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Tech News & Commentary
Here’s the old tech music video that Chris mentioned on the show:
Josh in Sparta, Tennessee listening on WTN 99.7 FM and calling in via the App asked us: “I have finally convinced my wife to let me upgrade our TV. I’m trying to find out which is the best TV. Right now we got a 42 inch Sanyo. It works pretty good but only has 1 HDMI. We’re upgrading to something with more megahertz as far as the refresh rate and the best HD screen. What do you think of the “OL… LCD” and all that kind of stuff.”
Josh, In terms of image quality alone, the most recent survey we’ve seen the top 5 sets are either Samsung, Sony or Vizio, all other brands score below the top 5.
The high refresh rate you’re after can be a good thing for sports or video games, but keep in mind that it will also probably give you what is known as “the soap opera effect” in which the TV is creating so many fake frames to use as padding for every movement that the final product ends up looking hyperrealistic in a way that makes it seem like you’re watching dolls move, not people, pans across the room show no blur and everything looks strange.
For sports and video games it usually adds to the experience, but for closeups of regular people it just looks odd, so keep in mind that you may be better off turning down the refresh rate every now and then.
As for the different type of screens: OLED is thin, has vivid colors, but it’s not worth being discussed because you would probably be paying tens of thousands for one, and they’re not worth that kind of money. Plasma still has the best contrast, but if the room is bright you’re basically buying a mirror, so only consider them for dark rooms. LEDs are probably your best choice, they have reasonable quality, a reasonable price, and can be used in a reasonable lit room.
A Samsung UNF8000 set will get you 1080p, a 240hz refresh rate, 3D and SmartTV features (including voice commands), for a couple thousand dollars.
A Vizio M2i-B will get you the same features, except no 3D but will cost you less, so it may be a nice option, and if you don’t want the latest, for around $600 you can get a Vizio E0i-B, that still has a very decent refresh rate of 120hz and SmartTV features and a very affordable price.
If you are at all interested in plasma TVs, you should purchase one soon because they are a dying breed. Panasonic has already discontinued making them, Samsung has announced they will stop later this year, and the last company to be making plasma displays, LG, will shut down production sometime in 2015.
All of the arguments about which is best are really moot now, since plasmas don’t sell enough to keep the breed alive and OLEDs are very expensive. If you have that kind of cash, you go OLED, otherwise you look for the best LED/LCD picture you can find and live with that.
For more information tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.
Consumer Reports Feature With James McQueen
Earlier this summer, Sony released a new, slimmer model of its PlayStation Vita. Generally, second generation electronics mean upgrades, fixes, and more. But the new Vita might be an exception to the rule. Consumer Reports Electronics spokesman James McQueen is here to explain.
The “Into Tomorrow” team discussed the latest apps that they have been playing with recently.
• Mark recommends: WhatTheFont?, FREE
- “Do you ever have to recreate a document only to discover that you have no idea what font was used in its creation? All you know is that your client is really in love with it and expects your revised document to use the same font. What are you going to do? You’re going to download my app for this week: WhatTheFont? WhatTheFont connects to the font database at fonts.com, easily the largest on the web, and helps identify your font, or at least gives you very similar choices. All you need to do is take a picture of the font, crop the selection down to a single letter, type the letter in the identifier box, and submit. The app gives you a list of similar fonts, showing a sample of each, most of which you can easily download from fonts.com. WhatTheFont is free for iPhones in the iTunes App Store.” — Mark
What are your favorite Apps? Let us know at 800-899-INTO and we’ll feature them in this segment!
Tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast for more details
Guest Segment:
Aaron LeMieux, CEO and Inventor – nPower
offers computer training and technology consulting services to the non-profit community of Seattle and the Puget Sound region.
OWC Feature with Larry O’Connor
Is your computer slowing down? Upgrading your hard drive might be the answer. But what type should you look into? OWC’s Larry O’Connor is here to share some insight.
Randy in Nashville, Tennessee listens on SuperTalk WTN 99.7 asked us: “I’m trying to convert WAV or WMA files to a PCM file and I don’t know the best way to do that. I have a Windows 7 computer. Can you help me?”
PCM stands for Pulse Code Modulated, and that refers to the format of the actual audio itself. WAV and WMA, on the other hand, are file formats. So a WAV file, typically, is using PCM data.
PCM is an uncompressed file format, which is different from lossless (that’s compressed but only in a way that doesn’t lose any of the file’s original data when being uncompressed) and of course is MUCH different from compressed or “lossy” (where a portion of the file data is thrown away to make a small file size).
WMA can be either lossless or lossy, but WAV should always be uncompressed PCM format files.
If what you have is a WMA Lossless format file and you want to convert that to an uncompressed WAV PCM file, Microsoft themselves makes a free tool you can download. We’ll link that to you in this week’s show notes.
For more information tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.
Wireless Update with Chuck Hamby
Do you love it on the links? Verizon’s Chuck Hamby is here with a tech tip to trim your score.
This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners
Kanex: GoPower Pack – 6,000 mAh and 11,000 mAh battery packs with built-in stands for smartphones
Other World Computing (OWC):Power2U AC/USB Wall Outlet – power outlets for your wall with built-in USB ports.
Bits Limited: Mini Squids — Travel-Sized surge protected power strips
Tylt: ENERGI Sliding Power Cases the Samsung Galaxy S4.
“Into Tomorrow”: Microfiber Screen Cleaning Cloths with Dave’s cartoon on them, for all your smartphones, tablets, TVs, camera lenses and computer screens!