Free Range Geeks

We have a nice HP ZBook Firefly for sale. It could be just what you need. Firefly is HP's small, light, road warrior notebook. This model has an 11th gen i7, 16GB RAM, and 256GB NVMe storage, Thunderbolt, and a 14" FHD display. This model is a little special, it arrived completely air gapped. No networking, no Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. We've added a tiny dual band USB Wi-Fi adapter. Included is HP's 3 year CarePack warranty with ADP through January 11, 2025. It's fresh with Windows 10 Pro but will upgrade to 11 if you let it. It's a long ad to be sure but many questions are answered. $1254 plus tax is the last answer.

We've been rolling out security updates to the Wi-Fi access points we manage. These updates address the Wi-Fi WPA2 vulnerability, KRACK. Our vendor UniFi released security patches on October 16th. We always keep security updated. We don’t always tell everyone…

The Password Conundrum
We've said for years (possibly decades) that frequent password changes don't necessarily make systems more secure. Now the National Institute of Standards and Technology has issued draft recommendations encouraging longer passphrases, rather than passwords, and doing away with frustratingly or ridiculously frequent forced changes. (Anyone installed Quickbooks 2016 recently?) We have liked long, easy to remember phrases and 2-step/2-factor authentication for a long time. Read more about the whys and hows here: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2016/08/11/theres-a-new-way-to-make-strong-passwords-and-its-way-easier/
(Thanks to Matt Young for sending this our way!)

There’s a new way to make strong passwords, and it’s way easier The days of P@s5word rage might be coming to end,

Ting becomes even more affordable
Ting, our favorite mobile carrier, last week dropped their data prices even further. Visit frg.ting.com and get a $25 service credit to boot, just because you know us!

https://ting.com/blog/ting-drops-data-prices-to-10-gb-beyond-the-first-gig/
http://freerangegeeks.com

Google is looking to test wireless fiber internet service
Can you guess what city is on the initial list of 12?

http://phandroid.com/2016/08/11/google-fiber-wireless-testing-locations/
http://freerangegeeks.com

Calling all photograpers and pixel peepers!
Google announced they have made the Nik Collection of photographic tools free to download for everyone. The tools are widely used by pros and amateurs alike for simple and precise photo editing. Visit the Nik Collection web site to learn more and get your free download today!
https://www.google.com/nikcollection/