HOUR 2:
Tech News & Commentary
Charles in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania asked: “I’m interested in when solid state hard drives will be a common feature in computers, especially laptops. Or if they already exist, how come we don’t know about it?”
We talk about solid state drives quite often here on the broadcast. But of course, that’s what we do – keeping up with the technology of tomorrow for our listeners today. I’d say the reason why they are not more commonly included as standard equipment on computers is cost. Solid state drives, or SSDs, are still quite expensive when compared with standard rotating media hard drives.
Two examples of SSDs in laptops are the new MacBook Air models, all of which use SSD storage for increased performance, and the Sony Vaio “Z Series” laptops, many of which use SSDs, and some of which include SSDs in RAID 0 configuration for even faster performance. (No, RAID doesn’t have anything to do with the demise of insects. Redundant Array of Inexpensive Drives is a technology of writing data to multiple drives at the same time. RAID 0 writes a small amount of information to each of several drives for performance. RAID 1 writes the complete amount of information to several drives for data redundancy and backup. There are several other RAID types, as well.)
In desktop computers, SSDs have been used primarily in gaming machines that are seeking the ultimate performance. Capacities commonly range from 64GB to 320GB, although 480GB SSDs were recently introduced. One interesting product for adding an SSD to your system without a lot of cabling hassles is the OCZ RevoDrive. The RevoDrive is an SSD on a card that plugs in to your computer’s expansion bus. They’re priced about the same as other SSDs, and the installation can be a bit tricky from the software side, which is generally made up for being much simpler from the hardware side.
We don’t know that you’ll ever see a point where SSDs replace traditional hard drives entirely. It will probably always be cheaper to make enormous capacity hard drives than SSDs, and for many applications the amount of storage matters more than the speed of retrieval.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
“This Week in Tech History” Weekly Feature with Chris Graveline
Denny in St. Joseph, Missouri asked : “The new iPhone compared to the Droid X: Which one is better for the money. I’m an avid Apple user, but I would like to explore my options.”
The iPhone 4 and the Droid X are very similar in many respects. The iPhone 4 has Apple’s “Retina Display,” which gives it a higher pixel density than the Droid X. That means the screen will be a bit sharper, if perhaps a bit less bright. The Droid X has a larger screen than the iPhone 4, 4.3″ vs. 3.5″. That extra eight tenths of an inch makes the Droid X a better choice for watching videos, TV shows, or movies on your phone. The Droid X has an 8 megapixel camera, compared with the iPhone 4’s 5 megapixel, and our feeling is that it takes generally sharper, better exposed pictures. The performance of both phones is very responsive.
What it will really come down to is apps. The iPhone 4, of course, runs iOS. The Droid X runs Android. Which software you prefer is highly subjective. Android fans will tell you that their software supporting Flash lets them view “the entire web,” while iPhone users will explain that Flash slows your Droid to a crawl and they’d rather have a smoother web surfing experience and give up on some online movies, or even some web sites entirely.
The sheer number of apps is overwhelming on both platforms. Apple claims over 250,000 apps in their iTunes store and Android presently lists over 100,000. For what it’s worth, you should know that each keyboard variant, wallpaper color, etc., counts as a separate app. Generally speaking, you will find just about anything you’re looking for on either platform.
Android is a more open system, allowing developers of apps to distribute them through their own web sites as well as the Android Marketplace. iPhone apps are available only through the iTunes App Store. The former might provide for more variety, while the latter a higher level of quality assurance.
We think you’d be very happy with either phone, and we encourage you to spend some time using both of them at your local wireless store before deciding.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Doug asked us: “Is there any disadvantage to buying a refurbished iPod over a new one? Love the show.”
If you buy straight from Apple, you get the same warranty as you would on a non-refurbished iPod, a brand new box, brand new manuals, accessories, earbuds and even a new battery and a new outer shell, so basically you get some used parts and some new parts.
Since the iPod gets rechecked for quality after being refurbished and Apple offers the same warranty you’d get with a new iPod it seems like a fairly low risk gamble, worst case scenario you could use your “same-as-new” warranty to get it replaced.
If you’re not buying straight from Apple, check that the vendor offers the same warranty, since there are many third party companies that fix Apple products and they may be selling their own repaired iPods under a different warranty.
By the way, the same applies with their computers. You can’t go wrong buying refurbished products directly from Apple. In fact, a lot of these refurbs come from their show floor, where visitors play with these devices or end up returning recent purchases. Rob has friends that have purchased refurbs from them and they’ve been very happy with the process. The only thing to keep in mind is that there might be some minor scratches on these devices, depending on previous usage.
Tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast for more details.
Rickey in Columbus, Ohio asked us: “Is there a way to stream iTunes movies through my media center with my xBox 360 Media Extender. It plays music from iTunes but does not play movies.Is there any way to fix that?”
To do that you’re going to need a plugin for Windows Media Center that enables it to play iTunes content. The product we’re currently aware of that does this is “MCE Tunes” from Proxure. The Pro version, retailing for $29.99, supports TV shows and movies in addition to iTunes music in all formats.
That’s the good news. The bad news is, there is no “official” support for Windows 7. Only Windows Vista. Proxure has posted various statements on this through their official forums, but the last update was “before the end of 2010.” Frankly, from the tone of the postings, I get the impression that Proxure isn’t a large, or even well-organized, company.
A number of users of the product have posted to say it works fine on Windows 7, but others have had issues, and the lack of official support means Proxure won’t help you if you have problems. So use it at your own risk, we’re afraid!
But, if it works for you, it will let Windows Media Center playback all your iTunes content, including over the Xbox 360 media extender.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Guest in this hour:
Steve Fox, Editorial Director & VP – PC World
PC World’s “Best Tech Products of 2010” List is out. Who made the cut this year? Steve shares some his favorites and how they got on the list.
“Into Tomorrow” Product Spotlight with Rob Almanza: Holiday Gifts Part 1 — Click Here or on Rob’s face for details
‘Tis the season for all of us to try to figure out what gifts to get for our high tech friends this holiday. Rob brings you Part 1 of some of OUR suggestions. Items that you might want to take a look at, and that most of can afford.
Mike in Montgomery, Alabama asked: “I’m a truck driver and want to know if I can get by with a netbook while on the road.”
You certainly can use a netbook while out on the road. The main thing you need to worry about, though, is how you’re going to connect to the Internet. If you plan on using W-Fi at truck stops, you don’t need to worry about a thing. If you want to connect to the Internet when you are away from a Wi-Fi hotspot (NOT WHILE YOU’RE DRIVING) then, you need to look into a cellular air card.
All the major carriers have air cards available. Your best bet would be to look at their coverage maps and compare it to the areas you drive in. You want to make sure that you go with a company that has service in the same areas you are in. Otherwise, your aircard becomes a very expensive paperweight.
Another thing to keep in mind is what else you are going to be using the netbook for. If you want to use it to watch movies on your downtime, keep in mind that generally, netbooks do not have an optical drive, so DVDs are out. You could still use an online streaming service, or rent and download movies from iTunes or similar programs, but again, you need to have a good Internet connection to do that.
Tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast for more details.
This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
D-Link: Several MyDlink-enabled Wireless Network Cameras to keep an eye on your home.
Honestech: Copies of Claymation Studio 3.0 Deluxe with PC Camera included – stop motion video creation software
TrenMicro: Copies of Titanium 2011 — Maximum Internet Security including 10 gigs of online backup.
TuneUp: Copies of TuneUp Utilities – Optimization software for PCs.