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Tech News & Commentary
Terry in Nunley, TN listens on SuperTalk 99.7 WTN asked: “I have an iPad and the only time I can get on the Internet is when I have Wi-Fi. I wanted to find out – because I’m electronically illiterate – if there was a way I can pick up Internet other than that way.”
Storage and colors aside, iPads come in two flavors: WiFi + 3G or WiFi only, you bought a WiFi only version. That means that natively there’s nothing the iPad can do to connect to the internet other than connecting to a WiFi network.
You do have options though, what you’re looking for is a way to generate a WiFi hotspot on the go that your iPad can connect to, and depending on what phone you have, you may even be able to do that today!
If you have a somewhat new smartphone, and your carrier allows it, you may have a “Personal Hotspot” option. If you have that option, check and make sure that whoever is providing you with cellphone service won’t charge you a small fortune to use it, but you should be able to turn it on and let your iPad connect to your phone as if it was any other WiFi network. That would give you access on the go in the simplest way possible.
Failing that, you can always look into a MiFi type of device, it will do exactly the same as the Personal Hotspot on a smartphone, but it’s a standalone device, the clear downsides of using one of these instead of a phone are that you have to remember to take it without you wherever you take your iPad, and that you would have to actually buy one. Another advantage of using a smartphone, if that’s an option for you, is that your plan MAY include a pool of data that you can use as you see fit, so there’s the possibility that you may be able to do this without having to pay anything extra.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
“Into Gaming Update” Weekly Feature with Mark Lautenschlager
David in Albany, New York and listening via Android App asked: “I have never owned a computer, and I have been saving for two years for a new computer. I’d like to buy one. All I do is surf the net and email, as well as, streaming. Since I do not own TV, that’s how I will watch TV. What computer would be in the range of $450-$500 would be the best choice? Durability is very important, I’ll probably never be able to afford a new one.”
It’s hard to recommend a laptop for life no matter what, but it’s even harder on your budget. Typically, the price of a laptop is pretty directly related to how reliable and well built it is.
Having to stick to that budget, we’d look at Lenovo machines, they’re typically not the nicest looking computers, but they’re very reliable. The EDGE E350 meets your needs and is within your budget.
The ASUS K55 series may also be worth a look, it’s a pretty well equipped computer that you can buy for around $450, and ASUS has been scoring pretty hard on quality and reliability lately, on top of that, the 15.6” screen should make it adequate to watch shows on, and you always have the option of connecting it to a TV for a larger screen if you choose to buy one.
Acer hasn’t been scoring too badly on reliability lately either, and the V3 series, has models in your price range that will certainly meet your needs.
You’re really not asking for much, if all you want to do is email, web surfing and streaming, you may even by a candidate for a netbook or a chromebook, those tend to be cheaper, and if they fit your needs, you may even be able to get to keep some of that money you saved. Buying one of them also means that you’ll have a much easier learning curve, and if you’ve never had a computer before, that may be an issue for you.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Greg from the Virgin Islands listens via the App asked: “How can I open WMV video on my iPhone 5?”
You have a few options, the most obvious one would be… get ready for the cryptic name: WMV Player… yes, it is that easy.
You can also look at a few other options, iMedia Player will play WMV too and it’s free, where a WMV Player would cost you $1.99.
You do have options, but you may want to look into just converting the file. If you can get it to M4V or MP4 format, there are some free tools that will help you do that, and the iPhone’s native video player is probably better than most alternatives you’ll find.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
John in Decatur, Alabama listens via the App asked: “I’m having problems with Windows 7 Ultimate. When it starts up, it asks for a user. It used to not have the user on there and I was wondering if there’s a possibility to eliminate that.”
If you only have one user account on a Windows machine, you can bypass the welcome screen and log straight in by clicking the Start button, entering the command “netplwiz.exe” in the Run box and pressing Enter. Clear the check box beside “Users must enter a user name and password to use this computer.”
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Guest Segment:
Tom Sumner, Sr. Vice President – Yamaha
“IFA History Feature” brought to you by Messe-Berlin
The Compact Cassette, invented by Philips, started its very successful career as the most popular and very practical recording medium in 1963 at the Big German Radio Exhibition in Berlin, today known as IFA. This tiny cassette made prerecorded music portable for the first time, and later allowed people to record their own music and listen to it outside their home. 16 years later in 1979, the Sony Walkman was introduced at IFA in Berlin and created a new world of portable music, based on the Compact Cassette.
Tom in St. Louis, Missouri listens to the Podcast asked: “I’ve had a free Yahoo account for 9 years and having had it since 2004, I’ve never had a problem until the last 10 months. My account has been hacked twice and everyone in my address has received a dubious link each time. I’m wondering how Yahoo accounts are hacked, I’m assuming they’re hacked and what can be done to prevent that from happening other than switching to Gmail?”
Yahoo is probably just as safe as the other guys when it comes to their email security.
People throw the term ‘hack’ around and they talk about hacking Yahoo Mail, hacking Facebook, hacking Twitter, and when people hear that … they think of some nefarious guy, in a dark room, watching walls of text go by on the screen, in front of a computer that makes weird beeping noises that normal computers haven’t ever made. That’s TV… in the real world, the person “hacking” your account is probably not attacking Yahoo’s servers in any way, instead they’re probably just “forgetting” your password.
See, companies like Yahoo will make you choose a password with at least 14,000 letter and numbers, uppercase and lowercase with symbols… and when you forget that password, they let you set a new one by answering super secure questions like “what city do you live in?”.
Google has been pushing very hard to get your phone number, so they can let YOU change your password, or at least the person with YOUR phone, but pretty much every company is continuing their “dumb question if you forget your ultra secure password” policies.
Next time you log in change your password recovery settings, lie, but tell a lie you’ll remember and hopefully those guessing the answers to your security questions will fail in the attempt and move on.
Google has added two-factor authentication to Gmail, to try and combat account hacking. This fancy sounding technical term just means “to log in, it’s not just what you know, it’s also what you have.” In this case, your phone. You give Google a mobile phone number for your Gmail account, and whenever you log in they will send you a six digit code via text message to your phone. You must enter that code to log in.
You can set an option to have it remember you for 30 days on the computer you’re logging in from, so you will only be annoyed by it once each month, unless you are in the habit of logging in from many different devices. It will, however, send the text message each time you try and log in with a new device.
So if you get a text from Google with a login code, and you’re NOT trying to log in, then you know right then that someone is trying to hack your account.
All that being said Tom, we wouldn’t advise you to switch from Yahoo to Gmail for security purposes, but for professional purposes. You might find this ridiculous, and it is, but people actually do in fact judge you based on your email address.
In the professional world especially, if someone doesn’t have an email address from gmail but instead has one from yahoo or even, dare I say it, AOL, they seem out of touch with the current standards of proper netiquette.
Think of it as your digital dress attire, you can either wear shorts and a t-shirt when doing business with people which would be yahoo or aol. Or you can wear a suit and use gmail. Based on what field of work you’re in, you can gauge which is more appropriate for you.
If you are not in any kind of business where first impressions are crucial, and honestly I can’t think of any off the top of my head where they aren’t, you might not be concerned with that sort of thing. But rest assured, it is a very real phenomenon.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Joanne in Harrington, Delaware asked: “What other equipment is out there for the visually impaired? Equipment like computers & radios that can be accessible for the visually impaired.”
It’s hard to say really, most of what’s out there for sighted people has some version for blind people.
There seems to be a big trend in walking GPS devices to help the blind navigate the world on their own, but most of the devices are still concepts.
There are machines to help translate the written word into either braille or spoken word, so that blind users can read or listen to, for example, a newspaper or website, rather than being limited to literature with a braille version.
There are some kitchen appliances that come without built in alarms, for example, if you’re pouring water into a jar, you can always use your finger to make sure you don’t pour too much and spill it, however, if you’re pouring boiling water, an audible alarm might be a welcome feature, and those exist.
There are obviously lots of visually impaired friendly watches, from the old style ones with a liftable watch face to touch the hands, to newer cool designs that features surfaces that make the the time obvious by touching them.
There are plenty of useful technologies for the blind, the real question is, what needs do you need met? If you can tell us that we can look for specific solutions to that, but we can’t really name every technology out there… as technology becomes more useful, it becomes more useful for everyone and much of it is being applied at helping people become less limited and more independent.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
If you have any questions about any of this week’s show info, please email us here.
This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
Akitio: Neutrino Thunder Duo – 2-bay Thunderbolt Hard Drive enclosure
V Moda Headphones: a variety of styles of the DJ Inspired, Hollywood Designed Headphones
Ventev: An assortment of tangle-free USB cables and battery cases for iPhones