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Tech News & Commentary
“This Week in Tech History” Weekly Feature with Chris Graveline
Lee in Ohio listening on CKLW 800 asked us: “I’m wondering what’s the best way to dispose an old computer as how to wipe off the hard-drive and get your information off of it before taking it to a recyclable event.”
Lee, When backing up all your information, you can use either a USB-drive or hard drive or even a cloud service such as Dropbox, iCloud, or Microsoft OneDrive. With cloud services, an account is required for use of the service. Once you backup all your data, you need to wipe the hard-drive using a secure wiping program which can be found on the internet for free. A great safe software you can use is DBAN which will overwrite your hard-drive.
When someone decides to recycle, they do it out of good intention, but when it comes to electronic waste, it gets a little tricky. Many e-waste recycle companies don’t necessarily recycle the electronics.
If you want to properly dispose your computer in the most eco-friendly way possible, please consider e-Steward, a non-profit organization intended to prevent e-waste dumping in developing countries. You can visit e-stewards.org to find a certified recycler around you.
Now another way to destroy the data would be to get violent with the hard drive by bashing it to pieces with a hammer. This way you’ve gotten some tech rage out, and you won’t have any worries about anyone retrieving data the stored on the hard drive. If you plan to donate it to a charity or just want to recycle it without destroying it, than looking into the software to remove the data will be the best route.
For more information tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.
Brian in Cleveland, Ohio listens via Tune-In asked us: “I upgraded my iPhone 5s to iOS 8. Have you heard anything about battery issues. Seems like my battery drains a lot quicker when the phone is just sitting on my desk in Airplane mode. My iPhone was 50% better before the upgrade.”
Brian, It’s hard to say for sure because we always hear about battery issues, after every update, on every platform. There have been some reports about battery issues with iOS 8 too, but there have also been reports of better battery life.
The best advice we can offer is that if you are having issues with your battery life, the answer may be under General, Usage and Battery Usage, that will tell you how much of your battery each app has been using, including battery usage while running in the background.
That may shed some light on how to solve the issue for you, if it’s a problem with the update itself, you can only wait for a patch, but if it’s a particular problem stemming from the set of apps you have installed on your phone and the setting those apps are running under, that may help you solve the problem.
Keep in mind that some apps may have issues with iOS 8 in particular, and may have started acting up since the update, so spotting those may make your issues disappear.
I’ve upgraded my iPhone 5 and my iPad 3 to iOS 8, and I’ve not noticed any worse battery life with either of them. So I would suggest that there isn’t some general across the board problem with iOS 8 that’s killing batteries, but like we suggested it might be one of your apps that isn’t working properly under iOS 8. You should be sure you’ve updated all of your apps to the latest version.
If nothing else seems to work, you can always connect your iPhone to iTunes and choose to wipe the phone, setting it up as a new phone. please be sure you’ve backed up all your pictures and anything else that’s stored on the phone itself that you wouldn’t want to lose. This method will require you to download all of your apps again and enter all of your settings again, but it is the proverbial “big hammer” for sorting out weird problems on an iPhone. Sometimes, upgrades go sideways, and starting over fresh is the only way to get things sorted.
Since it came out recently, you can also just try upgrading to 8.1 now, if there was anything wrong with iOS 8, it may have been fixed before the 8.1 release.
For more information tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.
Tim in Sparta, Tennessee listening on WTN 99.7 and calling in via the App asked us: “I am looking for an app that will allow me to text my son from my Android phone to his iPod Touch. I don’t really want to go to an iPhone, so I’m trying to find something that’s compatible to both of us so he can text me while he’s at the house and I’m at work.”
Tim, A great free app that you should consider is TextPlus available for both Android and IOS. You can get an unlimited texting group and even also lets you set up your own phone number. It is ad-supported, but it will get the job done. TextNow is another free unlimited texting app similar to TextPlus but just with a simpler interface.
There are however hundreds of messaging apps that work on both iOS and Android that you could use, for example: Skype, WhatsApp, Google Hangouts, Viber, Kik, Yahoo Messenger, Nimbuzz, Line, Tango, Pinger, BBM and lots and lots more.
Basically, as soon as users figured out that you can text for free using your data and it has less of an effect over the course of a month than opening a single YouTube video does, messaging apps got popular. They’re all basically the same, pick whichever you like best.
For more information tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.
Guest Segment:
John Dick, CEO and founder – CivicScience, Inc.
CEA Update
Product Spotlight Segment
Frank in Nashville, Tennessee listens on WTN 99.7 asked us: “I had a co-worker just buy a new car and I was fascinated by all the electronics in the car. Are all electronics the same in all the vehicles on the road now or are they different? Also – he used a cell phone. All he did was speak a number and it called it. I was wondering how close they are to having like a Google search in the car where you can speak your search and it would pop up the results on a screen.”
Frank, It all depends on the make and model of the vehicle you get. Each car has different options available when purchasing cars. The more tech in the car the more expensive the vehicle will be.
Almost every new car has bluetooth capabilities and satellite radio, however you pay for the satellite radio monthly through SiriusXM Radio. There a lot of new features that you have to add into the cars, which as mentioned before increase the vehicles value. Navigation systems are very helpful because they keep you off your phone, and you’re eyes on the road more. When traveling if you select certain options it will tell you the closest gas station, restaurants, service stations, and even where there is current road construction.
As far as the Google searching in a car, we’re sure the Google self-driving cars will come with that feature later on, but your personal car will get it if it has Android Auto.
Apple has been trying to standardize in car “infotainment” systems with their CarPlay systems, but they haven’t made much progress with it so far. Google has now introduced Android Auto to compete with CarPlay, and our guess is that it will be the one more widely adopted over time. While we don’t know exactly what Apple and Google charge, we would be surprised if Apple’s CarPlay was free, just as we would be surprised if Google’s Android Auto WASN’T free.
Until one of these two standard interfaces becomes widely available, you’re stuck with the in car infotainment systems from the vehicle manufacturer, although you could purchase an aftermarket system if you found one you really liked better. What these systems can do vary widely from car maker to car maker, from model to model, and can even vary in the same model line with varying trim levels.
So you really need to check out the system in the specific vehicle you are considering buying. And yes, many infotainment systems will already give you Google Maps and its associated local search capability.
For more information tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Gary in Santamaria, California calling in via the App asked us: “I have two questions for you… I’m hearing popping and cracking sounds coming from a new monitor I just bought. And also, I have a question on Windows 8. When I’m online and I have things that are up in front of me, I come out of the room and noticed that they minimize down to the corner. Is that supposed to do that?”
Gary, The popping and crackling noise you might be experiencing is probably due to a static charge inside the monitor. First, check if the plug is plugged properly and isn’t loose. Another possibility of the noises can be the power cord itself that is plugged. We suggest you to be cautious when using your computer, the noises could also be due to a high voltage monitor that wasn’t manufactured properly. The best advice we be to contact your monitor’s manufacturer and if you have warrenty, they can probably exchange the monitor at no cost.
Normally, your computer shouldn’t be minimizing your windows when you leave. A software or program you might have installed might be causing this problem. Some softwares might have a certain conflicts with Windows 8 since Windows 8 is still kind of new.
Definitely make sure you have someone look at that monitor, CRTs used to get charged to over 20,000 volts internally, newer monitors don’t reach those levels but, depending on how it’s being backlit, yours may be getting a charge of 2,000 or 3,000 volts.
It won’t do anyone any good to have that constantly discharging. Sooner or later it will fry something inside your screen, or it may even start a fire… have it looked at.
For more information tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
Breathometer: Several of their Breeze – Smartphone breathalyzers
NewPotato Technologies:Classic Match Fooseball Turns your iPad into a fooseball table
Firefold:Ultra High Performance HDMI Switcher
NewerTech:Voyager Q – SATA Hard Drive docking solution