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Archive for the ‘Hardware’ Category


Me Want Drobo

My first three rules of computing are backup, backup and backup. You may haveĀ  heard this before? I use Carbonite a cloud backup solution that works very well but I really should have a local backup as well. 321 Backup Drobo looks like a great solution. Drobo is an external hardive based storage device that [...]

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Pro Microphones to USB

You can do podcasting or multi-track recording without the need for a mixer. If you have a good quality professional microphone (Shure SM58 or better) you can connect it directly to your computer via USB using one of two devices. The first is a USB microphone cable the SoundTech STUSBXLR10. One end is an XLR [...]

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Nexus One Tip

There are a couple of problems I’m having with my new Nexus One smart phone. One is even when all of the windows are closed many of the applications continue to run. To shut them down you have to press the menu button, touch Settings, touch Applications and touch Running Services. Next you have to [...]

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Build A Home Server

As I say constantly, “The three most important maintenance task on your computer are, backup, backup and backup.” You can always restore your software or replace your computer in a worst case scenario. What you can’t do or can’t do easily is recover your data. This is what you want to spend most of effort [...]

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My New Google Phone

About a week ago I receive my new smart-phone “the Nexus One” form Google. I am still putting it through it’s paces and trying to get use to the touch screen (hard for someone coming from a Blackberry with the keypad). Gmail, Calendar, Voice and Google Maps all integrate seamlessly. The new Google map application [...]

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D-Link DIR-615 Router

The wireless on my Netgear Wireless G router went out this week and I had to replace it. I got a D-Link DIR-615 Wireless N 300 Router this week and I can’t be more pleased. With my Netgear router I never got all of my 10Mb speed from my ISP. I never worried about it [...]

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Roku Player Easy And Awesome

The Roku players are settop boxes the brings all of your favorite content from the Internet to your television. Simple setup; I didn’t even look at the instructions. Roku players have built in wireless but I used the ethernet. After I connected the player to my home theater system and plugged in the ethernet I [...]

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Networking Over Powerline

Do you have a cable modem in your living room but have computers in a different room as I do. I live in an apartment so drilling holes and stringing cable is out of the question. I tried using wireless with some success but it is slow and very unreliable. I dealt with this problem [...]

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Build A Home Server

You could buy a HP MediaSmart Server or any of the other Windows Home Server PCs or any of the other home-server products (one being Drobo). These work great but they cost $525 and up. I am going to turn a pc I already have in to one using Ubuntu Server. Ubuntu Server is free [...]

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New Digital Camera

Feb 23, 2009 I really like my a new camera. My old one was the pits! I even went back to film because of that old piece of junk. I purchaased a Canon EOS 50D digital SLR camera. It is really a significant upgrade. 15.1-megapixel CMOS sensor so you can make tremendous print with little [...]

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