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Tech News & Commentary
Willy in Columbia, Missouri listening online asked: “I’m looking for the best products to make my surround sound system completely wireless.”
It’s going to be tough to do a completely wireless system. There aren’t that many of them on the market. True audiophiles and even people that really enjoy their home theater systems will tell you that the wireless technology is just not “there” yet. Yes, we see a lot of wireless speakers. Most are in the form of bluetooth speakers for MP3 players.
You don’t see a lot of wireless audio devices for home theater because they typically use RF signals which are very prone to interference from things like Wi-fi, walls and even a microwave oven.
However, you will find some products that allow you to wirelessly connect your speakers. And these typically work with most speakers. One that we came across is the Rocketfish Universal Wireless Rear Speaker Kit. As the name implies this is a kit that will allow you to hook your existing speakers up wirelessly. There is a base station that you hook up to your amplifier or tuner. Then there is a receiver module that you can place up to 100 feet away and connect your speakers to. This device has gotten some good reviews. You can find it starting at around $110.
For more information tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
“This Week in Tech History” Weekly Feature with Chris Graveline
Barry in Las Vegas, Nevada calling in via the app: “I have a question about Ultrabooks. I hear a lot about Ultrabooks lately and I don’t know how the different from a regular laptop computer, could you please explain the difference?”
Ultrabooks are high-end, very thin and very light laptops with long battery lives. They’re kinda like the Windows version of Macbook Air.
They’re not like netbooks, which have long battery lives, small screens and low prices. Ultrabooks will typically cost around $1000, as low as maybe $800 and high as over $1000. They have larger screens, usually 13-inches and up.
Since they’re very slim, they don’t always have many ports. So you may have a couple of USB ports and not much else. They’re meant to be fairly high-end laptops, so it’s very common to find solid state drives, a good amount for RAM and respectable processing power on them. You will usually be able to find a regular laptop with better processing power than an Ultrabook for the same price, but considering the extreme portability Ultrabooks offer, you get
a pretty good deal when you get one anyway. Just don’t get one to use it as a gaming machine or a video editing workstation.
If you’re in the market for a Windows based Ultrabook, make sure you look for one with the “Ivy Bridge” chipset. That’ll get you the third-generation Intel Core i3/i5/or i7 processor, the improved HD 4000 integrated graphics processor, and USB 3.0 in addition to Thunderbolt (introduced with Sandy Bridge, the previous generation).
For more information tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Robert in Fairbanks, Alaska listening on KFBX 970 AM asked: “I’d like to know where is a credible place to get free software for home or business use. Maybe like Adobe Photoshop, Word Express, something along the lines of that.”
You’re not really going to find any “credible” websites that will let you download software like Photoshop and Word for free. Photoshop costs hundreds of dollars, Word not as much, but it’s still not free.
Your options for getting something like that for free are to either a) get an alternative software. For example, Gimp is similar to Photoshop and free. And, LibreOffice’s Writer is similar to Word and free. Or, b) get an illegal copy.
If you look around you will find plenty of websites that will let you download software illegally. Frankly, you probably won’t have to do much more than to type the name of the software followed by the word “torrent” to find those sites, but they won’t be credible websites or always safe for that matter.
To go even further, we would say that it’s a virtual guarantee that IF you install some program with a keylogger or other malware that steals information off your machine, it’ll be a pretty good chance that it came off a bit torrent or some other “warez” site. Totally apart from the fact that it’s illegal and it just doesn’t make sense to steal someone else’s work, it’s very dangerous.
For more information tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Guest in this hour:
Ayesha Khanna, Co-Author of “Hybrid Reality” / Founder & Director of the Hybrid Reality Institute, among other things.
Ayesha says: “Survival of the fittest
will soon depend much less on IQ or EQ than on our Technology Quotient.” Learn about “Hybrid Reality” and how it affects you.
PRODUCT SPOTLIGHT with Rob: Camera+ iPhone App
Want to enhance your iPhoneography skills? Rob shares his secret to his most popular pictures on Instagram.
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You can take pictures within the app. It transforms your iCamera into sort of a virtual digital SLR. You have a stabilizer option, a timer option (great for self- portraits and group shots), and a Burst mode (not the best quality, but it works).Pictures are then saved in your Lightbox, your work area. Select the picture you want to edit and the magic begins.With Camera+, you can enhance the lighting of any picture in the Scenes tab. My most favorite option is “Clarity”. I prefer it over the “auto-enhance” option. And you have other choices depending on the environment the picture was taken, like you would choose on your digital camera.
You can also adjust the orientation of each image and crop. Because almost all of my pictures end up on Instagram, I’ve been using the preset “square” cropping tool on all of my iPhotos. There are 27 filters to play with. An additional 9 are available as an in-app purchase for 99 cents. My most used filters are: Purple Haze, So Emo, Tail Fins, and HDR. What’s great is that you can control the intensity of each filter and it’s not forcefully preset for you. Once you’re finished choosing your desired filter, you can add a border if you want. I’ve been using the rounded white a lot lately. And that’s it. Now, you can export it to your Camera Roll or share across Facebook or Twitter from within the app. What needs some improvement … One of my few complaints about Camera+ is that it doesn’t allow you to use more than one filter at a time. Once you choose a filter you like, that’s it. Also, I wish it would keep every picture you’ve worked on in your Lightbox after you save it, rather than closing it all together. Because then you have to go through the trouble of finding the picture and importing it from the Camera Roll if you want to add another filter to it. I hope we see that in Version 3. Camera+ is currently available on the App Store for 99 cents, for a limited time.
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Rich in New Bedford, Massachusetts asked: “Hi Dave! I have a PC using Windows 7 Ultimate. I use dual 23-inch monitors and I wanted to try Windows 8. Can I use my dual monitor setup with Win 8? I primarily use my PC for gaming and video. Your thoughts?”
You can use dual monitors on Windows 8, even the pre-release previews had support for dual screens.
You might want to check to make sure your video card is supported by Windows 8 at launch, just in case, and keep in mind that you may face some compatibility issues with games or other software when Windows 8 first comes out. Other than that, you should be fine, Windows 8 will support dual monitors.
For more information tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
HOUR 3:
Tech News & Commentary
Gaylord in Detroit, Michigan listens to the podcast asked: “Do you know if Amazon is coming out with an updated or new Kindle Fire2 this year? I own the original Kindle Fire.”
According to rumors, there will be a Fire 2 this year. No one really knows exactly when it’s coming out. Some people say this summer, some say September, some say before Christmas. The only things all rumors seem to agree on are that it’s coming this year, and that it’s going to have an 8.9 inch screen.
Some people even claim we should expect 3 tablets, 2 7-inch ones with different resolution and an 8.9 inch. You should probably expect to see a new one soon, but when it will come out and what it will be like is pretty much still a mystery.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
“Into
Gaming Update” Weekly Feature with Mark Lautenschlager
Group Discussion: Viper SmartStart Bluetooth Module
Julie in Hartsville, Tennessee listens on WTN, calling in via the App and asked: “I have a question about uploading video to YouTube, I have a Panasonic camcorder that’s not the newest, but when I upload my videos onto YouTube they become squished, I’m recording them at the 16:9 aspect ratio and I don’t think YouTube asks me any questions about how I wanted uploaded, but if you could help me I’d appreciate it.”
Aircards will most likely not work with many tablets at all. The Archos 101 G9 comes with a built in aircard, and it allows 3G tethering from a cellphone. But, for the most part if you want connectivity on tablets you will need either WiFi or a tablet with a built-in 3G or 4G chip.
If you’re willing to pay for an aircard just for the tablet, consider getting a 3G or a 4G tablet. If this is an aircard that you’d use with a computer as
well, then maybe you should look into getting a MiFi type of device. You’ll pay a monthly fee like you would with an aircard, but the WiFi network it creates can be used with any tablet you choose, and you could even use it with your laptop at the same time, as it supports more than one device simultaneously.
You don’t have to go through a cell phone provider to buy either an aircard or a MiFi. You can buy them through third party stores like Best Buy, but you will need to get service from someone, which may mean a contract
or a prepaid plan. Either way you’ll be getting it from a cell phone service provider.
The challenge on the North Slope is finding good coverage. Alaska Wireless has invested in cell towers that cover the Prudhoe Bay and surrounding North Slope areas quite well. They sell the Novatel MiFi device for $79 and their mobile broadband data plans are priced about the same as anyone else’s. 5GB of data per month will cost $29, 10GB is $59, and 20GB is $99. If you’re not in the Prudhoe Bay area, then we’d need to know more specifically where you are to suggest a provider, but Google can find one for you also. Search for your zip code and the nearest city name, combined with “cell phone coverage,” and you’ll hit a gold mine of information.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Guest in this hour:
Dave Vigil, President – Snaptracs
What if your pet were to run away? Would you be able to find them easily? Learn about Tagg and see how it can help us track our beloved animals.
“IFA History Feature” brought to you by Messe-Berlin
In 1933 at the 10th Funkausstellung, today known as IFA, several companies had already presented TV sets with bigger screens ready for the market, now about the size of a postcard instead of a postage stamp, with 180 lines and 25 frames per second. These receivers were expensive, but the engineer Dr.Walter Bruch from Telefunken developed a small and cheaper unit for the masses, named “Volksempfänger” which is German for “people’s receiver”. Two years later in 1935 the first regular TV broadcast in the world started in Berlin, with 90 minutes three times a week.
Rob in Hoboken, New Jersey listening online and calling in via the Free App asked: “I have a question about cell phones. Mobile phone screens are getting bigger and their processing speeds are getting faster, but still these phones can’t get you through a full day even if you’re using them lightly. When do you think manufacturers are gonna realize that battery life is a real issue for users?”
YouTube supports 16:9 aspect ratio for their videos, what your camera is calling 16:9 though, may actually be anamorphic video (especially if it’s old), which will look fine if you play it directly, but it won’t when you upload it
to something like YouTube or most of the other video-sharing sites. YouTube considers pixels to be perfectly square, so sometimes sources that claim to be 16:9 don’t show up as 16:9 in YouTube.
An easy fix for that is to add “yt:stretch=16:9” to your video’s tags, that will force the video to show in it’s intended aspect ratio.
In the future, if you import a video from your camera make sure that you use something like 640×360 or 853×480 as your resolution, and if you see an option for setting the “pixel aspect ratio” make sure it’s either 1.0, 1:1 or “square,” all of those will give you square pixels and they should work well with YouTube.
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
Boingo: Several 60-day Certificates — With Boingo you can connect online at free and paid Wi-Fi hotspots.
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