If you’re the sentimental sort, you probably have a computer you’ve owned for years and years. It’s a reliable old rig, chugging along through whatever tasks you assign it like an old, puttering station wagon. Sure, it might not be the most glorious system out there, but it works, right? It does what you want it to do. That’s the worst...

Chances are pretty good most of you out there will be installing a solid state drive soon or within the next year or so. However we’ve been told for almost 18 years (MS-DOS 6 was released in 1994 which featured the DEFRAG.EXE utility) that we’re supposed to periodically "defrag" our hard drives to optimize performance. But is this necessary...

It was recently discovered that upon a search of the Dell web site, the Inspiron mini line shows an inventory of zero. Uh-oh.. When Dell decides they’re going to stop making a specific computer, the industry as a whole usually follows suit because Dell does have that kind of influence. Now I’m not saying that it’s fact that Dell will cease...

I’m going to touch on the subject of Post-PC again by daring to ask if you could live without one. For some of you, even the thought of not having a PC will make you nervous – especially those of you who have been using PCs for several decades. I can’t speak for the masses, so I thought about what I would do if I didn’t have a PC,...

A standalone wireless hard drive is: A 3.5-inch hard drive in an enclosure where the enclosure on its own has Wi-Fi connectivity. Does such a thing exist? Yes. One such example is the Imation Pro WX, released in 2009 if I’m not mistaken. The Pro WX basically looks like a large-ish wireless router, except it’s a hard drive with its own wireless...

Digital SLR cameras take awesome photos. We all know that. However, any of them built within the last couple years or so usually also include the ability to record videos. Due to the optics of a DSLR, the video quality is AMAZING. They really blow away traditional video cameras in a lot of ways. The newer, more expensive DSLRs come with a lot more bells and...

The top 10 resolutions the world used over the past year according to Statcounter are:1024×768 1200×800 1366×768 1280×1024 1440×900 1680×1050 1920×1080 1600×900 1360×768 1024×600Some of you may be surprised to know that 1024×768 is still #1. And no, that’s not a netbook resolution (which...

In-ear stereo headphones, a.k.a. "earbuds" have been around for a long time. Most people associate earbuds with portable music players like the iPod or for those that listen to music from their smartphone, however there are good solid reasons you should use them on the desktop as well. 1. Better sound on the cheap If you haven’t used earbuds in...

If you plan on buying a new flat panel monitor (or laptop) soon whether, small, standard or large-sized, here are 5 tips that will make the calibration process a whole lot easier. 1. Disable all enhanced features Many monitors out-of-the-box have some sort of enhancement which the manufacturer thinks makes the picture look better when enabled. The vast majority...

People who have never used a Voice-over-IP box before get really confused because they don’t exactly understand what a VoIP box actually does, so I’ll explain it in the plainest English I can. What is a Connect-Me FREETALK box? A standalone VoIP box that allows you to use a plain telephone (meaning a traditional corded or cordless telephone) with...