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Saturday 27 October 2007

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Scott Wilkinson

You can purchase a little inexpensive converter box for Digital to Analog if you want to keep your older TV’s. The government have even agreed to give vouchers which are good for $40 off those little converter boxes, which will be helpful for those people who don’t have much income.

Digital does not mean High-Def, but it means that channels can be “multi-cast”. This means that several streams can be broadcast on one channel. Although it’s not in High Definition, but with analog you may get a fuzzy screen, whereas with Digital, it will look much better because it’s either there or it’s not.

The cable and satellite companies compress their signal as much as possible to get as much out of the bandwidth as possible, but the more you take out of it the worse the image looks. Over the air OTA is better for High-Def because they don’t compress as much.

You can get more information at a Digital TV site setup by the FCC or calling 888 338–2009.

Dick Debartolo - StealthSwitch

Quickly install the software and plug the hidden foot switch in (it goes either between the keyboard and your computer, or just into an available USB port) and you are safe. It hides in the shadows and just a light tap of your toes will let it work its magic. Based on your preferences, it can hide the current window, hide all windows, or hide all windows except for specified windows. Not just minimize, mind you, but totally erase from your screen. The Stealth Switch can also mute the sound, hide the taskbar, hide the desktop icons, and password protect the restore function. When the coast is clear, another quick tap and you are ready to frag in peace.

It’s essentially a Boss Switch.

Tech News

The new Apple Mac OS , Leopard was finally released yesterday… It’s the 5th version of their OSX version since it’s original desktop version release in 2001. It included 300 new features which all add up to make a nice bundle of features. It’s not a major OS upgrade in the way that XP to Vista was.

Leo got his copy early as Apple gave him a copy on Thursday. It’s a revolutionary upgrade to Tiger. In a thumbnail, Leo really likes it. It’s a $129 standalone, or if you bought a Mac after October 1st, you get a free upgrade, and if you bought it from Yesterday onwards, it will come with Mac.

If you have an older machine, then you need a GB of RAM, and a 877mhz system. It runs very quickly on all of Leo’s macs. Everything speed wise is better. It runs programs quicker, the finder is quicker. Photoshop for instance is quicker, because it relies on Apple’s core animation which is quicker. All the software Leo has runs fine. The only exception he has is File Maker 9, but apparently File Maker 8 works.

The new Apple mail is much improved. It has some really nice improvements such as To-Do lists and Calendar built in. None of the Mail plug ins work, so you’ll have to upgrade to the latest versions of their programs. The Leopard upgrade worked really well, and tells you what it turns off. There’s a few little things but everything generally works fine.

Apple told Leo that the upgrade will work just fine, “it’s not Windows”. Windows generally has problems and runs slowly when you upgrade, but it’s true that on Mac it’s just fine. If your a bit worried, Archive and Install works just fine. Leo upgraded 3 out of 4 machines. The upgrade is good and works just fine.

When you compare both Windows and Mac, there are many similarities. Not just the fact that the Trashcan / Recycle Bin is there. We’ve reached a point where most operating systems are the same in the fact that makers know how users use the operating system. Anything that works in the Safari 3 beta, will work in Safari 3 in Leopard.

You can find an indepth review on Leo’s Blog.

In other news, GMail also added an IMAP setting which allows you to use your email from multiple computers and have it sync on all systems. In POP, if you read an email in one computer, the others show it as “unread”, a smiliar case with any folders…etc. However, with IMAP, it unifies all those systems.

Hour 1

Q Michael from Pittsburgh - Can’t hibernate in Vista Basic

Windows Vista Home Basic is so primitive that Leo wouldn’t be surprised if it could handle Hibernation. Vista Basic was made for manufacturers to sell really cheap computers. You should really get an upgrade to Windows Vista Home Premium.

Take a look at this article on the Microsoft site that explains how to turn on hibernation if it’s off in Vista.

Because you got the machine with Vista Home Basic installed, then maybe Dell didn’t include it. Hibernate is nice but it uses a lot of disk activity, so it’s probably better if you use sleep.

Leo doesn’t recommend Vista Home Basic for anyone. It probably wasn’t intended for anyone to use for very long, but to get the machine for cheap and upgrade to Vista Home Premium or Ultimate. There’s a comparison list between all versions of Windows Vista available at the Microsoft website, and it’s clear from looking at the list, Vista Home Basic is a really stripped down operating system.

Q Cynthia from Sherman Oaks - Do I need any antivirus software for my new Mac?

Nope. Firstly Nod32 doesn’t work on a Mac, it’s just for Windows. Secondly, you don’t need it for the Mac. There are no viruses for a Mac! The Clear Channel network has asked Leo to install Norton for the Mac in order to use their VPN, and Leo’s said “guys, we don’t need it, there’s no viruses for the Mac!”.

You can run Windows for the new iMac. Unless you have Windows Programs that you need to run, then there’s no point in running it for the Mac. While your at the Apple store, pick up a copy of VMWare Fusion, which will allow you to run Windows inside your new Mac. You will need to run an antivirus on that Windows install if your going to be connecting to the Internet and receiving files.

Hour 2

Q Claudia from Los Angeles - Wants to record calls via her Blackberry

The problem is the fact it’s taking the audio from the internal mic. You should check to see the if Olympus has settings to change it from the built-in Mic, but from the Mic In.

Q Jeff from Dalas - DVD not working on Mac

It sounds like it’s having a physical problem reading the DVD. You should call Apple. They probably won’t replace the DVD drive because it’s a G4 iMac, which is now out of date.

If there’s a large enough amount of people reporting this problem to Apple, then they will update the update. It sounds like there’s more of a Hardware issue.

Q Jonny from North Carolina - Wants to use Video and Book databases

Amazon is probably the best way to do that. You need to sign up for Amazon Web Services. Then it will pull in the list and people can rate it, and then you can also sign up for Amazon Affiliates service and when people click the link to buy it, then they can buy it from Amazon and you make a commission on it.

Hour 3

Q Tom from California - Issues with Motherboard

The error message your seeing is due to the UPS you have. Your Dell may be aware of that UPS you have and might be telling you it’s time to change your battery inside the UPS. Try plugging the Dell directly into the wall and seeing if that fixes the problem. If that error message goes away, then you know it’s time to change the battery.

If you have tried changing the battery and there’s still a problem then you will have to take it out of the chain.

Q BJ from North Carolina - Device is Frayed.

It’s time to get a new one. The last thing you want to do is have a fire. The blinking may be that it’s just the power is coming and going.

Q Larry from California - Recording radio on Linux

Radioshack doesn’t sell Shark’s that can interface with Linux. It’s really the best way to go for things like this. It records radio, but not TV. You will have to use Windows or a Mac.

With a computer you could will have all the files right there, and you can just pick them out. You should take a look at AudioTime’s Programmable Audio Recorder and Player.

You could also use a little device called Radio Your Way. You can record many many hours using this device, and you can swap out the memory card, it can record many hours.

Q Forrest from California - Cannot get content of the DV cam to PC using Firewire

It could very well be that the JVC firewire chip is fried. It’s a little too easy to plug it in wrong and if you plug it in the wrong way, it can fry the chip. It’s most likely that it’s a Vista driver issue. Unfortunately that’s the problem with Vista is the fact that it’s taking a long time for companies to get drivers working for Vista.

You need to figure out what changed from the time when it was working to now, the time it’s not working. The key is the Video camera software on the machine as that’s what you use to control the device.

You should also try out Adobe Premiere Elements instead of Windows Movie Maker.

Q Alan from California - Computer is very slow

The only thing you can do is reformat that machine. You’ll have to transfer everything from that computer onto a USB external Hard Drive. Considering it’s 6 years old and you have a 12 year old using it, it’s probably riddled with spyware.

You will have to reload all the original programs back onto it. It’s a weekend project. After a while, on any computer it’s going to have a few problems build up, and it’s going to get slow.

Now it’s just like it came from the factory and it’s going to get alot quicker. It will be snappy.

The first thing you want to do is make sure you’ve updated everything on it.

Q Henry from Sun Valley, CA - Reducing power on the CPU

If you go to 80Plus.org and get an 80 Plus power supply, it saves alot of power, this is like the next version of Energy Star.

Monitors are possibly the biggest power consumptions on a PC. If you get the computer to shut the screen off after 10 or 15 minutes, you’ll save quite a bit of power.