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Tech News & Commentary
Greg in Manchester, Tennessee listens on WTN 99.7 FM asked us: “Is it okay to leave a flash drive plugged in all the time? Does is cause any more wear and tear on the drive?”
Greg, Leaving a flash drive plugged in all the time won’t do any damage to the particular drive but will shorten the lifespan of the USB drive because the PC is constantly communicating with it. The only way the drive and flash drive will mess up is if you accidently bump or kick the USB, damaging the physical connection.
It also depends on the flash drive. Some drives use MLC (multi-level cell) based memory that’s good for 3,000 to 5,000 program-erase cycles, but others have SLC (single-level cell) memory that’s good for almost 100,000 writes.
Also, keep in mind that reading from a flash drive causes no wear and tear at all. It’s only when new information is written that you get into a cycle of erasing and programming the memory chips.
And finally, the USB connector itself is specified to only withstand about 1,500 insertions and removals. So the case of the drive usually gives up before the memory chips do.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
“Into Gaming Update” Weekly Feature with Mark Lautenschlager
Frank in North Pole, Alaska listening on KFBX asked us: “I have an Apple 4S and I want to upgrade to the Galaxy S5. They’re some apps that I have on my iPhone that I paid, is there anyway those can be converted to be used on the Samsung Galaxy S5 or do I need to repurchase it?”
Frank, Unfortunately you can’t convert any app to be used on a Galaxy S5 from an iPhone. The softwares in Androids are completely different from those in Apple. You can try contacting the developers of the apps (only if the developers are the same in both the Google Play Store and iTunes) to see if they can transfer the licenses to your new phone, but other than that there’s nothing really you can do about your paid apps.
On the bright side, you will still own your paid apps from iTunes even though you move to Android. So if you have an iPad or iPad Mini or any other portable Apple device, you can access your paid apps through the app store.
What it will depend on is what kind of apps we’re talking about. As more and more apps migrate to subscriptions where you pay a monthly or annual fee to use them, it is increasingly common to be able to switch platforms and simply grab the app that’s correct for your current platform, sign in, and go.
So that’s a good rule of thumb. Apps that are free, or only cost for a one time purchase, are hit or miss. There might be Android versions and you might be able to transfer your license, but you might not. Apps that come with a recurring subscription fee usually will have clients for each platform and usually will allow you to switch.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Ken in Jackson, Mississippi listens on SuperTalk 97.3 asked: “I have a standard car radio – 2004 model car – no Bluetooth or aux input jack. I am wanting to play music on my iPhone 4s in my car. Every fm tuner kit I use I get static when acting whatever. Is there something out I can use?”
Ken, There will always be a little to a lot of static.
Try to not only pick an open frequency to transmit to, but pick one that also has open frequencies above and below it. This will give you the least amount of static. If your car has a removeable antenna and you don’t listen to local radio stations, then go ahead and remove the antenna, it should make every station you transmit to crystal clear, just remember that by doing this you won’t be able to listen to your typical radio stations.
Depending on how involved you’re willing to let things get, you can always replace the radio, you can buy an aftermarket car radio with a built-in AUX input for as little as $25, but you will need to either install it or have it installed by someone, and you may not like the look of it on your dashboard.
If you have an old enough radio with a tape deck, you can also buy a cassette adapter that plugs into your phone and lets you transmit music that way. That would be free of static, since it’s a wired device, but cassette players in cars are harder to find these days, and it’s quite likely you’re just trying to replace a CD rather than tape these days.
For more information tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.
Guest Segment:
Gordon Harris, CEO – Gus Communication Devices, Inc.
source for speech aids for individuals with stroke, cancer, laryngectomy, ALS and other conditions.
“IFA History Feature” brought to you by Messe-Berlin
At the 1981 IFA, the Compact Disc had its world premiere. Philips and Sony had agreed to standardize the disc to a 4.7 inch diameter, with a maximum recording time of 74 minutes, According to legend, that recording time was requested by Sony president Nohrio Ohga, because it was enough to record Beethoven’s 9th symphony. Music is recorded in pits on the disc which are then read by a laser beam. Mass production of CDs started on August 17 1982 in Hanover, Germany at the Polygram factory. Herbert von Karajan who had been involved in the development, personally received the first disc.
Christopher in Jefferson City, Missouri listens on 1240 KLIK asked: “I was calling about a Samsung Galaxy S4 mini that I just got, wanted to know if there are any interesting features or tips on this device.”
Chirtopher, Probably nothing you don’t already know about.
The S4 mini lost a few of the features of the S4 in the shrinking process, for example, it doesn’t respond to those gestures to scroll up and down without touching the screen that no one used past day 3 anyway, but for the most part you have the regular S4 feature set.
You may not know that you can download Samsung’s Milk Music for free music streaming, think something like Pandora or iTunes radio. Other than that, the operating system itself comes with several useful features, such as offline voice recognition for voice typing, and several new types of Google Now cards.
Some models don’t, but there’s a good chance your S4 Mini has NFC, which means that you should be able to transfer contacts and pictures, set up Bluetooth devices and some other things by tapping devices.
If you watch videos on your phone, you should be able to turn the volume and brightness up or down by sliding your fingers up and down the left and right edges of the screen. If you’re interested in maximizing your battery life, your phone comes with a WiFi timer, that will let the phone attempt to connect to available WiFi networks for a specific period of time.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
Sally in Cary, North Carolina asked: “I have taken a video and the white balance was off, I know how to correct that somewhat for digital still photograph but I’m not sure how to do it for video? Is there an editing program that will allow me to take a fairly blue looking video and adjust the color on it?”
Sally, If you have any video editing software, it most likely has a white balance correction tool somewhere. AVID, Final Cut Pro, Premiere, even iMovie all have one.
If you don’t have any video editing software yet, and don’t want to pay to get it, Avidemux is free, it’s multiplatform, and it does have a white balance correction setting (including auto white balance). It’s not anywhere near as full featured as any of the other options we mentioned, but it will cost you nothing.
For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.
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This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
SMS Audio: Street by 50 – Over-The-Ear Headphones and earbuds
Parellels:Parallels Desktop 10 Software allows you to run Windows on your Mac
Kanex: GoPower Battery Pack – Mobile battery pack with built-in stand for smartphones