing the issue difficult.

Sometimes administrators in IT departments may place restrictions on
using the regedit command to keep employees from changes things on
company computers, but viruses and other issues may also try to disable
it.

Listed below you will find the different ways to enable regedit,
the RegistryEditor.

First we'll begin with the method that appears to work the best.




Method 1 - Enabling the Registry with VBScript


Doug Knox, a Microsoft Most Valuable Professional, has created a VBScript
that enables or disables the Registry Editor based on the following
location in the registry. Of course, since the registry editor is
disabled, you can't change it manually, so Doug wrote a Visual Basic
Script to accomplish the task.


HKey_Current_User\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System\


Visit Doug's page and download Registry Tools VBScript to your desktop, double-click on it to run it, then reboot your computer and try to open the Registry Editor.

If this fix didn't solve your problem, try method two shown below.



Method 2:  Use Symantec's tool to reset shell\open\command registry keys



Sometimes worms and trojans will make changes to the shell\open\command
registry entries as part of their infections. This will cause the virus
to run each time you try to run an .exe file such as the Registry Editor.
In these cases, visit Symantec's website and
download the UnHookExec.inf
file to your desktop. Right-click on it and choose Install. Restart your
computer and then try to open the Registry Editor.


Method 3: Rename Regedit.com to Regedit.exe

Some viruses and other malware will load a regedit.com file that is many
times a zero byte dummy file. Because .com files have preference over
.exe files when executed if you type REGEDIT in the run line, it will
run the regedit.com instead of the real regedit.exe file.

Delete the regedit.com file if its a zero byte file to restore access to REGEDIT. In some cases, such as the W32.Navidad worm, you'll need to rename the REGEDIT file to get it to work.




Method 4: Windows XP Professional and Group Policy Editor

If
you have Windows XP Professional and access to an administrative user
account, you could change the registry editor options in the Group
Policy Editor.

1. Click Start, Run
2. Type GPEDIT.MSC and Press Enter
3. Go to the following location
   
   
   • User Configuration
   • Administrative Templates
   • System
     
4. In the Settings Window, find the option for "Prevent Access to Registry Editing Tools" and double-click on it to change.
5. Select Disabled or Not Configured and choose OK
6. Close the Group Policy Editor and restart your computer
7. Try opening REGEDIT again

Although there are a few other ways, the above ways I have used with great
success in re-enabling the REGEDIT command. If you are interested in
more ways to reactive the REGEDIT command, you may want to visit a site
called Killian's Guide, that goes into more detail on a variety of ways to get the registry editor to work again.

Download free anti virus software - AVG anti-virus free 8.0

From April 24, 2008 AVG is releasing a free version of the popular AVG Anti-Virus. This version (8.0) contains both anti virus and anti spyware and is the best free option available in the market. Unfortunately the free version lacks proactive scanning of browsing links to block malicious URLs (which contain spam/keyloggers).

AVG free offers fast scanning since spyware/antivirus engines are integrated. Another good thing is that it has a low load on the system.  It also comes with safe search - each time you search online, Safe Search checks the results on the fly to give you an immediate idea of which websites are safe to visit.

The limitations of the free version are,

• No real time link scanning.



• This cannot be installed on Windows server versions.


• No technical support

AVG anti-virus free 8.0 can be downloaded from here.