Thanksgiving 2013

Boston Strong

Congratulations to our Red Sox, the new World Champions!

The Best Android Phones

I can't believe that I don't own a smartphone yet. It just boils down to the monthly charges for a smartphone. Right now I pay $35 a month to Verizon for virtually unlimited voice and text messaging. I just don't see the value - again for me - in doubling that fee or worse for the benefits I'd get. What surprises me is that I do like being out there on the technology curve and reaping the benefits. I guess in my old age I just struggle with the costs. Add to that the costs of cable, high speed internet, and land line and it gets rather ridiculous.

Nonetheless I have decided that if I do take the plunge it will be to an Android phone, and thus this post meant for me and like-minded others.

This article comes from pcmag.com.

"These days, it seems like there's always a smarter, faster, bigger Android phone on the horizon.
 
Google's mobile operating system has managed to capture a record 80 percent share of the global smartphone OS market, according to research firm Strategy Analytics. That's thanks to Android's competitive licensing costs, a large, ever-growing app store, and numerous hardware partners—HTC, LG, Motorola, Samsung, and others offer multiple Android handsets on each carrier.

And that's one of the best things about Android: Choice. At any given time, on Verizon Wireless alone, there are at least 20 different Android handsets to choose from. AT&T sells just as many, and Sprint, T-Mobile, and the regional carriers also offer plenty of choices these days. But how do you decide on the right one?"
                                                            Read more.....

The Top 6 New Features in Windows 8.1

This is a good review of 6 of the top new features in Windows 8.1. For those of you on Windows 8, this is must reading. I think 8.1 looks pretty good. I'd probably wait 2 weeks or a month and watch the press for issues.

"Microsoft's just-launched Windows 8.1 upgrade is way more than a service pack, even though it's a free update for Windows 8 users through the Windows Store. And, let's be frank, even the operating system's most vocal supporters will probably agree that Microsoft needs an update bigger than a service pack to change Windows 8's somewhat rocky narrative. Yes, a lot of the changes are tweaks and tightenings, but there are also plenty of new capabilities like built-in support for 3D printing, Miracast display sharing, and a new Web radio feature in the included Xbox Music app."

More here.....

TECH NOW: Decoding all that processor lingo

This comes from USA Today and will maybe help you figure out all the language concerning the microprocessors in today's electronic devices.

"Who cares about core processors? We do, and so should you if you plan to buy a new computer this year. Here's why:

If you've been in the market for a new gadget lately, you've likely been bombarded with tech jargon that sounds like a cross between a football audible — i3, i5, i7 (hike!) — and a choice of Ivy League schools (Snapdragon, Haswell, Ivy Bridge). I'm talking about various types of core processors, which are like the heart and brains of our favorite gadgets. Why should you care? For one, which one you choose makes a big difference in cost — sometimes by thousands of dollars. Also, core processors can play a big difference in how fast your gadget goes and how long the battery lasts."

More here....

Windows 8.1 update arrives with fresh changes

I wouldn't want to be the first one on the block to install this, but give it a week or two to see what issues may arise first.

This appears in USA Today:

"NEW YORK — Not quite a year later, Microsoft's Windows 8.1 arrives with considerably less drama than Windows 8, and that is to be expected—the changes are far less radical than they were for consumers who made the leap from Windows 7 to Windows 8.

But the latest software promises to be a worthwhile update for anyone who bought a PC and/or tablet with the Windows 8 operating system. And it represents a critical test for Microsoft as it attempts to satiate critics, address Windows 8 shortcomings, and ultimately improve the company's standing in both the tablet and more traditional PC businesses.

The 8.1-update starts to arrive in the Windows Store at 7 a.m. ET Thursday, and will be rolled out globally over the next 24 hours, Microsoft says. Windows 8.1 will be available on new devices and in standalone retail packaging on Friday.

So what doth the upgrade bring? The newest version is more customizable than its predecessor, with more background colors, and more variable sizes for the live tiles that have come to define the Windows 8 experience, on computers and for that matter smartphones.

Perhaps the biggest change you'll notice is the return of a familiar Start button, located in "Desktop" mode in its customary location at the bottom left corner of the taskbar. It's not like you're completely going back to the future — clicking on the new Start button returns you to the default tile-based Windows 8 Start environment, known as the Modern UI with those colorful rectangular and square tiles, some with live data for such things as weather, stocks, e-mail and so on.

Microsoft in 8.1 also lets you boot up your PC in the more traditional-looking Desktop environment if you prefer, or stick with the default tile interface.

Microsoft's better-integrated Sky Drive cloud-based locker takes on a more prominent role in 8.1, and so does Bing search. If while searching, say, for a performer such as Alicia Keys, you'll be able to stream some of her top tracks in their entirety for free, provided via XBox Music. You'll also see pictures of the artist, her birth date and a link to her Wikipedia bio.

Multitasking gets better too in 8.1. Depending on the size of your computer screen, you can display up to four apps side by side, with the ability to alter the sizes of the windows that those apps appear in.
The Windows Store where you'll find the new upgrade also gets a design makeover. Microsoft says there are now 110,000 apps in there, up from about 10,000 about a year ago. New and updated apps are also continually being delivered to the place, a list that includes Evernote, Facebook, Hulu Plus, Netflix, and NOOK.

It remains to be seen, of course, how consumers and critics take to the changes, aesthetically and feature-wise. But if you already bought into the Windows 8 ecosystem, the 8.1-update is in the end a pretty big deal."

Essential free software you can't afford to miss

Now you're talking!

"Free doesn’t have to mean cheesy, especially when it comes to freeware. A developer’s passion project can become something you can’t imagine being without, and the fact that you don’t have to lay out any cash to acquire it is a major bonus. Some developers accept donations to further development, so consider giving what you can if you find value in their efforts."

Check out the whole column from PC World

Facebook Building Its Own Small Town So You Can Live at Work

Amazing!

This version of this story came from http://valleywag.gawker.com/

If you work at Facebook, your employer will already wash your underwear, cut your hair, and feed you—now it's getting into the landlord game. The Wall Street Journal says Zuckerberg will usher in the 21st century version of company towns, a place where you can never truly leave the social network. Read…

Recommended Security Baseline Revisited

It amazes me that this baseline security profile continues to work on all of our home systems, two Windows XP and two Windows 7. It has been a while since I have had to make a change. Note that these are all FREE programs!

From time to time I refer to my security baseline. My security baseline is merely a list of programs I use (all free) and recommend for anyone to use to keep their systems secure. This applies to YOU if you use Windows XP, Vista, or Windows 7. I do not yet have much experience with Windows 8, but have noticed when I get some hands-on time that Microsoft has replaced its Security Essentials with a built-in anti-virus called Windows Defender. For those of you who have been using Windows XP for a while, note that this is the same name as once used by Microsoft for its anti-malware program.

Remember, all of these products are FREE, but will do as good a job as any fee products you may use. I make that statement and stand by it based on 45 years of experience with computers.
 
1. Microsoft Security Essentials. This is a very impressive anti-virus program and can replace any you have now. DOWNLOAD HERE

2. Windows Firewall (Standard part of your operating system. Check the Security Center to be sure it is on.)

3. MVPS HOSTS File - download the current month's version and update monthly DOWNLOAD HERE

4. CCleaner - check for newer version than you may already have. Run weekly. DOWNLOAD HERE by clicking on Download Latest Version in the upper right hand corner of the page.

5. Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware - run bi-weekly. DOWNLOAD HERE

6. SuperAntiSpyware Free Edition - run bi-weekly in the off week after #5. DOWNLOAD HERE

7. Spybot Search & Destroy - run monthly just before downloading new HOSTS file.  I recommend, for now, downloading Version 1.6.2 under "old versions". DOWNLOAD HERE

I will be happy to assist you with any or all of the above installations. This can be done remotely.

Questions?  Comment below or write me, pcdoc at brpcdoc dot com

Windows 8.1 release date, news and features

Here is some good news for those of you who have Windows 8 and who may not be exactly thrilled with it. Some relief is coming. The referenced article comes from techradar.computing.

"Microsoft has revealed full details about the comprehensive update to Windows 8, now known as Windows 8.1 and formerly known as Windows Blue. We've also had plenty of time with the new update and are running it every day, so check out our brand new Hands on: Windows 8.1 review.

The Windows 8.1 release date is October 17 - it will be available to existing Windows 8 users for free on Windows Update. It will be available to buy in retail from October 18 and has already been released to manufacturers (this stage is known as RTM)."

Read the article here

Never Forget

How to solve the 10 most common tech support problems yourself

And if/when you get frustrated, call me! :-)

This comes from pcworld.com.

"Whether you’re dealing with your dad’s decade-old computer or your own custom-built gaming rig, troubleshooting PC problems is a part of everyday life. Before you make that $50 support call, though, try your hand at homebrew tech support. We spoke to some of the best support reps in the business about the most common problems they fix—and how you can do it yourself.

Read the whole article here

5 budget laptops for college students: We name the best

If you are serious about buying a new laptop, this is an excellent article. This is from PCWorld.com.

"So you’re heading back to school and you need a new laptop—but you didn’t manage your finances over the summer. Your bank account is nearly tapped out, and you still need to buy text books and lay in enough ramen noodles to last through the winter.

Yeah, we’ve all been there. Fortunately, Moore’s Law is still in play, so today’s budget notebook is yesterday’s workhorse. Pretty much any modern laptop can handle the gamut of productivity chores—word processing, number crunching, email, and the like—but all of the machines in this roundup can also tackle media editing and encoding sessions, and deliver respectable entertainment experiences.

To strike the best balance between performance and affordability, I gathered the top five notebooks I could find for $650 or less. Benchmark busters they’re not, but they aren’t budget busters, either."

Check out the whole detailed article here

Google Maps adding real-time traffic updates

One more reason I need a smartphone!

From USA Today:

"The first benefits of Google's $1 billion acquisition of map software service Waze will appear today.
Real-time traffic reports from Waze app users will now appear on the Google Maps app for Apple iOS and Android, says a blog post from Google.

The reports include accidents, road closures, construction and other incidents.

Meanwhile, Waze users will gain access to Google search and Street View. The updates to both services will be available today.

In June, Google scooped up the Israeli startup for $1 billion in an effort to bolster its already powerful Google Maps service. Social network Facebook had been rumored to consider an acquisition of Waze prior to the deal.

Waze is a social mapping app that provides turn-by-turn directions and real-time incident reports filed by its community. The app boasts about 30 million users."

The Best All-in-One PCs

OK, all-in-one PCs may not be the most popular tech items out there today, but there is still a market, and there are some pretty nice product offerings too. This article and table of the best 10 (in the author's opinion) product offerings comes from pcmag.com today. Of interest to me is that he includes offerings from Apple under the umbrella term PCs.

"The all-in-one desktop PC is an interesting beast. It has gone from being the only game in town (think Commodore Pet/Apple III/TRS-80) to a tiny niche (the original Apple iMac) in a sea of tower PCs, to today, where the All-in-One PC is replacing the tower PC as the form factor you picture in your head when you hear the phrase "desktop computer.""

More, including comparison table here.....

GMail a little too open? Google says users should have no ‘expectation of privacy’

I found a link to this article today on boston.com. The link below to protecting electronic communications has lots of detailed information on how to proceed if you want to do something about this, but it gets pretty technical very quickly.

"In a recent court filing, Google admitted what privacy researchers have warned for years: Users of the service have “no expectation of privacy,” likening itself to a secretary who screens a bosses snail mail. Here’s what you can do to change that.

As RT reported, the assertion was made in response to a class-action suit regarding how the company scans users’ emails for advertising purposes, such as offering up vacation destinations when it can tell you’ve got time off coming up.

But while the group that publicized the statement, Consumer Watchdog, claims that it’s a sign that Google does not respect users’ privacy, the problem goes deeper: The concept of third-party, private hosted email is almost fundamentally flawed, particularly now that it has come to light that court orders can secretly get access to corporate servers while preventing user notification.

Email was already deeply flawed since much of it is transmitted unencrypted between servers unless a user adds on an extra level of encryption such as PGP or GPG, and even then leaks of e-mail metadata are common.

Fortunately, Micah Lee of the Freedom of the Press Foundation and the Electronic Frontier Foundation has put together a good, relatively comprehensive guide on protecting electronic communications, and the better news is that much of what you need to do is not that hard, and is getting easier. And that means that, no matter what GMail or any other corporation, government, or hacker wants, you have major control in keeping your privacy protected.

As Lee writes:

“But even with direct access to all the data traveling at the speed of light through the Internet’s backbone fiber-optic cables, even with cooperation of the major United States tech companies (which are extremely difficult for people to boycott), the largest, most powerful, and best funded surveillance apparatus that humanity has ever seen cannot defeat mathematics.”"

 

No, your data isn't secure in the cloud

From computerworld.com:

While online data storage services claim your data is encrypted, there are no guarantees. And with government surveillance programs crawling the web for metadata and email, there's little doubt online privacy can exist without strong safeguards.

Read more...

Two Providers of Secure E-Mail Shut Down

This is very interesting: "Taken together, the closures signal that e-mails, even if they are encrypted, can be accessed by government authorities and that the only way to prevent turning over the data is to obliterate the servers that the data sits on."

See more of this NYT Technology article here

iPhone sinks as Android seizes market share

From the Wall Street Journal:

"Google's Android software continues to steamroll the competition in smartphones, posing bigger problems for companies like Apple and BlackBerry.

New data Wednesday from research firm IDC found that Apple's share of the global market slid to 13.2 percent in the second quarter from 16.6 percent in the year-earlier period. Handsets running Android, meanwhile, jumped to 79.3 percent from 69.1 percent.

The signs are particularly ominous for one-time market leader BlackBerry, despite some high-profile product announcements recently. Devices running its software accounted for just 2.9 percent of global smartphone shipments in the three months ended in June, compared with 4.9 percent for the same period in 2012.

Android is given away free to handset makers by Google, whose strategy is to make money on advertising associated with mobile devices. It has long powered smartphones offered by industry giant Samsung, but has lately also benefited by Chinese companies such as Lenovo, Huawei and ZTE. that are grabbing a bigger chunk of the smartphone market.

"You are seeing tremendous growth in the developing world," said Steve Mollenkopf, president and operating chief of mobile chip giant Qualcomm Inc. Companies selling there are "picking up Android and driving that.""

You can keep your PC clean, tuned, and problem free.

I am posting this for new visitors and regulars who might need a refresher. I continue to use this suite of programs and aids and have no problems on any of our 3 systems, two running Windows 7 and one running Windows XP. One of my objectives is to continue running Windows XP long after the end of Microsoft support in April of 2014.

From time to time I refer to my security baseline. My security baseline is merely a list of programs I use (all free) and recommend for anyone to use to keep their systems secure. This applies to YOU if you use Windows XP, Vista, or Windows 7. The only difference in Windows 8 is that Windows 8 comes with its own Anti-virus program. It is called Windows Defender. It too is free.

Remember, all of these products are FREE, but will do as good a job as any fee products you may use. I make that statement and stand by it based on 45 years of experience with computers.
 
1. Microsoft Security Essentials. This is a very impressive anti-virus program and can replace any you have now. There is no need to pay a fee for an anti-virus program. DOWNLOAD HERE

2. Windows Firewall (Standard part of your operating system. Check the Security Center to be sure it is on.)

3. MVPS HOSTS File - download the current month's version and update monthly DOWNLOAD HERE

4. CCleaner - check for newer version than you may already have. Run weekly. DOWNLOAD HERE by clicking on Download Latest Version in the upper right hand corner of the page.

5. Malwarebytes' Anti-Malware - run bi-weekly. DOWNLOAD HERE

6. SuperAntiSpyware Free Edition - run bi-weekly in the off week after #5. DOWNLOAD HERE

7. Spybot Search & Destroy - run monthly just before downloading new HOSTS file.  I recommend, for now, downloading Version 1.6.2 under "old versions". DOWNLOAD HERE

I will be happy to assist you with any or all of the above installations. This can be done remotely.

Questions?  Comment below or write me, pcdoc@brpcdoc.com