Homewood Detective Sgt. Bernie Hogancamp had little to go on in the May 1 theft of eight computers from a local mortgage company. The pros who pulled it off left no clues, and it looked like the machines would never be recovered.
Then, 14 weeks later, one of the computers phoned to say where it was.
The company was using CyberAngel, a security system from Computer Sentry Software Inc. (www.sentryinc.com), which not only blocks access to a computer’s data unless the right password is entered, but notifies CSS of the thief’s location if he tries to connect to the Internet.
Within two minutes, the rightful owner received a fax pinpointing the computer’s location, an office in neighboring Harvey.
A day and a half delay in recovering the equipment, Hogancamp said, was due to the state’s attorney’s office trying to figure out how to obtain the first search warrant in Illinois based on virtual evidence.
AOL MAIL ON THE NET
YOU’VE GOT VERSATILITY
The multimedia mavens at America Online finally have seen fit to let wandering members send and receive e-mail via the Internet rather than making them find a machine already loaded with the 30 megabytes of software needed to run the full-blown AOL service.
Sign up at www.aol.com/netmail for new software that lets one use any Web-connected browser to call up a near-identical version of AOL’s latest e-mail software.
Bugs lurk if you’re trying to do this behind a company’s firewall, but there are instructions for a workaround if the computer priests at your shop are willing to give you a dispensation.
HARDWARE
DOWN, DOWN DOWN
When PCs broke the $1,000 price barrier a year ago, it was a slice of consumer heaven that promised to spread the digital revolution to all income levels. Now it’s really a-chicken-in-every-pot time with the introduction of a $399 desktop machine from Micro Center and a $299 kids’ laptop from Wheeling’s VTech Industries.
VTech’s laptop–called the Equalizer–has a black and white display, comes with word processing, spreadsheet and communications software, and runs for 25 hours on four C batteries (it has an AC adapter for home use). It runs on a proprietary operating system, but VTech says you can use a connector to download documents to a Windows PC. And Canon is coming out with a compatible printer for $139. Both will be sold beginning in September at Toys “R” Us and other such stores.
The Micro Center desktop, the PowerSpec 1810, is Win98 machine with a 180-megahertz Cyrix processor, 24 megabytes of RAM, a 1.6-gigabyte hard disk, a 24X CD-ROM drive and a 33.6 kbps modem. For $100 more you get a 14-inch monitor, and for $599, Micro Center (www.powerspec.com) will provide a complete package with monitor and color inkjet printer.