Incredibly Japan is split by a 50 Hz/60 Hz incompatibility. The West based its power generation on 60 Hz American standards while the East uses ‘European’ 50 Hz. [...]]]> Despite the West of Japan having a power surplus it can’t help the East, which is short if power thanks to the post-tsunami nuclear power problems.

Incredibly Japan is split by a 50 Hz/60 Hz incompatibility. The West based its power generation on 60 Hz American standards while the East uses ‘European’ 50 Hz. There are few interconnects and they can handle little power.

Neither choice explain Japan’s unique decision to standardize on 100 volt power rather than US 110 or EU 240 volts.

To add a new search provider, simply click on the link below and [...]]]> Microsoft seem to have been making it harder to personalise the search engines used by the IE search box. There is a process for adding any search engine but it doesn’t seem to be as easy to find as it once was.

To add a new search provider, simply click on the link below and follow the instructions:

http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/searchguide/en-uk/default.mspx?dcsref=http://runonce.msn.com/runonce2.aspx

You can make any search engine the default option when it is added – by ticking the ‘make default’ box - or by the following process:

Click the little arrow by the search box and choose ‘Manage Search Providers’

Clicking on your chosen search provider

Then finally click the ‘Set as default’ button

Happy searching!

While the lack of a 3G product price may be down to negotiations with [...]]]> Apple have still not announced details of UK iPad pricing despite the fact that the product is due to launch this month. Apple’s website currently says the WiFi iPad will be available in ‘late March’ with the 3G product following in April.

While the lack of a 3G product price may be down to negotiations with mobile networks there seems little reason for Apple not to have announced a UK price for the Wifi version. Perhaps they are counting up the US pre-orders to see if they can make the next price-break…

There is another secret Apple are keeping from us – how did they author the iPad product announcement page so badly that it slows even faster computers to a crawl? Whatever you do, don’t bother looking at it with a puny Atom powered netbook or you’ll be there forever.

It is possible to restore the program to its rightful place but [...]]]> Due to a foul-up by securty firm Symantec, users of Norton anti-virus products found that Spotify had mysteriously stopped working today. The reason was that the security product had falsely identified the program – Spotify.exe – as a Trojan Horse and quarantined it.

It is possible to restore the program to its rightful place but it is a bit of a pain. Note that there is some risk in doing so as the law of averages means that some people with compromised PCs may have copies of the program that are infected by a Trojan, and this could include you. Anti-virus programs would normally attempt to clean the original program by removing the Trojan from it, warning if this is impossible. In our case Spotify.exe had itself been mis-identified as a Trojan, so it was safe to restore.

Norton’s official advice is to reinstall Spotify but ‘free’ users who don’t have the install files or their registration details may find it is no longer possible to register for the free version of Spotify. (Premium users can invite up to 10 friends to register for the free service.)

To restore the spotify.exe, simply follow these steps. Note that you need to wait until Norton have fixed the problem and your antivirus has been updated or it will simply quarantine the file again:

1. Double-click on the Norton icon in your System Tray (the bar on the bottom right hand corner of your screen, next to the clock)
2. Click on Quarantine. You should now see a list of Security History events that resulted in a file being quarantined
3. Near or at the top will be a message that a Trojan Horse has been removed, click on this so it is highlighted
4. Now click on the More Details button at bottom right
5. You should now be looking at a Security History Alert Summary saying “Trojan horse detected by Auto-Protect”
6. Clicking on the underlined words Risk Details will open a new window. Clicking on the Details tab should show that the supposed Trojan is spotify.exe. (If it doesn’t, go back to the Security history and lok for another Trojan removal event.) You can now close this window
7. Back in the Security history window, the final step is to click on the Restore button on the right

You should now see a screen a bit like this:

And you should now find that normal Spotify service is fully restored.

Here is the [...]]]> So, Steve Jobs of Apple announced their new tablet product today. The fact that it features on the US Apple website but not on the UK site is probably not good news for the UK’s early adopters. Rumours are June/July but I wouldn’t hold your breath. The product itself is…hmmm… interesting.

Here is the spec of the $499 basic model – essentially an iPod Touch on steroids: