Miscellaneous – Page 2

Installing an OEM Xbox 360 Wireless Controller Receiver

Not wanting to pay the full retail price for a Microsoft Xbox 360™ Wireless Gaming Receiver for Windows®, I bought a knock-off from eBay. It turns out that you do get what you pay for – the drivers that came on the 80mm Mini CD were very old and didn’t work with Windows 7.

For anyone in a similar situation, here’s what I did to get everything working as it should (thanks are owed to jamesw1 for finding this solution):

Download and install the latest Xbox 360 Accessories Software (version 1.2 at the time of writing).
Plug in the device and open Device Manager (searching in the Start Menu is probably the quickest way to get there). Find your device in the list (it might be listed as an Unknown Device, though mine was labelled correctly), right click it and select ‘Update Driver’. Select ‘Browse my computer for driver software’, then ‘Let me pick from a list of device drivers on my computer’. Pick ‘Microsoft Common Controller for Windows Class’, click ‘Next’, then select ‘Xbox 360 Wireless Receiver for Windows’ and click ‘Next’ again. You will be given an ‘Update Driver Warning’ – click ‘Yes’ (and don’t blame me if your computer and/or controller blow up). That’s all.

Finally, apparently these drivers are recommended for some applications: XInput Force Feedback Driver (XInput 用フォースフィードバックドライバ). You should be able to navigate the Japanese on that page – the platforms and languages are spelled out quite clearly.

Changing the Synaptics ‘ChiralScroll’ Cursor

The Synaptics Gesture Suite enables a variety of useful features for supported laptop touchpads. My favourite is ‘ChiralScroll’, which allows you to scroll by making a circular motion on the touchpad. Synaptics actually offers generic drivers on their website now, so you can download them directly without needing to go via the usual websites.

Unfortunately, the cursor used for ChiralScroll leaves a lot to be desired:

At the very minimum, it doesn’t mesh well with the cursors found in the Windows Aero theme. I decided this would be a better cursor:

I’m misappropriating the ‘Move’ cursor here (a separate metaphor), but I think the image fits with scrolling to some extent. Let me know if you can come up with a better alternative.

Read on for instructions on replacing the cursor.

Continue reading “Changing the Synaptics ‘ChiralScroll’ Cursor”

Default Password for ‘myLGNet’ Wireless Networks

If ever you stumble across a wireless network with the name ‘myLGNet’ and have need to access it, the default password is ‘123456789a’.

Of course, if the network uses only WEP for protection, it shouldn’t be hard to gain access even without that knowledge.

Adventures in Password Security: AirAsia

When I created a user account at AirAsia’s website a little while ago, I was surprised to be told to choose a password with a minimum length of 16 characters*. I suspect that the average user’s password doesn’t approach that length (perhaps it would be better if it did). In any case, I duly typed in my combination of letters and numbers and went about my business, happy to believe that such an onerous requirement said something about AirAsia’s commitment to security.

A month down the track, I went back to the website only to find I’d forgotten which password I had chosen – for whatever reason, my browser had not saved my credentials. After a few guesses, I gave up clicked the ‘Forgot Password’ link (making sure nobody was looking; I must not be the only one embarrassed to have to have to rely on that feature). I typed in my email address and received a message shortly afterwards.

Lo and behold, there was my 17-character password in plain text, staring right at me.

Oh, well – if someone happens to steal their database, at least it won’t be any of my usual passwords that they find – those are shorter than 16 characters 🙂

(*I see that the requirement is now for only 8 characters.)