I often get asked by my less "geeky" friends on a easy-to-setup easy-to-use method of establishing a secure connection between two (or more) computers on the internet. The purpose of having such a connection ranges from simply sharing files, controlling a remote computer and even having a virtual LAN to connect together a geographically scattered community. I usually have a simple one word answer for all such queries: Hamachi.

Hamachi is a zero-configuration Virtual Private Networking (VPN) application that uses its own central server with encrypted communications. The software isn't open-source, it's method of encryption has a few unanswered questions and it relies on a central server beyond one's control, however, despite all that it admittedly is a very elegant solution to the traditional VPN. The ease of setup, the ease of use and its ability to work with NAT'ed connections render it a very attractive solution for use by anyone. Best of all, software is a free download of around 800Kb in size!

Once logged into the Hamachi network using the software, we can create our own virtual named networks that individual nodes can access by typing in the name of the network - quite similar to joining a channel in an IRC network. The virtual networks can have password protection so as to restrict access to known persons only. The application comes with its own chat facility allowing the user to strike up a chat with anyone on the Hamachi virtual network. The application is also configured to allow browsing another user's computer via Windows File Sharing/SMB - as per access restrictions of course. The neat thing here being that you can have File Sharing disabled for the Internet connection yet have it enabled for the Hamachi connection.

My PC at home in Male' is behind a NAT but is easily reachable via the Hamachi network that it automatically joins on whenever it is switched on. The Hamachi central servers rid me of the burden of having my own server as is required by standard VPN systems. The connection speeds on the Hamachi network is decent enough for most purposes including VNC use. This is an ideal solution for all those of you who want to create a virtual network to pool together all the friends and/or family or simply want to make your alternative PC easily accessible wherever you are...

The main Hamachi website is at http://www.hamachi.cc/. There is a handy guide on setting up Hamachi for optimal use at http://www.itsatechworld.com/2006/01/17/hamachi-vpn-solution/

Enjoy

DVDs carry something called a Region-Lock. It is a restriction that prevents DVDs marked as a particular region from being run on a DVD drive set for another region. This isn't usually a problem - as long as the DVDs are set to the same region as the drive or the DVDs aren't region locked at all. However, the problem starts to arise if you have a laptop that you carry around in your travels and want to play movie DVDs from the various "regions". It will also be problematic if you have movie or game DVDs bought from another region in the world and it happens to differ from the region your DVD drive is set to.

Most of the computer DVD drives also carry this restriction. If you inspect the properties of your DVD drive, chances are it is set to a particular region - the region/country you reside though normally you wouldn't even be aware of this setting if you haven't encountered a region locked DVD. The older generation of DVD drives had something called RPC-1 (Regional Playback Control). RPC-1 leaves the enforcement of the region lockout up to the particular media player you run on the computer. This is quite easy to bypass and so the newer DVD drives all carry RPC-2. RPC-2 drives enforce the region locking by themselves and don't leave it up to the player software. The drives usually allow a maximum of 5 changes to its regional setting. So if you had a DVD marked as US and changed your drive to US region and then changed it again to play a DVD from Australia and then so on till finally you've used up the five allowed changes, then the drive becomes locked to the last region you set to. That means DVDs from all other regions are unplayable!

Thankfully, there are workarounds and software devised by a sneaky smart bunch of people who don't like this restriction. One of the more popular methods is to use a software called DVD Region+CSS Free. It acts as a layer between the DVD drive and the player software to allow playback without the RPC-2 hassle coming into effect. Sadly, the software isn't free. I prefer the next available method - known as firmware flashing. Firmware flashing involves installing a "patched" firmware for the DVD drive that revert the drive to a RPC-1 drive. Firmware is software that runs on chips inside the DVD drive and work independent of the computer the drive is installed on. Thus, firmware flashing leaves the drive as a RPC-1 even all on its own and gets rid of the need to install special software like DVD Region Free. However, I must note that firmware flashing isn't the end of it all - you still need special software even for RPC-1 drives to make it work smoothly. A software to do just this, called DVD Genie, is available for free and is a small download.

If you are keen to get your DVD drive flashed to RPC-1, head over to www.rpc1.org where they have listings of patched firmware for the various manufacturers and drive models. A bit of warning though, firmware flashing CAN leave your drive dead as a brick if done incorrectly. So read up and double check before going through with it. The RPC1.org site has excellent information guides and an active forum where there have been many questions clarified and problems solved - READ IT!

Enjoy!