Goggling or Googling

Goggling or Googling

PC Clean Blogger, writer, technician, social media instructor

Brought to you by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean

Much talk on the tech front over the last week about Google’s new product simply labelled Google Glass Goggles. No, it’s nothing to do with swimming on the net!! When an amazing moment happens, you pull out your mobile phone to take a picture and by the time you are ready to shoot, the moment has passed. Simply annoying and frustrating, I know this from personal experience also. With both our very young children, they pull the funniest of faces, or dare to amaze you by their capabilities exceeding your expectation. These are what Kodak meant by “Kodak moments”. Small snippets of time that you will always remember fondly as time goes by.
Google are still in the prototype of a device called Google Glass, which appear as normal glasses on a person’s face to the unsuspecting. Only these glasses are connected to the internet and have a small film of a screen to give the wearer real time information without distraction. The goal of this device is to remove the need of taking out your Smartphone to make calls, send texts, read emails, check reminders and surf the internet.

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(Image source: dailymail.co.uk)
The team behind this project is Google X, the team of R & D that always vision the unimaginable. Not cheap, these glasses are currently going on market to developers for $1500 and ready for delivery next year to these customers. They have named this project, Project Glass. The team hope to have it available for release in 2014 and no price has been guessed at yet. But the glasses will cost more than the average Smartphone. The cost of producing the glasses is in the region of $3,000 at current stage of beta.
Android software developed by Google will be the driving chassis on the glasses for all applications and responses to work on. A built in camera with microphone will have the ability to record live feed and upload to YouTube or feed it live to a website for your friends to watch a live scenario you are part of at that time, so everyone can share the experience. Similar to Google smartphones and Apps, applications and commands can be sent to the glasses by voice, therefore giving the user a total hands free experience. Integration of other Google Apps including Google Maps will play a creative role in how we live our everyday lives. Imagine having the possibility of a GPS Sat Nav built into a small pair of glasses, so when we are on foot we can have arrows on our lenses to give us signposts to what direction to go. Google Weather alerts popping up to say whether it will be a great day or not, helping us ponder on the indecision of taking a raincoat to work.
Google launched a demo video on YouTube to give us a taste of how it can benefit our lives. From watching this, its amazing how all our computer powered applications, mobile phone apps and online platforms can come together to enable us to be a “Computer Wearer”, having our computers in our vision at all times!! With the upcoming and developing application Google Goggles, the scope of what can be done will be second to none. Already Goggles can be found in Android Play marketplace, the software that brings up online information about the item being held in your hand, the painting you stare at on a wall, author biography of a book you look at in the book store and many more facts surrounding all visuals in our lives.
With the positives, there are surely to be negatives. Some say that it will infringe on other peoples privacy when they don’t know if they are being recorded or it will be a distraction to our normal lives, with too much gadgetry. Like all new concepts, it will take the rough with the smooth. All I can say is, bring it on and let me be as Speccy as possible.


To catch up on any missed articles written by Niall Mulrine of Pc Clean, go to www.PcClean.ie

Saorview, Digital changeover and no more BBC or UTV

Saorview, Digital changeover and no more BBC or UTV

Brought to you by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean.

Recently the government gave the people of Ireland the deadline for the digital changeover as 24^th October 2012. What does this mean to me at home with my current setup?

This launch of new technology called the “Digital Changeover” is as mind boggling to many people with home televisions as “The Cloud” is as confusing for computer owners. They are buzzwords that are used too sparsely that they remain buzzwords until someone actually sits down to explain to us what it all means. For this week’s article, I brought in the expertise of a local installer of digital and analogue TV systems C Mc Groarty Ltd trading as Digitel.

Clement Mc Groarty, Donegal Town has been installing and repairing TV systems for homes, businesses, hotels, schools and health institutions all over Donegal for the past 20 years. He has seen so many changes in the TV technology in this time and has always put himself and his team in the forefront of the skills required to keep consumers up to date with what equipment they need to enjoy TV. They recently rebranded the company and many of Donegal motorists can see the newly decorated vans with Bart Simpson labelled on it. The vans have raised lots of interest from people and Donal Brennan from Sign Worx in Ballybofey was responsible for the great art work.

All electrical shops, newspapers, websites, magazines and TV adverts are displaying Saorview capabilities as the sole system to enable the Digital Changeover. Saorview is owned by RTÉ Media Company and will carry both RTÉ channels and NON- RTÉ channels such as 3e, TG4 and TV3. All these channels will be given great picture quality as it moves from the old Analogue signal to the new clear picture of Digital. Also, Irish radio channels will be distributed onto our TV sets for high quality sound with none of the interference we get on our old “wireless” radio.

Clement Mc Groarty commented on the amount of confusion regarding the systems the public are having since the government announcement. “Our office has been inundated with phone calls from our customers and members of the public asking what the Digital changeover means and what do they need to do before October 2012? We are informing the people of their situation and asking what current systems they have in place”. What people did not know is that they may lose all their UK terrestrial channels such as BBC, UTV and Channel 4 depending on the area they are located. To get these channels may involve extra systems and cost, especially for those that have more than one TV installed.

To get help and advice on what you need to do, contact Clement or Tania and their team on 074 97 22966 or 087 2250599. If you quote “Donegal News” when placing an order, the first 15 orders will receive a Digital MP3 player. Follow them on facebook.com/digitelireland

Highland Radio breakfast show this week will be running a competition with a prize of converting one TV to Irish Digital using a High Definition Saorview box, along with a full home survey to ensure you are digital ready.

 

To catch up on any missed articles written by Niall Mulrine of Pc Clean, go to www.PcClean.ie

 

 

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086-2377033 Pc Clean for Computer repairs, Laptop Repairs, Virus repair and removal service, callout services, network issues, printer problems in the Stranorlar, Letterkenny, Donegal Town, Lifford, Castlefinn, Donegal Area. Computer Training, Social network for your business, online marketing, it security,computer protection, child safety software,restricting websites, internet security, antivirus,microsoft, IT Support Donegal, Laptop Screens repair

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No Space left on my phone?

No space left on my phone??

Brought to you by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean.

We all know the feeling when we are at a special occasion such as a concert or a party and we want to take a precious memory home with us to keep. How do we take that special moment home? It used to be in the hands of our digital cameras. But, what we all reach for now, whether it’s out of our pockets or handbags; is the mobile phone. Gone are the days of the mighty “brick” that was used commonly to communicate with our friends, whilst away from our stationary landline phone at home. Yes, we thought we were in Doctor Who or Back to the Future with the large Motorola and Ericsson phone, using large buttons and a large LCD screen with the plain black text much like a calculator. Some of us may remember a snipe taken by the creators of “Only fools and Horses” over the so-called ‘mobile phone’. The episode of Del-Boy trying to sell the “Executive mobile phone” to Michael, the owner of Nags Head. They demonstrated the irony of a mobile phone that was too large for a jacket pocket. But it was not only Del-boy who believed that they would be millionaires this time next year. Phone manufacturers such as Motorola, Ericsson and Nokia were the market leaders in mobile phones in the 1990’s. Their products did make them millionaires again! They answered the prayers of mainly business people that were consistently on the road and could only be reached by their employer when they reached a certain appointment. To the employee’s dismay and eagerness to try the new technology, they accepted these large mobile phones and marvelled at how they could communicate while 100’s of miles from any phone line, with the help of the satellite in the sky.

Today, phones are micro slim and come with more complexity than any modern computer system. The ability to make a phone call is the last request on a buyers question list. Has it got music player, Bluetooth, Facebook, Email, video player and camera. If these are not standard, then the buyer will move along to a phone that has all the bells and whistles. Not only must we have call ability (which is used less than the other functions today), but we must have real time access to our online status whether it’s social networks or emails. Can we take photos of our friends and send them to other friends within seconds?? Have we got a mini jukebox in our hands with all our favourite songs? What about some videos of the party last week? All these songs can be transferred from our music library at home onto our phone using a cable from the computer. What happens when the time comes sitting on a bus for 4 hours and the songs on the phone are all overplayed? We used to sit there and either listens to them again until we get home to our computers for different music or turn it off!

With the help of online cloud storage, more products are bringing the concept of having our music come with us from home always. How can I have my 40GB hard drive full of music stored on my mobile phone with storage of 8GB? Most of the storage is taken up with videos recorded on the phone. The hassle of connecting cables and changing the music library seems like a chore and is rarely seen as an enjoyable experience, sitting at a computer not knowing what songs we will listen to, tomorrow or next week. It normally depends on the mood at that particular time.

A San Franciso company called “Popoplug” have come up with a service to give the consumer what they want, when it comes to sorting out instant access to a large music, video and photo library. A small networking device called the “Popoplug Mobile Device” is connected to the owners broadband router at home. This can attach any amount of storage whether is a 1TB external hard drive storage of 1GB SD Memory card with photos and stream directly to the user’s mobile phone via Popoplug software. The customer does not download any music from the Internet or home, but instead streams small amount of data at regular intervals to give video, music or photo slideshows on the phone instantaneously over any 3G network. No disk space on the phone will be full by streaming the files. Some data is stored for short period of time.

The customer has still the same empty space on the phone to take more photos and videos. No law is being broke, as the customer is accessing their own personal music library via an internet signal. Not only has the software this feature, but also, every time a new photo or video is recorded on the phone; it is directly backed up to the “Popoplug” device at home for safe keeping.

This is just an example of how our want of having our homes with us at all times is being achieved in the technology world.

To catch up on any missed articles written by Niall Mulrine of Pc Clean, go to www.PcClean.ie

 

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Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
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sales@pcclean.ie
086-2377033 Pc Clean for Computer repairs, Laptop Repairs, Virus repair and removal service, callout services, network issues, printer problems in the Stranorlar, Letterkenny, Donegal Town, Lifford, Castlefinn, Donegal Area. Computer Training, Social network for your business, online marketing, it security,computer protection, child safety software,restricting websites, internet security, antivirus,microsoft, IT Support Donegal, Laptop Screens repair

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I lost my laptop with all the company documents!!

I lost my laptop with all the company documents!!!

Brought to you by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean.

Some of the reasons why we should use online backup can be emphasised by a few points on safety of mobile computers. We have heard the stories; we have encountered it at work, home and at school. More people are carrying their offices, theses and photo labs under their arm in a small electronic device. This small device, yet so powerful that it may contain so many documents, emails, passwords, photos and work files that we tend to forget just how “big” it can be. It could carry everything that is most important to them at any time. We take it for granted; we could never loose these items. But what happens if the laptop is stolen or lost? Laptops are not the only devices that are carried around in people’s personal belongings. Mobile phones, Smartphones, Tablets, and many more portable devices that store our vast amount of contacts details, phone numbers, text messages, private information, photos and much more.

Remember all the big stories in the past years of government officials, solicitors, business people and employees of semi-state bodies loosing USB drives, laptops and smart phones with all sensitive data in the wrong hands. These devices were not even locked down with a password. The biggest case in the news in Ireland was the 5 laptops that were lost by Department of Social and Family Affairs. But luck was on their side, no leaks were found regarding the private data. It was a wakeup call or was it? It has not changed the mind-sets of computer consumers. Basic protection such as access code or password for opening the devices is never activated. We seem to think that we will never lose our devices and all the data is safe. Is there a solution if our laptop or phone is stolen?

There are solutions to this issue in the realms of software preloaded on the devices and having an internet connection turned on. Some packages can trace the device to within a couple of feet to the correct GPS location.

One such free package called Prey got a lot of coverage from an unknown person in the US called Sean Power. His laptop was stolen in New York, but with the help of Twitter and Prey software, he was able to get back his laptop. The software took a picture of the user and sends it online to Sean’s account and the IP address located to within 200 metres proximity. With the help of Twitter posts, he was able to pinpoint the laptop to a bar owner in Manhattan. He rang the police with these details and they raided the bar and caught the suspect in possession of the laptop. This made an impossible situation possible again with the help of modern technology. What were the chances that he could have otherwise found his laptop in New York city via the old detective work!! The police would have bothered about a minor offence such as this, so the case would have been closed quickly.

Another software package called Druva, which is not free, but worth the money if you consider your laptop files to be sensitive and important is a great market leader for protecting data on stolen or lost laptops. What this can do differently to the previous example is, wipe the laptop hard drive clean of all data from anywhere online or by a method activated when the user inputs the password incorrectly beyond a predetermined limit. An American study carried out on the devastation caused by a lost or stolen business laptop can cause the company on average $49,241 per machine. Also, the survey reported that only 30% of machines were encrypted with a password and 46% of laptops had “sensitive data” stored on them. This is frightening how careless we are when it comes to security. Spend nearly a thousand euros on a great laptop with all the software to start your computing needs, but need skim on basic additions of security software or even encryption methods.

Even if we don’t go for the fancy software packages, at least we can protect our data with a good strong password.

To catch up on any missed articles written by Niall Mulrine of Pc Clean, go to www.PcClean.ie

Online Backup Dilemna

Just about every day we see an advertisement in the paper, on websites and TV for cloud data backup. Files from our local computer get backed up to a site somewhere in the World via internet service. So if our computers crash; we should have good chance of getting back all our documents and photos from the Backup Online service.

Many vendors provide a great service that once we set it; we never have to look at it again. Most of us really get into a good habit of backing up to DVD or external hard drive for a few weeks then we get “too busy” to backup files. This is Russian roulette strategy. The day, the computer crashes and the owner cannot get their important work files, is the day they had wished they backed up. Too late then, the milk is spilled and there will be lots of crying. Why risk that situation. Act now.

There are plenty of choices on the market for getting a backup vendor to do this work for us. I will talk of a few with some points of strength and weaknesses.

SugarSync would be one of the most popular due to the added bonus of allowing the users to share a folder of 5GB free storage of files between multiple computers and mobile devices. Automatic backup of files work in the background on your pc and while changes are detected, a collection of these files are kept with 5 different versions in case you did not like the recent changes with the ability to go back 3 or 4 versions is available. The files are secured on the SugarSync server with 128 bit AES encryption. Anything over 5GB needed can be paid for and a ceiling on the amount of data allowed at the moment is 500GB.

Dropbox similar to SugarSync functionality, including automatic backup, share folders on computers and mobile devices, but only comes with 2GB free online storage. More can be purchased or if you refer people to their service, Dropbox will reward you with extra free storage. They use 256 bit AES encryption to protect the files, with the online file viewer comes the option of checking the storage status and email notifications to remind the user of status also. Dropbox also allows the user to allocate certain bandwidth to the backup, so other internet services are not hindered by the current uploading. Great service, a little more expensive than other leading vendors and only support available is by email.

Mozy backup is a file backup service that is unlike the previous two companies in terms of access to file retrieval. For home users, that want a small online backup storage free or purchase some space in small quantities, the option to retrieve the files can only be done by purchasing a second licence. You cannot share the files like Dropbox or SugarSync. The desktop interface and online setup is easy to use even for the more computer illiterate people. A bonus Mozy has when backing up open files, such as email clients or documents that are currently being worked on, is the ability to back up all files open or close. Other clients do not have this facility. This is unfortunate if using a backup service to back up the email client such as Outlook, as it would be open most of the available computer time online.

These are just a few of the packages available, for better investigation use the free trials that they all offer to assess what is best for your needs.

To catch up on any missed articles written by Niall Mulrine of Pc Clean, go to www.PcClean.ie

AutoPilot Cars!!

Do we have Autopilot on our cars??

Brought to you by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean.

If you missed the previous articles, please go to www.pclean.ie and check out Blogs.

Car manufacturers around the world are more concerned about the innovative developments of car building than that of the economic saving virtues to the customer. It is believed by many manufacturers, majority of cars are similar in terms of quality, economic to run and environmentally friendly. Competition between big brands in these areas are almost saturated. To nose their product over the line, they focus on what innovations can be brought to the car that will make the customer “want” to own that model. High tech gadgets will be the must in the future cars. People focus on the compatiability of their car with their smartphones, iPhones, iPads, Mp3 players and bluetooth devices. “Can I make calls on my phone without taking the phone out of my pocket?” As we seen Ford are pioneering this to the next level with the Sync system that was described in a recent article of mine.

Mercedes have developed Splitview technology, where the only the passenger can watch media on the display and the driver can just see the naviagtion map. BMW using WLAN technolog to communicate with other similar vehicles in the vicinity to aid communications regarding driving conditions, traffic jams, accidents and sudden change in weather conditions. Example of prevention of accident is, when a car is coming up to a junction with traffic lights and someone is driving through the red light, the car will warn the driver of this and to hit the brakes to prevent collison. Also, the blind spots when trying to pass a car in front when you see nothing coming, you believe it’s safe to pass and you indicate to overtake then the car recieves message that there is car oncoming soon and warns the driver to pull back into your lane before collision.

Elsewhere, MIT students in association with Audi are devising a 3D interactive map that will be displayed on the dashboard of the car. This will show where the driver is with position on the map and show buildings and streets in the vicinity. When the car moves, the map moves to adjust with the drivers view, so both vision out of the windows and interactive map are in sync. It will have locations marked on it as normal satellite navigation systems have points of interest on the map. Even though manufacturers seem more creative towards innovation, in actual fact, the innovation is bringing a new level of safety to the driver’s cabin.

To catch up on any missed articles written by Niall Mulrine of Pc Clean, go to www.PcClean.ie and read the blogs already submitted.

 

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086-2377033 Pc Clean for Computer repairs, Laptop Repairs, Virus repair and removal service, callout services, network issues, printer problems in the Stranorlar, Letterkenny, Donegal Town, Lifford, Castlefinn, Donegal Area. Computer Training, Social network for your business, online marketing, it security,computer protection, child safety software,restricting websites, internet security, antivirus,microsoft, IT Support Donegal, Laptop Screens repair

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Stream your personal music and videos online

brought to you by Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean.

Software streams photo, music and video libraries from any PC or Mac to other computers, gaming consoles, and mobile devices.

San Francisco, Calif. – June 22, 2011 – Cloud Engines, Inc., creators of the Pogoplug multi-media streaming device, released a new, software-only version of their cloud-based streaming service. The new software turns any PC or Mac into a “Personal Cloud,” no additional hardware required. This new version allows users to stream their entire photo, music, and video libraries and makes that content accessible anywhere in the world. Files stored across multiple computers and hard drives can be connected to a single account to provide users one easy interface for streaming all of their files – called OneView™.

“Our software-only product is a very natural expansion of the Pogoplug streaming service that started with our hardware,” said Daniel Putterman, CEO of Cloud Engines, Inc. “By offering solutions that can stream files from your PC, Mac, or external hard drives, we are creating a single access point for anyone who wants to be able to watch their movies, show off their pictures, and listen to their entire music library no matter where they are and no matter where those files are stored. There are no storage limits, no long upload times, and your files are secure at your home, office, or wherever you keep them – not stored with a 3rd party. No one else offers this kind of unified cloud streaming solution.”

The software update includes a number of key features, including three new web apps under the banner of Pogoplug OneView™:
•    Jukebox: Sit back and listen to all of your music aggregated from all of your Pogoplug-enabled devices into a single, duplicate-free library
•    Cinema: Stream movies for easy remote viewing on the web or your mobile device
•    Gallery: See all your pictures in a unified timeline, organized using the files’ original, rich metadata
•    My Devices shows all of your Pogoplug devices and Pogoplug PCs and Macs, making it easy to find and share individual files
•    Pogoplug software is available for free, allowing users to share and access files remotely and stream all of their photos to any mobile device, PC or Mac.
•    Streaming music outside the home network or streaming movies anywhere requires Premium. $29 one-time fee, install on multiple computers.

The Pogoplug software maintains all of the great sharing and data access solutions provided by the original Pogoplug hardware. Users can still access and share files of any size or type from anywhere in the world, to anyone in the world. Pogoplug also released an update to their iPhone and iPad software to take advantage of the new OneView™ apps. With these updated apps, users never have to worry about syncing or storage limits and will always be able to listen to music, look at photos, and watch movies from their entire multimedia library right on their mobile device.

 

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Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie
sales@pcclean.ie
086-2377033 Pc Clean for Computer repairs, Laptop Repairs, Virus repair and removal service, callout services, network issues, printer problems in the Stranorlar, Letterkenny, Donegal Town, Lifford, Castlefinn, Donegal Area. Computer Training, Social network for your business, online marketing, it security,computer protection, child safety software,restricting websites, internet security, antivirus,microsoft, IT Support Donegal, Laptop Screens repair

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3D Time is a scam? You make the decision

Last Friday, I departed from my normal business technology beat to talk about the geek entertainment event Game of Thrones. This week I’m going to plug into our Friday Geekend theme again, but this time the topic is something more nefarious — the entertainment industry’s misguided scam of the public.

The 3D gimmick has sadly infiltrated movies and television and is now threatening to infect video games and smartphones as well. There’s only one reason why the entertainment industry keeps relentlessly pushing this at consumers — it’s a transparent attempt to bleed more money out of people. And, while a lot of consumers have caught on to the scam, not everyone is doing enough to stop it.

3D is definitely NOT about innovation, as the industry would like you to believe. In fact, adding the current 3D effects to a movie or video of any kind subtracts from the picture. It muddies the colors and unsharpens the images, and it has to slow down the action shots because it makes people sick if things go too fast in 3D. In fact, optometrists estimate that up to 25% of people get headaches or nausea from simply watching 3D at all.

 

My first hint at the 3D scam was in October 2009 when Toy Story and Toy Story 2 were re-released in the theaters as 3D movies. My kids were excited to see Toy Story on the big screen for the first time so we gladly ponied up the extra money to see the 3D version of the double feature. We weren’t very far into the first movie before I realized that the quality of the colors and images were actually worse in 3D. That was a big disappointment. Even my kids said that the 3D wasn’t as exciting as they thought it would be. There went an extra $24 down the drain ($3 extra for 3D for four people for two movies).

Of course, the Toy Story movies were standard 2D movies that were converted to 3D (which is actually the way most “3D” movies are still handled). So, what about movies that are natively shot with special 3D cameras, such as Avatar? I’ll admit that when I first saw Avatar in the theaters I was impressed at how well it wove in the 3D effects. But, my admiration wore off once I saw it on Blu-ray on a 240Hz LED TV and quickly realized that all of the colors and action shots suddenly came to life and really popped off the screen. That’s when it fully dawned on me what a horrible scam 3D really is. They are making us pay more money for a gimmicky, inferior experience. Sure, there are a few neat moments in most 3D movies, but the novelty wears very off quickly and it’s certainly not worth the trade-off in picture quality or action sequences.

I had started to see this coming a little sooner, and I should have pounced on it. Back at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, I was dazzled by the new LED TVs that Samsung showed off at its big press conference. The images were so sharp and the colors were so bright that the picture almost felt three dimensional. Plus the TV themselves were amazingly thin.

The next year, at CES 2010, I was surprised to see all of the TV manufacturers including Samsung pushing TVs with 3D glasses. I immediately felt like this was a step backward. I didn’t want to mess around with watching TV with 3D glasses. I wanted to see more super thin TVs with amazing pictures (at even better prices) like the ones I had seen the year before. After consumers rejected 3D TVs in 2010, the companies tried to come back at CES 2011 and pitch “no glasses” 3D. I wanted to shake my head and do a face-palm every time one of these electronics vendors mentioned 3D.

This is a bad detour for the entertainment and electronics industries, and they stubbornly refuse to let it die. In fact, they keep trying to push 3D on us, since many of these new products have been in planning for a year or two (before consumers started catching on to the 3D scam). The movie industry and movie theaters try to force us to only be able to watch some of their top movies in 3D (and pay extra for it). TV makers are forcing 3D into all of their new top-of-the-line LED TVs (and trying to make us to pay extra for it). Content companies are now making their Blu-ray/DVD/Digital Copy bundles include 3D discs (and trying to make us pay extra for it). Game companies such as Nintendo are integrating gimmicky 3D into their new systems. Mobile computing vendors such as HTC and LG are even trying to put 3D into their smartphones and tablets.

There’s only one way to stop the madness. Avoid 3D whenever possible.

This is a bad experiment that the industry is forcing consumers to subsidize. And since they can’t create a better product, they’ve simply latched on to 3D as a marketing ploy that the entertainment and electronics industries can use to trick people into thinking that they are getting a superior experience. It’s only working because just enough people are falling for the scam to keep it alive.

A lot of smart people have already sniffed this out and are avoiding 3D entertainment. It’s time for the rest of the public to reject 3D and stop being cheated.

It’s not that we don’t want innovation in real life imaging. Of course, we do. We just want real innovation, and don’t want to pay for badly-overpriced gimmicks and half-baked experiments.

 

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Niall Mulrine, Pc Clean, Navenny, Ballybofey, Co. Donegal, Ireland
www.pcclean.ie
sales@pcclean.ie
086-2377033 Pc Clean for Computer repairs, Laptop Repairs, Virus repair and removal service, callout services, network issues, printer problems in the Stranorlar, Letterkenny, Donegal Town, Lifford, Castlefinn, Donegal Area. Computer Training, Social network for your business, online marketing, it security,computer protection, child safety software,restricting websites, internet security, antivirus,microsoft, IT Support Donegal, Laptop Screens repair

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Oxford dictionary accepts mobile phone “Initialisms”

'Initialisms' used by writers of emails, text messages and instant messages - specifically, OMG, FYI and LOL - have made it into the new online edition of the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) to be released at the end of the month.

OED calls these abbreviations "initialisms", because they are made up of the initials of the expression.

The entries of the short forms of 'oh my God', 'for your information' and 'laugh out loud' signify the dictionary's acknowledgement of the internet's influence on our daily lives.

Another new entry includes the heart symbol - not the <3 emoticon, the actual ♥ graphic.

OMG, LOL and FYI join IMHO (in my humble opinion) and BFF (best friends forever) among the web-influenced entries in the authoritative text on the English language.

To wit, the entry for OMG, the Guardian reports, will read, "OMG int. (and n.) and adj.: 'Oh my God' (or sometimes 'gosh', 'goodness', etc.)". LOL is defined as "LOL int. and n./2: 'laughing out loud'."

Some of the initialisms have a history, however, and have not spawned from 21st-century tech talk. OMG, the OED discovered, was first used in a personal letter in 1917. People in the 1960s used LOL, but back then it meant 'little old lady'.

It may all be enough to make one ROFL.

 

 

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Don’t throw away your laptop for iPad!!

I constantly get asked what is the cheapest laptop that can do X, Y and Z. Customer wants the cheapest. Cheapest does not mean high quality in electrical goods especially computers. Then they will return a few months later with their newly purchased laptop and ask “Why can this laptop not run Autocad or Photoshop?” – Politely to answer “It was a CHEAP laptop you were looking for to use the internet and send emails, not a working horse laptop that you need for any highly weighted software packages”

Now the tables have not changed, they are just herded into the “I need this” syndrome. Apple name is the “must have” name. It means you stand out in the crowd, apparently. I do not understand. Yes the Apple computers are fine machines, for those that are doing specialist jobs on it and to an extend they do not get viruses. Mainly because Apple has 5% of the computer OS Market, where Microsoft dominate approx 90% of the consumer market. The malware creators sit in their room with a white sheet of paper with a line down the middle. Microsoft vs Apple. Who will be effected more if i create a super virus??? It’s a no brainer. That is why we (Microsoft clients) have more attacks that Apple users. Same can be said about Linux also.

Now, going back to my original point, where ever that started!! People now don’t care about Apple iPhone or iPad price tags because these are the devices that will make me cool and fit in with everyone else!! “Hi look at my new iPhone, cost me €500, I have more money than you!!”. Yet there have been many devices of same standards out longer than the new iPhone or iPod. Smartphones have been on the go for years now, Blackberry holding the throne and same with MP3 players. There are better and easier to use MP3 players out before and still out on the market that are cheaper and better than the iPods. What will everyone do with their new iPad when suddenly they want to play a DVD, type an assignment, download software that is needed for a project (guess what its not tablet friendly) and use external hard drives etc. This is where i came across an article written by Tom Dunlap, PCWorld recently and I thought he hit the nail on the head about several of these issues. I have snippet below of the post.

I thought this an interesting article regarding the new “Tablet Craze”.

Everywhere I go these days, my friends slam laptops. They tell me my PC of choice is a dying breed and sing the praises of their new, "post-PC" Apple iPad.

Lenovo ThinkPad X30They carefully pull out their Apple device. I admire it and then say: "So where do you insert the DVD? How do you bang out a long e-mail on a touch keyboard? Oh, and guess how much less I paid for my little Lenovo ThinkPad X30 laptop than you did for your iPad."

I recognize that the iPad is thin, light, and easy to travel with, and I understand the advantages of portable entertainment. But if you don't need the prestige of having the latest-and-greatest tech, I believe you can get all that and much more for much less than the cost of a new tablet. All you have to do is tote around another measly pound or two.

If you're willing to take a chance on used equipment, you can find slightly older laptops on Craigslist starting at about $200. Also check out PCWorld's Daily Deals.

[PCWorld Business Center blogger Tony Bradley responds in the Net Work blog: Why My $185 Tablet Crushes Your $200 Laptop.]

My Reasons

Here are the top reasons that I think my used ThinkPad--which I paid about $200 for--crushes your iPad 2, which new, starts at $499 and can run more than $800, depending on the configuration. (Of course, a used iPad 1's price would be lower; on Craigslist, prices started at around $400 on the day I checked.)

My ThinkPad has a CD and DVD player/burner: If you're into permanently saving photos, music, or movies, or if you're serious about backing up your hard drive and programs, you probably need to burn discs occasionally. Your relatives in Indiana need a copy of the video of cousin Paul's drum recital, or they'd love to look at a CD containing pictures taken during your night trip to Alcatraz. You can't cram everything onto Facebook.

It has a physical keyboard: Most iPad users readily admit typing data-intensive text on their tablet's touch keyboard is difficult. I'll go further: I detest typing on a touch keyboard. As PCWorld reviewer Jon L. Jacobi sarcastically puts it: "Overpriced pads: Touchscreens without keyboards. How innovative." Flimsy, add-on keyboards don't cut it. Give me a solid, built-in board like the one on my ThinkPad. It's one of the best laptop keyboards ever, and I still like the old-school Trackpoint eraserhead cursor control.

It has lots more storage space: If you want to download and store tons of decent-quality movies, TV shows, videos, music, PowerPoint presentations, PDFs, and the like, the iPad 2's maximum 64GB of storage falls short. Even the 250GB of storage on a decent laptop fills up faster than you might expect. (I do grant you that you can easily back up almost anything to external storage or to a cloud-based service.)

It has useful and versatile ports: No USB port on an iPad? Sure you can buy a pricey adapter, but what if you want to plug in a mouse, digital camera, and/or printer? So much for the iPad's smooth lines and ease of use. Being able to insert a USB device or a thumbdrive into my laptop is essential to me.

As for Apple's iPad, here are a few of my least favorite things about it.

Apple iPad 2The iPad doesn't support multitasking: As a result, I can't listen to sports talk radio online, check to see if little Charlie has bitten anyone else's finger, and type my blog, all at the same time. Such versatility is why I love mobile computers--and it alone will ensure my allegiance to laptops.

It is confined by the limits of iTunes: Jared Newman, a PCWorld blogger, summed it up: "Even if you never sync a single piece of media from a computer to an iPad, you still need iTunes on a PC or Mac to keep the tablet's software up to date. This needs to change," he wrote in the Today@PCWorld blog. (For a longer look at the iPad 2's limitations, check Jared Newman's list of 5 Disappointments With Apple iPad 2.)

Its battery isn't replacable: I know the iPad has respectable battery life, but if you ever have to work on a long plane ride and in a café with no available power outlets, you need excellent battery life and a back-up cell that is easy to install. This isn't possible on either model of iPad. As on all other Apple mobile devices, the battery is sealed and nonreplaceable.

I hope you found my article interesting which I have copied in an insert from Tom Dunlap to further my point? Don’t throw your laptop away for an iPad, stick to the big guns.

 

 

 

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Pirate software in our Vatican City!!!!!

This story I thought was crazy when I first heard about it, but its true!!


Avast, Antivirus software manufacturer send a 14 user licence trial key to a small firm in Texas to try out the software for their use only. Avast discovered there was more that 14 users using the software. Rather than contact the company directly, they thought it would be interesting to see what would happen if nothing was done.

Add caption

So as Avast watched the licence grow around the World, they were amazed at the amount of people that wanted their software, whether it was free or pirated. The licence went on file sharing websites and illegally download software sites around the World, in matter of weeks. This had spread across 200 Countries. By the end of 2010, 774,651 people had illegally installed this licence on their machines. Now alarms were ringing on how people were willing to take illegal software from malware infected sites, just to get free antivirus software. It would defeat the purpose of an antivirus program download, if it itself was going to bring in serious malware onto the user’s pc??? But more surprising was that 2 of the illegal pirated licences was installed in Vatican City, Rome. The capital of the Catholic Church, where the commandments are preached on not stealing from your “neighbour”!!!

The 12 main culprit countries were

1. Russia
   
2. Mexico
   
3. Brazil
   
4. Italy
   
5. Spain
   
6. USA
   
7. India
   
8. Philippines
   
9. France
   
10. Ukraine
    
11. Argentina
    
12. Thailand

Avast are now turning all theses pirates into legit purchasers of the software. Imagine the irony, getting a phone call to see you AV software from the company that created it and saying you do not wish to purchase it. The caller would go something like this maybe!! “Please sir, we are not trying to sell you a new product you have never heard of, we are just informing you if you DONT PAY NOW for the illegal version you have installed, we will report you to the authorities.”
Now does that seem a good sales pitch????

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Change my personal Facebook Profile to a Page

Since profiles are for meant individual people, they aren't suited to meet your business needs. Pages offer more robust features for organizations, businesses, brands, and public figures, which you can learn more about here.
Further, maintaining a profile for anything other than an individual person is a violation of Facebook's Statement of Rights and Responsibilities. If you don’t convert your profile to a Page, you risk permanently losing access to the profile and all of your content.

To learn more, go https://www.facebook.com/help/?page=175

 

 

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Keep Malware of your Android Phone

 

The number of free Android apps that may be infected with malware this week has increased to more than 50.

Although some of these apps might look suspicious, others bearing names such as "Quick Notes" or "Chess" seem innocent enough, and you might not think twice about downloading them

.

Tips for a Malware-Free Smartphone

Following are five quick tips to help you keep your Android handset free of malware.

1. Always research the publisher of the app. What other apps does it offer? Do any of them look a bit shady? If so, you should probably stay away.
2. Read online reviews. Android Market reviews may not always be truthful. Check around to see what reputable Websites are saying about the app before you hit the download button.
3. Always check app permissions. Whenever you download or update an app, you get a list of permissions for it. An alarm clock app, for instance, probably shouldn't need to look through your contacts. The general rule of thumb: If an app is asking for more than what it needs to do its job, you should skip it.
4. Avoid directly installing Android Package files (APKs). When Angry Birds first came to Android, you could get it only through a third party. This is called "sideloading," or installing apps using an .APK file. Although Angry Birds wasn't malware, in general it is highly advisable not to download and install .APK files that you randomly come across. Most of the time you won't know what the file contains until you install it--and by then it's too late.
5. Put a malware and antivirus scanner on your phone. Although many people still think that antivirus scanners on phones are useless, maybe outbreaks such as this one will change minds. Several different big-name security companies already offer mobile-security options, many of them free. I myself had downloaded "Spider Man," which is on a bad-apps list. My Lookout software identified it as a Trojan horse.

Infected-Apps List Published by Android User 'Myournet'

• Advanced Currency Converter
• App Uninstaller
• Chess
• Dice Roller
• Falling Ball Dodge
• Falling Down
• Funny Paint
• Hilton Sex Sound
• Hot Sexy Videos
• Photo Editor
• Scientific Calculator
• Screaming Sexy Japanese Girls
• Spider Man
• Super Guitar Solo
• Super History Eraser
• Super Ringtone Maker
• Super Sex Positions

Infected-Apps List Published by Android User 'Kingmall2010'

• Advanced App to SD
• Advanced Barcode Scanner
• Advanced Compass Leveler
• Advanced File Manager
• Best password safe
• Bowling Time
• Magic Strobe Light
• Music Box
• Sexy Girls: Japanese
• Sexy Legs
• Super Stopwatch & Timer
• Supre Bluetooth Transfer
• Task Killer Pro

Infected-Apps List Compiled Under the Developer Name 'we20090202'

• Advanced Sound Manager
• Basketball Shot Now
• Bubble Shoot
• Color Blindness Test
• Finger Race
• Funny Face
• Magic Hypnotic Spiral
• Omok Five in a Row
• Piano
• Quick Delete Contacts
• Quick Notes
• Super Sexy Ringtones
• Tie a Tie

Also on the lists are the foreign-language apps shown at left.

Lookout Mobile Security, which provides security software for mobile phones, posted on its blog a list of 56 Android applications that have been infected with DroidDream, a new type of Android malware that roots your phone and gains access to as much personal information as it can. The apps also can open a backdoor, allowing more executable code to download to your phone without your being aware of it.

A few of these apps have already been downloaded by at least 50,000 users, making this one of the most widespread cases of Android malware to date. Although the apps in question have been pulled from the Android Market, Google is investigating them and has not yet moved to wipe them remotely from users' phones.

Lookout has issued an update to its mobile security software. If you have downloaded any of these apps, the company advises that you run its malware scanner and e-mail the Lookout support center. Mashable (which earlier today posted a list of infected apps complied by Myournet) suggests returning your phone to your carrier, as your data and security may be compromised.

With more and more malware emerging for the Android platform every day, users would do well to be careful and pay strict attention to what happens on their phones. You have to remember that smartphones are essentially computers--and all computers are vulnerable to attack by malicious software.

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