Sweden, America and Green Tech
2007-05-15 11:17:15
I think anything "green" is better than something dirty- of course. I hope it works out, but I wouldn't want to subsidize it with government money as I have a feeling it could be just a "feel good" kind of thing. Any great technology should benefit its users without any needed help. One tech example is when record labels did away with the useless long cardboard cd boxes. They did it on their own.
Remember your first cd?
Read more: Sweden
, America
, Green
Intel comes back against AMD
2007-05-06 21:24:19
Intel charges back, while AMD
slides
By Michelle Kessler, USA TODAY
What a difference a year makes.
Chip giant Intel on Thursday touted a long list of accomplishments at its annual meeting with financial analysts in New York. Costs fell. Profits rose. And a new chip manufacturing technique will give Intel another edge, CEO Paul Otellini boasted.
Across the country in San Jose, Calif., rival Advanced Micro Devices apologized. The most recent quarter, in which AMD lost $611 million, "was a disaster," CEO Hector Ruiz told shareholders at their annual gathering.
It was a near reversal of last year, when AMD was leading the industry with Intel scrambling to catch up. The sudden shift shows how precarious things can be for AMD, which is about one-sixth the size of Intel, says tech analyst Roger Kay at Endpoint Technologies Associates.
"They are big," Ruiz told AMD shareholders. "In some (situations), they have 10 times the resources that we do have."
Intel has always loomed over AMD, w
Read more: Intel
, comes
, against
Essential Programs review-Directory Opus
2007-05-03 04:17:57
Along with a few other utility programs that I'll review
this weekend, Directory
Opus from GP Software occupies the top rung of the "I can't live without this program" (I realize that statement lacks perspective, but you know what I mean) ladder. I've used this program since 2004, but the need for DO increased three-fold when I foolishly switched to Vista, as its file manager broke its own record for "software with the most needlessly difficult user experience" (Do Microsoft programmer's get bonuses for messing up File Explorer?). Anyways, necessity being the mother of invention, the fine people at GP Software made Directory Opus for people who find it necessary to keep themselves sane while using Vista.
Not just a pretty face.
Imagine my disappointment when I discovered that DO didn't work properly with Vista. I still used it, but it couldn't completely replace Windows Explorer. It would do things like open Windows Explorer windows while on the DO directory tree. I checked
Read more: Essential
, Programs
Review Interlink ExpressCard Media Remote for Bluetooth VP6600R
2007-04-28 04:24:34
If you have an express card slot in your laptop, you need this product. First, unless you have a cellular card, you won't be using that express card anytime soon. Almost anything you want will connect through USB or firewire. Second, since almost all of you use your laptop for some kind of entertainment application, a remote is a very convenient addition to your tech gear. Bluetooth
can be added with a USB receiver. If you're buying a new laptop, I recommend buying one with Bluetooth. Not only will it work with the Interlink remote, but you can connect Bluetooth headphones, your phone, mice, keyboards, and all other sort of gear and without adding any external receivers.
The Interlink remote charges in the card slot. All you have to do is just press a couple of buttons and it connects. The major multimedia functions are covered, fast forward and reserve; advance; volume. In addition, you can use the remote to control your Powerpoint presentations. The range is 30 feet and works
Read more: ExpressCard
, Remote
Phone review LG VX8600
2007-04-27 02:38:56
To replace the disappointing Samsung SCH i730, I purchased the excellent LG VX8600 from Verizon direct. It replaced the annoying Razr with its annoying volume issue as well as the Samsung i730 and its overall awkwardness. This is the best phone I’ve ever had.
I liked:
1. The Bluetooth works great.
2. The buttons are even better than the Razr’s which, I have to give it to Motorola, are good as well.
3. It’s very thin.
4. The buttons are easy to navigate.
5. The screen is good.
6. It plays music. With a 1GB micro-SD card, I can play a couple of hours of music. Music cameras should replace a good deal of non-hard disk mp3 players like the Nano. Most people use these to go to the gym or to go jogging. These people also usually take a phone. As Forrest Gump might say, “That’s one less thing.”
7. It connects my laptop to the internet through a cable or through Bluetooth; how convenient is that? I can access the internet from anywhere now
Read more: review
MIcrosoft helps out poor schools
2007-04-24 12:42:33
That's nice of them. Besides, many of the schools in those countries would just pirate it anyways. And, each disk probably costs them $.03. A win-win.
Microsoft Selling Windows XP, Office Suite to Schools for $3
Thursday, April 19, 2007
SEATTLE — Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) said Thursday it will build on existing efforts to bridge the digital divide worldwide and announced several new ventures, including a $3 software package for governments that subsidize student computers.
The software maker said it will sell a Student Innovation Suite, which includes Windows XP Starter Edition and Microsoft Office Home and Student 2007, for $3 to governments that subsidize a certain percentage of the cost of PCs for primary and secondary students for use at home and at school, starting in the second half of the year.
The Redmond-based company also pledged to open 90 new "innovation centers" in countries around the world. Microsoft has already opened 110 of the centers, which offer classes a
Review Samsung SCH-i730/ SCHi740
2007-04-23 03:54:15
Samsung
i730 PDA Phone (Verizon Wireless)
In technology, like in everything else, silver linings often accompany clouds. For the nerd (from what I hear), broken equipment needn’t be a bad thing. If one looks upon electronic tragedies as excuses to upgrade, disasters can be felicitous events.
It’s even better when you don’t have to pay for the upgrade. The best possible scenario occurred recently. My brother drove over his phone and he needed another one. I acted appropriately sorry for his loss, and then offered him my phone saying that, because he’s my brother, I would be willing to go out and purchase another. My phone at the time was a Razr V3c. If anybody has one of these, and who doesn’t, you know that you’ve missed a lot of calls because the darn buttons that control the ring volume are constantly getting pressed by accident. It drove me crazy. Anyways, I was glad to get rid of it. I can say this because my brother rarely reads my blog.
China should be huge computer market.
2007-04-20 03:20:22
Rich people travel. Poor people with money use their computer. China
is in the later category at this moment. I would think computer demand in China will explode in the upcoming years. Too bad Americans only make the processors and the software. And they pirate the software anyways.
Which brings me to a phenomenon I found interesting. World of Warcraft is the most popular MMORG or massive multiplayer something or another. Basically, people assume characters and ally with other players to defeat rival groups. Or, they can solo it (like they must...never mind). Anyways, leveling up characters is a time-consuming endeavor. So, Americans pay these Chinese companies to play their character for them. These Chinese cyber-sweatshops employ many Chinese. What a job!
Oh, back to the article. This weekend, I'll explain why you want a laptop and not a desktop.
A scene from Warcraft
Story below:
=> Read more!
Review Cruzer Micro 2GB Thumb/Flash Drive
2007-04-15 23:58:05
I prefer a thumb drive capable of running applications for three reasons, two having to do with my jobs and one that should apply to anyone who travels. When I wear my teacher hat (we don’t actually wear hats-it’s just a figure of speech), the school, like many institutions, blocks out personal email services like Yahoo and Hotmail. By using a thumb drive, I can use an email program like Thunderbird to download emails from these commercial sites. The Army does the same thing. In addition, sometimes access to the internet is impossible outside of public computers. When I was deployed to Iraq, I used portable Thunderbird to download my personal emails and then read them on my laptop in my room. This idea caught on and Thunderbird became quite popular around FOB Speicher and I became somewhat of a portable application evangelist.
Besides email, having excellent programs like Firefox, Open Office, Roboform, and Gimp photo editor at your disposal can be a lifesaver. Portable
Read more: Thumb
, Flash
, Flash Drive
Cursor flaw gives Vista security a black eye
2007-04-05 04:30:36
There is now officially no advantage whatsoever of Vista
. I find it more problematic than Windows Me. I regret upgrading very much. The only possible advantage is to use Direct X 10 which no current game uses.
=> Read more!
Read more: Cursor
, security
Dell sued over business practices
2007-05-17 14:03:36
This story details some of Dell's business practices. The Asymmetric rule on business law is: Customers should be responsible, but if a company lies, nail them. Unless Dell made it extremely difficult to understand the terms of the agreement, they're not responsible. If a company is bad enough, they'll pay for it eventually through sales declines.
I've been on Dell tech support and they're OK. The Indian reps. are fine. They speak English better than some Americans.
Story below:
=> Read more!
I like my camera phone
2007-05-20 17:39:13
Camera phone
s are pretty darn convenient.
Comparison: Nintendo Wii vs. Sony Playstation 3 vs.Microsoft X-Box 360
2007-05-20 10:13:21
This story has the Wii
beating th other two consoles. Some of my friends bought the Nintendo
Wii as soon as it came out and I thought then that it would be the most successful (honest). The reason was simple: The Nintendo Wii
was the most fun of the three. Not only was it the most fun, but it allowed a whole new group of gamers to play.
Let me explain. I, and I assume millions around the world, lack whatever necessary finger dexterity is necessary to play quick reaction, twitchy games (first-person shooters) competitively. The Nintendo Wii's legitimately revolutionary gyro-motion control divorced game play from finger control, allowing you to use your whole body in natural movements (Not to be sexist, but I get the feeling that the better half of the population would fall into the group that prefers the whole-body approach). When you think about it, how ridiculous was it that your gaming success depended on one physical trait, finger control?
That one feature counted more than Pla
Read more: Sony
, Microsoft
Essential Programs review-Clipmate by Thornsoft
2007-05-26 13:51:36
Previously, I talked about Directory Opus, the most useful Windows utility I own. Today, I'll be talking about the second most useful utility I own, Clipmate by Thornsoft Development. Clipmate enhances one of the greatest computer ideas of all time, the clipboard. The clipboard allows one to save data (clips) temporarily for use in another program and since you've all used it (cut, paste, copy), I won't describe it further.
This great idea comes with one tremendous flaw, however: Windows clipboard, the free Microsoft utility that comes with every version of Windows, can only save one piece of information at a time. Indeed, next to accidentally emptying the recycle bin or forgetting to save, the most frequent "woops" moment in computing must be copying or cutting something over your previous copied or cut data.
Clipmate completely fixes this problem by saving each item you cut or paste in a file that you can use at a later time. For instance, let's say you're grabbing a series
Read more: Essential
, Programs
, review
Internet Host Reviews: Bluehost and Bravenet
2007-05-29 10:35:30
When I was stationed in Iraq, I began an email correspondence with a friend from back home. The emails consisted mostly of political arguments and, as soldiers never talk about politics, I found it to be a fun way to sate my thirst for political discussion. When I got back home, some friends joined in the email conversation. At one time, I think we would receive and answer about 20 emails a day. I remember that time fondly.
Because of the unmanageable email traffic and the quality of thought in the posts, I thought it would be best to move our discussions to the web (this was before I started blogging).
Eventually, A friend of mine started a free bulletin board (which eventually became Magnasquids on a service called Bravenet
. I loved the conversations, but the software from Bravenet su**** (was really bad). The bulletin board couldn't divide the posts by subject and my fingers tired because of the constant need to click on advertising.
I took the initiative to pay for the advanc
Read more: Internet
, Bluehost
What's up with audio reviewers mentioning their cd catalogue?
2007-06-08 22:18:46
What’s up with droning on about one's music collection during the course of a speaker review?
I’ve noticed a very annoying trend in the “tech press.” Lately, it seems that whenever somebody reviews any device having to do with music, he has to tell me which cd from his totally rad collection he chose, and then, during the course of the review, continuously demonstrate his ability to distinguish a guitar from a piano.
I’m sure the writers think they’re being colorful in the manner of car magazines that describe the interesting locale they chose to serve as a backdrop to their family sedan “comparo.” One can almost justify mentioning the irrelevant people sitting in a cafe when reviewing automobiles because cars have to be photographed in front of something, I guess, but, when reviewing audio equipment, flaunting your taste in music removes the focus from the product and gives the writing a pot-induced, dorm-bull-session vibe that quick
Study finds teens chat about drugs and booze.
2007-06-21 23:57:13
I'm shocked. Shocked! What's next: Studies show teenage boys interested in "chicks."
Read more: Study
Blog World Expo-Yeah, I'm going
2007-07-07 00:33:09
Here are the conventions I've attended:
1. A few teacher ones.
2. An electronic gaming one in Vegas a few years back before I was married. It happened to be next to a...
3. ...porn convention, upon which, and by total accident, I swear, my friend and I chanced. I met a small, hirsute gentleman by the name of Ron Jeremy who apparently was to porn what Michael Jordan was to basketball.
4. Some gaming convention, maybe Gen-con. You know, the one with the people dressed up as Rangers and hit each other with foam swords.
5. Gatecon, my favorite. What a lovely time getting to know the actors of that once great show, Stargate SG1. Here's a picture.
There may have been a few others, but I only mention them because I plan to attend Blog world. Why? I don't know. maybe I'll touch the hem of Kos' garment and get like 100,000 hits. Besides, it's in Vegas so it should be fun. Here's some blogging stats I came across from their site.
Important Blogging Statistics
* Ove
Read more: World
iPhone-It's stylish and hyped. If it's easy to use, it'll be huge
2007-07-06 23:55:44
iPhone this, iPhone that. The iPhone has had had more hype than any technology product since Windows 95 because people think that it’ll popularize advanced phone/music hybrids the way the iPod popularized music players.
If you take a trip to the dark ages of digital music (2001), you'll remember that Mp3 players were around before the iPod and competed with it during its entire existence. Most of them had more features and were far more versatile, especially with the variety of software you could use and the number of compatible file formats. I myself never purchased an iPod because of it's purposely engineered-in restrictions, preferring a cool iRiver H-110 that I used as a portable hard drive and that played everything I could throw at it. I replaced it with the excellent Creative Zen Vision M.
Creative Zen Vision:M 60 GB Portable Media Player Black
iRiver H-10. I loved that thing.
But, I’m a nerd (shhh)- Mr. and Mrs. Consumer Electronic Purchaser aren’t. J
Read more: iPhone
Microsoft to spend one billion dollars fixing X-Boxes
2007-07-06 05:28:56
In another setback for Microsoft
Corp.'s unprofitable entertainment and devices division, the company says it is planning to spend at least $1 billion
to repair serious problems with its Xbox 360 video game console.
Anybody want to take up a collection for Microsoft? Seriously, for a billion dollars
, Microsoft can probably train and employ the entire country of Belize to fix X-boxes.
Read more: Boxes
Vista Task Manager discovery
2007-07-03 22:09:15
If you have Vista
, I know you hate the fact that pressing Control-Alt-Delete takes you away from Windows and forces you to pick the task manager (I have to summon the task manager more often than I did under Windows XP)-the thing you want 99% of the time. Well, I found out the keyboard command to take you strait there. You have to press Control-Shift-Escape. Remember that; you'll probably need to do it often.
Vista-How do I hate thee?** Let me count the ways...
2007-07-14 11:36:28
1. You add nothing to the computing experience except some see-through windows. Wow.
2. You're incompatible with mucho software like Nero image drive, Directory Opus, and many others; and hardware like phones, TV tuners and printers.
3. You're slower than XP.
4. Up until the last hotfix, you would chug along at 100% CPU usage when charging the battery, rendering the computer useless and wasting hours of my time.
5. Not only did you cost me money that I could have spent on something more useful like some Ben Affleck DVDs upon which I could have placed my Coke Ones, but I had to upgrade several programs just for you-at great cost.
6. You nag worse than an OSHA bureaucrat at a Walmart loading dock. Is everything I do on my computer really that dangerous? Why don't I just leave it off and use a typewriter?
7. One compound word- Sidebar.
9. I upgraded my memory to two GB for what? To run Vista
? did you collude with memory manufacturers? Why didn't you just say 3GB? Some nerds would h
Read more: count
Teacher Laptop recommendations-Which one should you get?
2007-07-14 03:47:05
Christopher Dawson from zdnet wrote a post about teacher laptops. I'm not convinced of the value of such a post; he might as well as written, "Time for some new plumber laptops" since I don't know why a teacher would require anything different from anybody else. I do, however, have some laptop opinions.
First, let's deal with his objections:
I know what I don’t want:
* Glossy screens are the work of the devil. They smudge, glare and otherwise drive me nuts. Business-oriented models tend to have them as options, although they are becoming increasingly common as standard features.
Questionable theology aside, he's right. Unless you're watching a DVD in pitch black, get a matte screen. If my Dell came with one, I would have taken that option.
* 17? screens. I love my giant screen and use it for small presentations, multitasking, etc., and it allows me to have a numeric keypad on my full-sized keyboard. The weight of a 17? laptop, however, is unacceptable for the
Read more: Teacher
, Laptop
Service Review: GoToMyPC-Great
2007-07-13 00:44:04
I use GoToMYPC whenever I'm deployed or away from my home (I was a Ft. Leonard Wood and Ft. Sill for five months). One of the reasons is that my wife sometimes needs a little computer help every now and again (and if you've ever provided computer help over the phone, you realize how frustrating it can be to help somebody over the phone, "do you see the whatever next to that other thing"). GoToMyPC allows me to run the anit-virus on my wife's computer, update critical programs, and several other chores better left to me at this stage in her computer evolution.
Another reason to use it is that sometimes the internet access you're stuck with restricts certain usages you may require. This is true of email, some podcasts, streaming video, etc. GoToMYPC can circumvent those restrictions.
You can use two multiple monitors on GoToMyPC
Of course, the highlight in GoToMYPC is its ability to control one computer from a remote location. And GoToMYPC does this excellently. One caveat, ho
Read more: Service
, Great
Browser conundrum-Comparing IE, Firefox, Opera, and Avant-part 1
2007-07-17 01:55:15
Let's face it, if you worry about which browser to use, you live a pretty good life. Well, I feel very grateful that my browser choice has been my main preoccupation for the last two hours of my life.
Here's my browser issue. First, almost anything was better than Internet Explorer 6 and of the browsers available in 2005, I chose Avant
because of its ability to tile browser windows and its compatibility with programs I used often like RoboForm. This year, however, I stopped using Avant browser because it's still based on Internet Explorer 6 which is less secure than other browsers and because it doesn't have the ability to search Digg, Technorati, Webster's dictionary, and Wikipedia from one drop-down menu like Firefox
, my current browser.
I loved Avant's ability to tile windows.
Firefox is perfect except that I miss very much the ability to tile web pages within the same window. In other words, I want to be able to have multiple tabs open side-by-side where so that I can co
Wii-style controller for PC.
2007-07-15 18:12:30
I was going to ask "Why don't they have a Wii
style controller
for PC?", but I decided to not to advertise my laziness and perform a search instead. I came up with this article. It says one is on the way. It's this kind of flexibility coupled with the recent ease with which one can connect a computer to a big-screen TV which still makes the PC the platform of choice in the Guirado residence.
Here's some more:
PlayStation 3’s SIXAXIS has six degrees of tilting freedom, and the Wii-Mote offers tilt and motion tracking capabilities, but new technology from UK peripherals specialist In2Games could create a level playing field for all gaming platforms; from console to PC.
Named Gametrak Fusion, it uses a patent-pending ultrasonic and RF system to track the motion of a Wii-Mote-style controller, using a small base unit on the floor in front of the player. A 3D accelerometer in the controller also provides data on absolute position and orientation.
Combined together, the compa
PSP to get TV Tuner
2007-07-21 16:51:35
This article on Gamespot says that the new, slimmer PSP will get a TV tuner. It only works in Japan right now, but you know how it is in capitalism-supply and demand and all that. It'll be here eventually.
I think it's a good idea. The PSP already functions as a Wi-Fi enabled web browser (although it's torture without a keyboard), primitive PDA, movie and music player, and, of course a game platform. As it stands now, however, movies for the PSP are expensive and ripping your DVDs to the PSP can be a pain.
Being able to view something on your PSP without prior preparation can be a very nice thing.
If my son were able to catch an episode of YuGiOh in the back seat of the minivan, let's say, it could cause a chain reaction that would begin with allowing his siblings to travel un-tortured (or un-enhanced-interrogated), making them quiet, thereby, which would then provide for a peaceful trip for his father, and, finally, get his mother of his father's back for yelling. And that's
Read more: Tuner
SEO Site Review- iwebtool webmaster supersite
2007-07-23 16:56:07
I started becoming involved with web things last year. Like many of my previous hobbies, I threw myself at my forum and later, my blog, with true nerd abandon- the kind of enthusiasm that increases one's knowledge of a particular subject quickly, but, just as quickly, makes one insufferable ("oh no, he's going to talk about his web site again") and angers wives.
In those heady days of October, 2006, I would scour the internet for products that would make fast work of SEO
tedium. Since I couldn't imagine going to the Thailand Google every time I wanted to submit a site, for example, I purchased All-in One Submission Tool, an uncheap product that automates search engine submissions (and which accomplished its task with aplomb).
One thing about the internet, though, is if you look hard enough you're very likely to find what you need for free. And, so it was when I encountered iWEBTOOL, the best SEO-service site and the one I visit most frequently. Most of the services are free an
So long Vista, Hello, XP Nice to see you again.
2007-07-25 04:47:09
For the reasons cited here (plus my darned 100% CPU Usage problem keeps cropping back up), I abandoned my Vista
-cursed Dell e1505 for my old HP ZT3000. I think of the old HP like I thought of my grandfather, (may he be in Heaven): a little slow, but beloved and worthy of respect. Looking upon this HP, I realized how much I missed XP with its simpler but just as functional interface, and it cemented my preference for the matte screen over the glossy ones.
I wonder if the preference for glossy screens isn't unlike the preference for spinner wheels or big watches, uglier and less functional in every way, yet desired by many. I'm convinced that the preference for glossy screens is pure marketing. Either that or people have a Rube-like fascination with the shiny. I must admit that when they're off, computers with shiny screens look much better and that when they're on, they may still look better, but only until you have to do some work next to a window.
Anyways, if my mom let's me
Read more: Hello
Computer utility recommendations
2007-07-29 04:46:34
My friend Jose Reyes has a list of programs he likes. Pretty nice.
Read more: Computer
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