Monthly Archive for August, 2009

The Logitech Performance Mouse MX lets you use transparent glass as a tracking surface

Published on August 31, 2009 in Computers & Electronic Gadgets. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

logitech_performance-mouse-mxYou read that right. Logitech has introduced a new technology that will allow you to track on transparent glass. They are calling it the Darkfield sensor and it beats Microsoft’s BlueTrack technology hands down. BlueTrack lets you leave your mouse-pad behind to explore newer surfaces where no computer mouse has ever gone before. Darkfield does all that effortlessly and then one-ups BlueTrack by enabling the mouse to track on glass. How is Microsoft going to defend this one? Well, the same way they defend against any premium piece of equipment that threatens their sales.

Microsoft is saying that it is too expensive. True, the Darkfield enabled Performance Mouse MX retails at $99 and BlueTrack is available in mice as cheap as $40. Also true that survey shows only 7% mice users want to track on glass. So according to Microsoft, the rest 93% are happy with their $40 mouse. How true is it? The answer depends on how you look at things. Let me change your perspective a bit.

If you want something cheap and basic, Microsoft really is the better option. However, when you are in the market for something premium, that $99 gets you as lot more than just the Darkfield sensor. It gets you the familiar finesse and advanced features that Logitech is known for. You get better usability and more comfort. You will be getting the Logitech unifying technology with that tiny USB receiver that barely sticks out of your laptop when inserted.

The Unifying USB technology allows you to use up to six different (Logitech) input devices with the same dongle. Since all Logitech Unifying Technology enabled devices come with the tiny USB receiver, you can have them plugged in to several shared computers across the house or office and then let everyone use their own keyboard and mouse.

The new Darkfield sensor works quite well too. Testers have reported that the only surface that it really cannot handle is a mirrored surface. Other than that it can handle pretty much any surface you would like to work on and that includes glass surfaces.

Other than the Unifying USB microreceiver feature, Logitech also has a much more sophisticated approach to recharging the wireless mouse. The Performance Mouse MX has a microUSB port in front of it. So you can simply connect the mouse to the USB port and keep using it as it recharges.logitech_mx500_optical_mouse

What’s Your Email ID – 3 Sites That Give You a Personalized Identity

Published on August 31, 2009 in Tips & Tricks. 0 Comments Tags: , , , .

In cyberspace, our emails IDs are virtually our signatures. But somehow don’t you feel that an email ID is bereft of the singular thing called – a personality. After all, how lively is jimsmith@emailaddress.com? Even an illegible scrawl of a signature is a personality stamp. But a signature generally does not tell us much, except perhaps the gender maybe. In the kitchen soup of generic email IDs, how do you raise your cool quotient? Get a personalized email ID which is you…individualistic and unique.

The most professional but pocket pinching way is to buy your own domain address and a few email IDs with it. But that’s like an elephant gun for a mosquito. Easier and free solutions exist. Three email services which let you create email IDs with a touch of personalization.

Mail.com

1_Mail.com

Mail.com is a free web based email service which lets you pick from 250 mail addresses. Addresses fall into ‘domains’ like jobs (e.g. consultant.com, chef.com, doctor.com), hobbies (e.g. collector.org, elvisfan.com, artlover.com), locations (e.g. europe.com, usa.com), fun (e.g. cybergal.com, couple.com, witty.com).

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Two Free Apps to Make Your Net Surfing Better

Published on August 28, 2009 in Application & Software, Privacy & Anonymity, Security and Utilities. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

freeinetwasherThere is nothing like surfing leisurely on the net things you don’t really need and reasons you don’t really understand. However, what happens when your browser becomes leisurely too?

Firefox is one of the most popular Internet browsers on the market. When you install it for the first time, it is nice and clean and runs pretty fast. Over the months you encumber it with pages upon pages of history, cookies, bookmarks, etc. This is when it starts slowing down.

Then it takes longer to start up, response is sluggish and it generally bogs down your web experience. Wouldn’t it be great to relive those days when your Firefox was still a new installation? Well, you can do that now with something called SpeedyFox.

Developed by a company called Crystalidea, this little program does some tweaking mojo to get your Firefox running as fast as it used. The webpage it is safe to download and use because it has been used and “tested on many computers”. So you won’t lose or break any of your saved passwords or bookmarks. Best of all, it SpeedyFox is absolutely free to download and use. It is freeware with no restrictions.

It will speed up FireFox startup time, history browsing time and cookie handling.

Get it here.

Now that you have your Firefox running all fast again, you might want to surf some sites that you do not want others to know about. Whilst you nudge and wink, we give you something called the Free Internet Window Washer. What it does is it washes away your sins all traces of your online activities.

firefox_bombAs you may or may not know, the browser constantly records your online activities. Not because everybody’s out to get you (they are) but because it aims to make your browsing experience better by reducing load times and remembering settings. However, other than giving other people full access to your surfing records, it also takes up valuable disk space.

This is why cleaners such as the Window Washer are really useful apps that help you get a better computing experience. With this app you can erase run histories, the Windows temp folder, recent documents, browser caches, cookies (the virtual kind, if you have chocolate chip ones pass ‘em on), history, URLs, typed URLs, auto complete data and a lot more. For Windows only, by the way.

Get it here.

(Almost) The Same Leopard, Finely Tuned

Published on August 28, 2009 in Application & Software, Mac OS and Operating Systems. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , .

apple_snow_leopardAfter a lot of waiting, planning and speculations, Apple has finally released Mac OS 10.6 – Snow Leopard. With a $29 upgrade cost; it is the cheapest point upgrade in the history of Mac OS so far. However, the price is actually just right due to the lack of too many apparent changes. The average user will hardly understand the difference except for the better performance on almost all quarters.

So what is so very special about this upgrade that Apple simply could not bundle it along with a proper upgrade that had significant changes like when Leopard was released? Well, you really have to think of this as fine tuning and polishing of the Leopard system instead of a whole new OS experience like upgrading to Leopard from Tiger. Hence the name has ‘Leopard’ in it.

The main changes, as you may have been told ad nauseum, are under the hood. That means faster performance, better security and less space occupied. Believe it or not, the entire Finder has been rewritten in Cocoa, the native language of Mac OS. What this means is faster day-to-day Finder performance. Making your general Mac OS experience faster. There’s also Dock and Exposé integration, which shows up when you long click on dock icons or try to drag and drop items in to dock icons.

One thing that Apple has finally dropped is support for Power PC. So that means end of the ride for older Mac users. It is the right time to do this because it has been about 4 years now since the Intel Macs came out. Time to make the switch guys.

Due to lack of PowerPC support, this upgrade will do something quite brilliant. Not only will it take less time to install (like under an hour on an average), it will also free up an enormous space on your hard drive (at least 6GB and then more). The installer will take care of sorting out incompatible apps and plugins for you and will store them under a folder called ‘incompatible’. No headaches on your part.

There is also another side to it. There are actually many things that Apple is not telling you about this upgrade, good things. But Apple really wants you to go for this upgrade, hence the tiny price tag. A common sentiment within the tech community is that this is actually a bridging for something better to come very soon. It is a well-justified conclusion too.

I say you should really upgrade to Snow Leopard but wait till you have all your necessary applications running smoothly on it. Those without too many customized hacks, installations and third party applications will do just fine and can upgrade immediately.notice the slider on the side, yes even 'stacks' has been upgraded

Yummy JVC Marshmallows

Published on August 26, 2009 in Computers & Electronic Gadgets. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , .

green marshmallows, prolly green apple falvored

One of the main problems of buying MP3 players these days is the pair of really bad ‘buds’ that come with the players. Even Apple is guilty of this I would say. Sure they have everything pat down in the design and user experience areas  but the earphones could’ve soundede a lot better.

The difference is quite self evident when buying even simple cheap earbuds make an audible difference in the perceived audio quality in mp3 players. For those who want proper audio quality from their newly purchased mp3 players, upgrading to better earphones is a must. So it is with great pleasure that I lay my eyes on the new JVC Marshmallowearphones. These are your typical in-ear earphones from JVC. They have a small protruding tip on to which you can attach any one of the two provided sets of tips.

Since these are in-ear, they  have a very snug fit that will not be  yanked out with slight movements. They also have some amount of isolation, so they make for a quieter music listening experience. Although, they are probably not safe for runners to wear for this very reason. Gym goers are fine though, because this means you can simply ignore the annoying person working out next to you and yapping away to glory.
JVC HA-FX34P Marshmallow In-Ear Headphones (Pink)

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Find Duplicate with Ease and Erase Any File That Gets you all ##**%!

Published on August 25, 2009 in Application & Software, Privacy & Anonymity, Security and Utilities. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , .

How many times have you done some pretty massive downloads only to realize that you have unwittingly downloaded various duplicated files on to different parts of the machine? Or may you have been doing some manual restoring and went a bit wild with that crtl+c thing. What be your reason (data coming to life and crawling away to safety on its own), there one piece of freeware that can help you out in situations like this. It is equipped to find duplicated files all over the system and then allow you to see them in a categorized list and then decide which ones to keep and which ones to delete.

SimilarityMeet Similarity from  GAR softwares. This is one handy utility that would recommend you to keep. The main thing here is the fact that it can tell if two files are the same based on not only name and size but also through meta information like tags, and other experimental ways. It supports most of the common media file types like mp3, wma, ogg, etc. and it can also identify and edit id tags. You can also mass edit the tags on multiple files. The best part is that it is really fast in scanning the content, so it won’t keep you waiting. It is not restricted to your hard drive. It can search for duplicity on hard USB drives and on local computers over the local network. That that is impressive. Another small features enables you to export search results as playlists.

Download it from here.

Finding files is only one half of the journey. You need to erase those files to make space for new ones. However, if your data is of a sensitive nature you should think of securely deleting them. That means those erased files are never coming back, even with recovery tools.

moo0's File Shredder

Recovery tools can salvage deleted data because the data is never completely erased from the hard drive. The space that was allocated for the deleted file is then up for being overwritten by other files. Still, the data may  be partially readable. That is why you need something to securely erase your data to such a stage where there is no recovery possible.

Moo0 has released a freeware called File Shredder. It is a lightweight program with a simple interface and full usability.

Get it from here.

Nokia Releases Booklet 3G Netbook, of sorts

Published on August 24, 2009 in Computers & Electronic Gadgets and Desktop PC & Notebook. 1 Comment Tags: , , , , , , , , , , .

Nokia-Booklet-3G-HDMISo it is finally official. The news of Nokia and Intel teaming up has finally shown its results. Nokia has unveiled a new line of mobile products from its stables – an Intel Atom powered uber-portable pc that will have features that are not standard to netbooks. In size and well, processor, the new portable is similar to current netbooks. However, features like onboard 3G and GPS redefine what we know as small and Ultra Portable PCs.

The new device from Nokia will be powered by a new generation of Atom processors that promise full functionality and processing power. Whether Intel gets to beat ARM chips, it remains to be seen. Intel is making no such noises, so it safe to assume that we will not see ARM like power conservation features.

Nokia calls the device the Booklet 3G. It has a 10 inch glass-coated screen, which falls smack in the middle of netbook territory. It is super portable, weighing in at less than a kilo. It has a slim body made out of aluminum and it also promises long battery life. Long in the sense of 12 hours long! Yes, that is a pretty tall claim even for a tiny laptop device. Of course, you have to cut back on everything and to basic web surfing and word processing all day long to get that kind of a battery life.

So far it has been quite familiar. Now comes the unfamiliar part. It has a 3G enabled onboard. It supports onboard high speed Internet connectivity through 3G/HSPA and has a hot swapping bay for SIM cards, which I personally find to be a really cool feature. It also has on board GPS coupled with OVI maps for navigation. It will also have a full gamut of connectivity features other than 3G. So we are looking at WiFi and Bluetooth as well. It will also have a CD card reader. It will also have HDMI out for HD output.

Where Nokia goes with this only time will tell. However, it is for certain that this device is not making it in to the netbook segment. With so many features it will definitely be priced higher. One bad news is the fact that the Booklet 3G will run on Windows, not the stablest of platforms.

Nokia is currently gearing up for a show and tell at the annual Nokia World, which is coming up on the 2nd of this September.Nokia-Booklet-3G

Fancy a 17-Button Mouse?

Published on August 21, 2009 in Computers & Electronic Gadgets. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , , .

razer-naga-smlWell, you can have one soon. Razer, the company that makes premium gear for gamers has announced a special mouse for MMO gamers. MMO stands for Massively Multi-player Online and is usually used to refer to MMORPGs where RPG stands for Role Playing Game.

Continuing with their obsession with snakes, this is new mouse from  Razer is called Naga – a word that means male snake or snake in general. This is going to be a normal high-precision laser mouse with a twist. It has 12 macro buttons along with the 3+2 mouse buttons used for other functions. For those who don’t know, a ‘macro’ in terms of gaming is a kind of shortcut key that triggers a complex set of moves or actions that would otherwise require a complex set of inputs. These macros come in very handy in MMOs because they usually have a plethora of complex moves to execute.

One special thing about this mouse is the fact that it comes with a special plugin. This plugin actually gives you a native set of assignable macros for your favorite MMO games. These macros directly correspond to the 12 macro button on the mouse, arranged in a similar 3×4 grid. This is something that is going to attract a lot of gamers to this new power mouse from Razer.

The software also supports an unlimited number of profiles each with unique commands and macro key presets. That means hardcore gamers can maintain specialized settings for each game and even for each map of each game, if they want to do it. Of course, that last one would be bit of an overkill, but you never know.

The hardware with the mouse contains the familiar 5600dpi tracking engine from Razer along with a 1ms response time. This much precision is more than enough for MMOs really.

naga angle

The mouse features an overall blue backlit color scheme and the LED is also blue. The numbered macro keys are also backlit and look great in the dark. There are the usual right and left buttons with the clickable scroll wheel in the center. There are two additional buttons on the upper left edge of the mouse, beside the left button.

The palm rest features an impressive decal of the Razer logo, which is also backlit with the blue light. Let’s face it folks, gamers like their gear to light up the room and Razer knows that only too well.

3 Useful USB Utility apps

Published on August 20, 2009 in Application & Software, Security and Utilities. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , , .

Here are 3 useful freeware Windows applications that you can use with your USB flash drive. They are all light, small, free and very useful.

usbdeviewUSBDview – This small app lets you view both your current and past USB devices. The app sees and remembers all the USB devices that have been plugged in to the system. You can view all the details of each and every USB device you have plugged in to the system. The extended information includes serial numbers, device names and descriptions, vendor ID, product ID, time and date of use and more. This little utility also allows you to uninstall previously installed USB devices. It can even be used remotely but you need to log in as an administrator to do that. This is a completely free to use software. It will come in really handy if you have a plethora of USB devices and you want to keep track of them. You will also know if unknown devices have been plugged in to your system.

Get it here.

usbdrivefresherUSBDriveFresher – USBDevices are really hard to keep clean, on the inside I mean. Systems that you use them on are constantly writing invisible files on them. You can also get malware written on your USB when you use it on an infected computer. Now you can automate the wiping of your USB drive with this handy little app. It can selectively erase files every time you insert you USB stick. You tell it what to delete and it will do it automatically every time.

Get it from here.

portablesmenuPortable Start menu – The name says is all. You can take your favorite softwares with you and run them off you USB flash stick via a handy menu. These programs will be running directly off your USB stick and they will not leave any trace on the host PC on which they are running. The main premise of Portable Start Menus is the fact that you can access your programs from an easy to use menu that sits on the system tray as an icon. Clicking on the icon will present you with the menu of the programs you have. Closing the application automatically closes down all the applications that are running off the USB drive.

You can also assign keyboard shortcuts to your favorite programs to launch them without wasting time clicking around. In addition to all this, the program also checks whether the programs have changed or not before executing them.

Get it from here.

Get all Bling Bling with iBlink Earbuds

Published on August 19, 2009 in Computers & Electronic Gadgets and Utilities. 0 Comments Tags: , , , , , , .

iBilnk white with white LED
Alright, so they are not diamond studded or anything, just some blinking LEDs on a pair of inexpensive earbuds. But that is a cool enough reason to buy them. These LEDs actually flicker with the music, presenting a nice little personal light show for you when you are enjoying your favorite thumping music.

The iBlink earbuds sell for $23. That makes them part of a price category that is known for being terribly crowded with similar products without any features distinguishing them from one another. It is through an innovative design features (the LEDs) that iBlink manages to separate itself from the rest of the crop and catch our attention. Now do not go expecting stellar sound quality from any of these earbuds and that includes iBlink. iBlink is not meant for the audiophile and even if it were I cannot think of any self-respecting audiophile using a set of earbuds that blink with the ‘beat’.

The target audience for the iBlink are of course teenagers who do not really care all that much for sound quality. Having a cool gimmick like these blinking lights are enough to entice them in to buying a pair. The sound quality is thus tolerable enough for casual listeners.

The iBlink pair needs a battery to be fully functional (the light show needs power you see) and thankfully it comes fully equipped for that. It is has a rechargeable battery that can charge via USB. A USB charger is included with the set, a thoughtful and welcome addition to the package.

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