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Tech News & Commentary
Steve listens to the Podcast and is calling via the App calling in via the app asked: “I listen on the App. I travel a lot and it’s like having a friend in my head. My 17 year-old has an iPod and goes through headphones like you wouldn’t believe. The earbud kind. Wondering if you recommend some that are a little more sturdy or durable. With a reasonable price in case he does tear them up.”
You should probably have a look at earbuds designed to workout with, those are usually expected to take more of a beating and built accordingly.
We’ve tried Yurbuds, their in-ear line ranges from the $29.99 for the regular Inspire, to about $99 for the Limited Edition Inspire. They’re supposed to be for athletes, so part of their appeal is the shape that keeps them from falling out during your workouts but, those same workouts mean that you’ll likely tug on them a little during use, so their cables are better lined and reinforced too. For the price, they may be worth a try. In fact, Dave gave our newest staffer, Cristian a pair and he runs and jumps and does some extreme sports stuff … and they don’t fall out of his ears.
This may fall outside the range of what you consider reasonably priced, but $99 Klipsch Image S4i is a ruggedized model for use outside, they are made to take a beating, they can take snow, rain, according to their own description “the concrete jungle” so, if you’re willing to make a bigger investment, they may work very well for your son, if he’s… less that careful.
Earbuds can be a pain in a neck by breaking easily. They just need alittle love and care. You can also try plugging yourself into Skullcandy Ink’d 2 headsets. At a cheaper price of $20.99, these have been pretty durable and have quality sound. Skullcandy also have many other different types of earbuds and cheaper prices that you might want to look into.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
“This Week in Tech History” Weekly Feature with Chris Graveline
Bob in Anchorage, Alaska listens on 700 KBYR asked: “My computer is really slow. It takes about 5 minutes for my computer to load when I start it up and about 5 minutes to shut down. I have a whole bunch of movie files on both Real player and iTunes and I’m wondering if that’s the problem. How can I bundle up all those videos and move them out of iTunes or RealPlayer to improve the performance of my PC. Is there a program or something I can use to move them to an expansion drive?”
Well Bob, an easy way to to transfer your music and and videos is to put it all on a external hard drive. Now which hard drive you may ask? Well a solution to your problem could be a WD Elements 1 terabyte external portable hard drive. Priced at $79.99, you can store all your music and videos, and still have plenty of storage for more!
Having said that, if your computer is taking a while to boot up, it’s taking a while to read and load system information (settings, drivers, etc), not media files. Your iTunes or Real player could take a while to load because of the large libraries, but that shouldn’t have a huge impact on your bootup time, media files don’t change startup settings.
What may help you the most is either upgrading the RAM on your computer or, if you don’t mind the trouble of cloning your drive, maybe even installing an SSD.
An SSD may not be the greatest option for you if you do have a large media library, since storage space is still expensive on SSDs, but it would certainly speed up your computer.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Paul in Chicago, Illinois listens Online told us: “I would like to ask you if I should update from Windows 8 to 8.1. I use an Hp Envy DV6t-7200 Quad Core. Will I still be able to get all my drivers?”
There really haven’t been many complaints about Windows 8.1, and it’s a fairly important upgrade, so you probably should install it. Having said that, yes, you may run into a few driver issues.
You should still be able to use all of the hardware that worked with Windows 8, however there is one big problem. Windows 8.1 will overwrite some drivers that’ve manually installed, and replace them with outdated drivers, thinking that it’s “updating” what you have, when you actually already had to go out of your way to install drivers that actually work.
If you have had to replace drivers manually this may or may not happen to you, the good news is that if it does, you should be able to do just what you did before and reinstall the drivers you have now.
Other than that, Windows 8.1 seems stable and everyone seems to regard it as an improvement, even if not a life changing one, so you might as well go ahead and get it.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
Guest Segment:
Mike Kahn, Director of Alpha Camera Systems – Sony Electronics
Troy in Gonzales, Louisiana and listening via CenLa’s Talk Radio 970AM KSYL asked: “I’m a truck driver and I need an iPhone or some phone that has lots of verbal command ability and decent size screen to also use as a GPS, can you help me?”
Pretty much any modern cellphone will have a decent screen, GPS and something of a voice command capability.
If you’re looking at iPhones, obviously the 5 has the largest screen, it can talk to the GPS and GLONASS (Global Navigation Satellite System) networks for global positioning and it has Siri for your voice commands needs.
If you want a really big screen, the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 will give you the biggest one out there, it also does GPS and you can use S-Voice for your voice commands. The Galaxy S4 has a smaller screen, but bigger than the iPhone 5’s anyway, and it can still do GPS and S-Voice.
The two Galaxy phones are Android under the Samsung customization, so if you don’t like S-Voice there’s a good chance you can just disable it and use Google’s version as well.
Whichever device you choose, there are a lot of third party apps out there that are great for drivetime use. One that we’ve talked about a lot on the show is Vlingo. It is packed with features, will speak incoming texts and emails, has great voice recognition, and gives Siri a run for her money in the research department.
For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.
This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
Covington Creations: Earbud yo-yos “A clever solution to tangled earbuds”.
C.Crane: Senta Ally Portable Bluetooth Stereo Speaker with built-in FM radio and SD & USB reader.
Yamaha: Pro 300 Hi Fidelity, over-the-ear Headphones.
Nite Ize Innovation: Connect Case and Connect Cradle for iPhone – Hard case with belt clip, vehicle mount and desk stand.
“Into Tomorrow”:Microfiber Screen Cleaning Cloths with Dave’s cartoon on them, for all your smartphones, tablets, TVs, camera lenses and computer screens!