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Tech News and Commentary
Dave and the team discuss Apple’s new Mac Pro, iTunes retirement, macOS Catalina, a new voice for Siri, Chinese Tesla Model 3s, Style Snap for Amazon, AI animals, Target’s digital sales increase, the Echo Show 5, and more.
Denise in Mississippi listens on SuperTalk Mississippi and asked: “I have a 6s iPhone and when I’m at my house I can not hear other people calling. In the city where there’s plenty of towers, it’s not a problem. Just at my house in the country. Is there a solution for that problem?”
Denise, that just sounds like you have a lousy signal at home. There are some ways around that but they are dependent on a couple of things.
The first solution would be a repeater like the weBoost and SureCall we regularly talk about. Those are installed in a way that allow them to pick up the good signal outside your home via more powerful antennas, and have an indoor module that repeats it inside your house. Unfortunately, that means that they need that signal outside and if you don’t have good signal when you stand right outside your house, they’re probably not an option for you.
You can also try WiFi calling, there’s nothing too complex about it, you turn it on in your phone’ settings then connect your phone to your home’s WiFi network and it routes the calls through the internet, only you don’t have to be aware of that. You can still answer and dial your phone as if it was using a tower, without ever having to think about whether or not it’s actually doing that.
The third option would be a combination of the two above, cellphone companies used to make available a sort of micro tower that would give service to the phones inside your house by routing the calls through the internet. The problem with this approach is that since phones themselves include that feature now, those devices are rare and rarely offered these days.
Kerri in Nashville, Tennessee listens on WTN 99.7 and asked: “I have an LG phone, the G7 ThinQ. And I want to load Mcafee Livesafe virus protection but google play keeps trying to override it with their own McAfee anti virus. Wondering how I can get around that. My second question is: I am not a fan of Google. And obviously you have to use Google to make the camera “into the options place” on this phone to work well. How do I get around doing that?”
Kerri, the McAfee website has the full instructions on how to download LiveSafe to your devices.
The process involves logging into your account, clicking on the plus sign to add a smartphone and under “add a device” clicking on send link.
That link will arrive via email allowing you to accept their license and then be redirected to the page in the app store of your choice to download the LiveSafe version for your device.
After that, frankly, it won’t do much other than occasionally nag you to remind you that it’s there. Smartphones are secure devices designed very differently from old computers and they’re not as prone to viruses as even modern computers are. The main infection vector for a smartphone user is the user, not the smartphone. Try not to fall for scams, that the main danger.
Joe in Lincoln, Nebraska listens online and asked: “I do a lot of presentations and travel around the country. I find myself sometimes in a situation where there is not a projector ready for me. And so I would like to get some information on pocket-sized projectors and what they would cost and which you think would be the best one.”
Joe, it sounds like you’re in the market for what is known as a pico projector.
Keep in mind that they won’t be as bright or as good as fullsized projectors, but even lesser quality it beats having nothing to show at a meeting.
The AAXA Pico LCoS is generally well liked and it will set you back around $130. It has HDMI and analog video ports, so you should be able to get it plugged into your computer relatively easily.
AAXA’s catalog is worth browsing, look at their offering online at any big retailer like Amazon or Best Buy and see what would work for you, they have many small projectors and you may get a better one if you’re willing to settle for one that may be more of a computer bag projector than a pocket projector.
ViewSonic has its own portable projector, it’s not quite pocketable and it costs $300, but they should know a thing or two about getting a decent picture by now, so they may be worth a look to, if you can afford the price.
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