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Tech News & Commentary
Ray in Niagara Falls, New York listens online asked: “I have an iPhone 4 with Verizon and I’m thinking of switching to Sprint. If I do, can I sync my Sprint iPhone to the same place I did my Verizon phone?”
Yes, you can sync your new iPhone to the same user on iCloud, and to the same computer. When you first get your new iPhone, during the setup process, it will ask you if you want to set it up as a brand new iPhone or from a previous backup.
As long as your old iPhone had been backed up recently, be
it to iCloud or iTunes, you should be able to have your new phone automatically configured to have your old email accounts, apps, notes, and everything else, and it can continue to be backed up to the same place as your old phone.
The network really doesn’t matter, your choices for syncing your phone are: your own computer, or Apple’s computers, which company is giving you a phone line doesn’t really matter at all.
Also, make certain that you DO synchronize your old iPhone
4 just before going to buy the new one. You wouldn’t want to miss something in your data just because you were using an older backup of the phone.
If you do decide to switch to Sprint, you can trade them in your Verizon iPhone, for a credit towards your new iPhone. This is a limited time offer that Sprint is promoting.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Group discussion:
June is National Internet Safety Month. In
the first hour of this program, we had Child Advocate John Walsh (from “America’s Most Wanted”) and he said “parents should take charge and be cyber savvy”. New survey results of tweens show why parents need to monitor more than just the home computer.
So we asked our listeners on Facebook: Parents: How do you currently monitor your children’s computer activities?
Some of the responses we shared:
Amber said: My children have age restrictions set on their iPods and
I still have to approve each app they download. They also are not allowed on the Internet in their bedroom and I have to have access to all passwords at all times so I can check whatever I want whenever I want. No Facebook or Twitter allowed for the kids either.
John: We monitor by only allowing him to use his laptop in the dining room where there is a wired connection for him. His wireless card is disabled and just incase the card does activate the MAC is blocked in
the router. All his emails have a copy sent to me automatically (set on my mail server). But you know the best thing we did? We raised him right and he talks to us about everything.
Ron in San Jose, California listening on KLIV asked: “I am running XP 32 bit version. I want to upgrade to Windows 7 64 bit. My processor is an Intel Q9550 and motherboard is a Gigabyte GA-EP45C-UD3R. Both the processor and motherboard are 64 bit compatible. Can I anticipate any problems during the upgrade? I will do a clean install.”
From the hardware side, you probably won’t face too many obstacles, like you said, your hardware is 64-bit compatible, so that should be enough. You will face problems on the software side of things though, a 32-bit version of Windows cannot be directly upgraded to a 64- bit version, you can install it on your machine, and it will run just fine, but the installation will not preserve your settings and files.
You’re going to have to do a “custom clean” installation, which means that by the end of it you’re going to have a computer that will feel as if you had just brought it home from the store, no files, no custom settings or custom wallpaper set, it will just be a computer with a clear copy of Windows and nothing else.
If you backup your files before the installation, though, you should be able to easily restore everything back to your computer after Windows 7 is installed, just keep in mind you absolutely need to back up first or you will lose all you data.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Guest in this hour:
Scott Rosenberg, Co-founder & CEO – Umami TV
How many of you watch TV and keep your smartphone or tablet handy to research anything your hear on the show? Our next guest has created an app dubbed as your “TV companion.”
“IFA History Feature” brought to you by Messe-Berlin
In August of 1930 Albert Einstein was the keynote speaker at the opening of the 7th “Big German Radio Exhibition”, today known as IFA. The show was held at the Berlin fairgrounds which were now centered around the newly erected “Berlin Radio Tower” or “Funkturm”, the German name of this national landmark which is still one of the main attractions of Berlin, like the Eiffel Tower in Paris after which the “Funkturm”
had been modeled. At the show, TV receivers with the mechanical Nipkow disc where shown, but the company Loewe demonstrated the first television set with a Braun tube.
Donald in St. Croix, US Virgin Islands listening on WSTX 970 AM asked: ” I’m making a studio at my home for music and videos. I would like to know what’s the best PC I could use right now? A business workstation, a gaming PC, or a home and office? Thank you.”
Any of those types of computers will work “in theory.” However, a gaming PC is what we always recommend if your gonna do a lot of video and audio editing. The reason is that “gaming” PCs generally have more RAM, faster processors, more video memory, and all that kind of cool stuff that makes a computer run faster. When you’re playing a game, you don’t want your computer to be running slow. It could mean the difference between life and death. (Well, at least virtually — in the game.)
Audio editing doesn’t really require a whole lot of processing power, unless you’re getting into a lot of multi-track music editing with effects. Video editing on the other hand, especially high definition, is very “resource hungry” meaning it will consume a lot of the memory and processing speed on a computer. So you want to make sure you have enough to go around. That’s why a gaming PC is probably your best option. Yes, they are a little more pricey, but you are getting the extra speed and power you need for your money.
You can certainly save some money by purchasing a lesser video card, however. You sure don’t need an AMD Radeon 7900 series card running in Crossfire mode to edit music and videos. You’ll be able to save hundreds of dollars by choosing a more mainstream card.
Make sure you’re getting something with lots of RAM and a fast hard drive. Ideally, it would be nice to have an SSD for the operating system and applications and a large traditional drive for storing the files long-term.
Mark has bought gaming PCs from Dell and iBuyPower, with good results from both. Newegg.com often has special pricing on iBuyPower computers, so check there first even before you check the iBuyPower web site directly.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Gloria in Nashville, Tennessee listening on WTN 99.7 FM asked: “Hi Dave! How can I connect my husband’s iPhone 3G to our wireless? It shows up on WiFi, but never asks for a password. Thanks!”
Your husband’s iPhone should only need to ask for a password the first time it connects to a new network. If it’s not asking for a password and showing up as connected to WiFi, it seems to be doing what it’s supposed to do.
If you mean that your home network shows up on the phone and it still won’t connect to it or ask for the password it needs, the phone may be remembering the wrong password for that network and not asking for the correct one for some reason.
You can tap on the network that’s not working from the list of WiFi networks and then hit “Forget Network”. That will make the phone forget the password for that particular network, but it will retain the rest of the network configuration.
If that doesn’t work, you can go to Settings, and then “Reset Network Settings,” but keep in mind that doing that will clear all of your network settings, not just the settings for this one particular network.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Jim from Idaho Falls, Idaho listening on KBLY 690 AM asked: “I am running Windows Vista. I have a Seagate solid state 500GB drive. I had the drive full, so I reformatted it with Windows format program. I backed my system to the Seagate drive. I reformatted my C drive, and reinstalled Win Vista. I now want to retrieve some of the data, not reinstall the whole system. Is there a program that will do the job?”
It depends on how you backed up the files. If you just copied the files over, then yes, just open your Seagate drive and look for the file you need. If you used some program to back up the files, it depends on what program you used. Some software will save onto one file, while some will basically make a copy of your hard drive, file by file, in their own folders.
Typically even the software that saves everything onto one file has a way of accessing the contents of the backup without making you bring everything back. Check the program you used, but there’s bound to be some sort of “browser” that will let you access the contents of the backup.
Sorry, we can’t give you more detailed instructions, but every piece of backup software is different and without knowing which one you used, we can’t tell you what steps to follow to access your files. If you call us back and give us more information, though, we’ll do our best to find more details for you.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Into Gaming Update with Mark Lautenschlager
At the 2012 edition of E, the Electronic Entertainment Exposition, several things stood out. First, Microsoft completely underwhelmed everyone who was expecting news on a next-gen Xbox console. Instead, they got a major dose of Halo 4 and Call of Duty Black Ops, and then a bunch of stuff about the Xbox 360 that had nothing to do, really, with gaming. The “big” announcement was the Xbox SmartGlass, which is an app for your existing tablets and devices to let them connect with the Xbox 360 sort of like the Wii U Gamepad controller. Yes, it can be used for gameplay. I’m betting it never is, though. Oh, and Internet Explorer for the Xbox 360? Greeeeaaaat.
Nintendo was making the most noise at E3 since they actually have a new console they intend to ship before the holiday season. They were showing off lots of shiny new games, and demonstrating how the Wii U’s Gamepad would coexist with the Wii Remote, sometimes in the same game. For example, players in Legend of Zelda using a sword would swing the Wii Remote, while those targeting with a bow and arrow would use the Wii Gamepad. Problem is, the Gamepad isn’t as smart as it should be. It seems to frequently get confused when you’re tipping it about, and you have to recalibrate it with the motion sensor often. The battery life is about 3 to 5 hours also, which is the cost of having a screen in it. Wii U is a good concept and if Nintendo sticks with it, this will eventually catch on, but it may not fly off the shelves like the original Wii did.
As for the games, well, once again it’s the year of the polished, derivative title or outright sequel. Assassin’s Creed III IS going to rock, no doubt, and the Skyrim expansion and Elder Scrolls MMO are both big news, but there wasn’t anything about E3 this year that made you say “wow! look at that!” Except, perhaps, for this final tidbit. The Entertainment Software Alliance, who puts on E3, had some figures for us. The average age of the US gamer is now 30. THIRTY! Who knew? They favor smartphone and tablet games as much as console or computer games, and in 2011 the industry as a whole (games, hardware, controllers, apps, peripherals, and so forth) racked up $25 billion in sales. Not bad for a market people keep saying is dying, eh? ~ Mark Lautenschlager | Twitter: @MarkLaut
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This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
Kingston: 16GB SD memory cards and a MobileLite G3 (USB 3.0 Card Reader)
Radio Shack: Auvio Element Earbuds with Microphone
ZoneAlarm (Check Point Software): Download keys for ZoneAlarm Extreme Security