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Weekend of December 31th, 2010

Dave and the team wish you and your family a Very Happy New Year! Tune-in this New Year's Weekend to hear a brand new show featuring fresh interviews and answers to YOUR tech questions!

Happy New Year ... “Into Tomorrow”!

 

Dave and the team wish you and your family a Very Happy New Year! Tune-in this New Year's Weekend to hear a brand new show featuring fresh interviews and answers to YOUR tech questions!

Join us on our FIRST show of the new year!

 

ITTV Video Update (Watch in HD - Powered by Tricaster)

Goodbye 2010, Hello 2011! We wrap up the year with our Annual ITTV Bloopers. Hopefully it makes you smile a bit. Also featuring: Webkinz with Caitlyn Gatrell from KidsTech and Chris Graveline with his tech throwback on This Week in Tech History.

Listeners & Guests on the show this week:

For ALL the details ... be sure to listen to the show by downloading the MP3 or clicking the RED & WHITE "Play" button on the media player, both on the right-hand side of this page.

HOUR 1:

Tech News & Commentary

For more information, tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.

The "Into Tomorrow" team discussed the latest apps that they have been playing with recently.

• For Android:
  • FlightTrack, it costs $4.99 but ... it's the best way to track domestic and international flights in real time • Live flight status & gate info • Live flight tracker maps • Home screen widget with latest flight status • Seamlessly import data from TripIt (with upgrade that will cost you yet another $4.99)
  • Tweetdeck, an Android app that combines Twitter and Facebook into one easy to read, easy to follow stream. I can set the fonts nice and big, I don't have to deal with separate apps, it's fast, free, and easy to use. What's not to like? Tweetdeck is available now in the Android Market. There's also a version for iPhone, and one for PCs running Windows.
• For iPhone/iPad:
  • Word Lens, it uses the phone's video camera and processor to interpret printed words and almost instantly translate them between English and Spanish.
  • PhotoShop Express. It's a free app and we've talked a lot about it on the show. With PS Express, you can adjust the saturation, brighten pics, crop/rotate and add effects.
    
    

 

Bob Duffy, Community Mananger for the Intel AppUp Developer Program, shared with us some highlights from the Intel AppUp Center.

 

Tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast for more details.

 

 

 

David in Indianapolis, Indiana listening on 570 AM WWNC asked: "About five years ago, I bought a high-end HP digital camera. It has exceeded my expectations, but recently the corners of the photos have turned into dark corners similar to something I associate with scrapbooking. Is this a setting issue or do I need to start shopping for a new camera? The camera still functions great aside from this. Thank you for your time and thanks for the show."

t is possible that a setting on your camera is responsible for this, but without the specific camera model we can't guarantee it.

The "scrapbooking shading" at the corners of pictures that the question refers to is what photographers call "vignetting" and it can be done on purpose by the camera, but it is usually an annoyance caused by shadows hitting the lens or, in some unfortunate cases, by a fault in the camera's sensor.

The first step we think you should take is to read your camera's manual or go through it's menus and try to find vignetting settings, if you can't find any and especially if they're not mentioned in the manual your sensor might be damaged.

If that's the case you could ask HP what the cost to replace it would be, but keep in mind that after five years your camera is probably discontinued, so there is a chance that they will either not be stocking it's parts or that they will charge a lot of money for them.

We can't speak about point and shoot camera sensor prices specifically, but replacing the sensor in a digital SLR can cost hundreds for the part alone and hundreds more for the labor, so if the sensor does need replacing you might want to start saving for a new camera instead.

If you can't find vignetting options on the camera ask HP, they might give you a free quote or at least an estimate of the cost of fixing whatever's wrong.

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.

 

 

David in Ashville, NC asked: "I'm interested in upgrading a computer to Windows 7. I have a RAID in place with about 1.2 TB of storage. I'm trying to buy a RAID controller that will be less than $100, still be scalable in the future, and still a maximum of 4 or 5 drives and will be fast with Windows 7. Can you do that?"

A four or five channel RAID adapter that has Windows 7 support, is fast, and costs under $100? That's going to be quite a find. Our first question, though, is does your motherboard have an integrated RAID controller? Because that is going to be your most inexpensive route to go. Most motherboard RAID controllers use either the Intel or NVIDIA NForce chips, and Windows 7 will usually support either of those.

If you don't have a RAID controller in your motherboard, then you're going to have to install a card. You can get four port RAID adapters for around $100. Most of them require an available PCI Express "X4" slot (the X rating refers to performance, typically, you'll see X4, X8, and X16). But depending on the age of your motherboard, we're just cautioning you to make sure it has PCI-e slots with at least that rating.

Also, know that for $100 and under, you're not likely to find RAID controllers that operate at the hardware level, meaning that the actual work is done by the RAID driver software, and the card is just a host adapter for talking to the drives. You'll need to spend a bit more than $100 to find a controller with 4 ports and hardware RAID. Generally, hardware RAID is considered to be faster because it's not worried about how much other stuff Windows is doing, and whether it's bogged down writing to the paging file, and so forth.

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.

 

 

Arland, listening on WTN 99.7 FM asked: "I am shown to be in a good coverage area with Verizon and AT&T. Problem is, it doesn't work that way. I can get AT&T if I sit on the roof. I have an air card with Verizon. It's lousy. I need to know a website to tell me what service, and what phone has better reception where I live. How can I find out how to get good reception on a phone? Is there anything I can do with a phone to get better reception?"

We actually found a really cool tool online, called the Root Wireless Carrier Coverage Map. This is from an independent company with no ties to any particular carrier. You can search their maps, right down to the block you live on, and it will compare carriers in your area - both the voice quality and data speeds.

The way it does this is by people downloading their application to their phones. Right now they support iPhone, Android and BlackBerry apps are in the works. After the software is downloaded, it runs in the background, measuring connection speeds and reception quality. It then reports back to them and the data is made available on the site.

Obviously, the more people in a particular area that have the app, the more data is available. Chris put in his address and found that AT&T, the carrier he uses, had a very good voice quality rating on his block. The data, however, was a different story. It was poorly rated, and he has experienced that while sitting at home. It told him that the information was averaged from 5 users who were in his area, using the software.

You can access the RootMetrics map by clicking here.

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 1 of our podcast.

 

 

HOUR 2:

Tech News & Commentary

Christina in Tyler, TX listensing on KTBB 92.1 FM called in and asked us: "I was looking online for a Blu-ray player for my Wife. I saw that it was Wi-Fi capable. Why does a Blu-ray player have to get online?"

The first thing you need to know about dial-up is that it's slow, this might not be a huge deal to you if it's your only option or if you're only going to use the connection for basic tasks like checking email or browsing the occasional website, but uses like Magic Jack are pretty much out of the question.

On a connection that slow, Magic Jack will be able to connect to it's servers, but if you try to make a phone call there won't be enough bandwidth available for it to maintain a reliable connection and you will not be able to have a quality conversation, this is because the Magic Jack requires 80kbps during a phone call and a dial up connection can't get speeds of more than 56kbps and often gets less.

Another issue you may have with Magic Jack is that your computer must be on and connected to the internet to accept an incoming phone call, which seems counter productive considering that for your computer to be connected to the internet you need to dial an actual (paid) phone line that could be receiving that phone call anyway.

As an alternative to dial up you can also look at satellite, it will be much, much faster than dial up and you can keep it running without tying up a phone line. Unfortunately, satellite is also several times more expensive than dial up and where you might be able to find an unlimited dial up connection for $10-15 a month and a limited one for much less, a basic, bandwidth limited, satellite connection in your area will cost you no less than $40 a month and it can go much higher than that.

Depending on where you live, of course, there are the new 4G data networks, like Verizon's LTE. You will get speeds that exceed DSL, although still not as fast as a cable modem, but plenty good enough for VOIP services like Magic Jack. Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint are all rolling out "4G" networks, and all three of them offer USB devices for your computer to connect up and go online.

 

Tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast for more details.

 

 

Lynette in San Jose, CA listening on KLIV 1590 AM called and asked: "I am looking for a device that will play audio files where the speed can be raised, so it can go faster. I know most MP3 players don't have that, I was looking for something that I could possibly download that would play a CD of some sort, that would have an audio speed control."

 

We're not so sure that "most MP3 players don't have that." In fact, I would say that most of them DO. The Sandisk Sansa line of MP3 players, such as the Clip+ or Fuse, have the ability to increase playback speed. So does the iPod and iPhone. There is a trick to it, however.

What you need to do is edit the MP3 properties and change the file from Music to Audiobook or Podcast. After you do that, when you send the file to your MP3 player, you will be able to adjust playback speed. If you're using iTunes, you can press CTRL-I (or Command-I on a Mac) and changed the "media type." If you're using Windows, right click on the file in Windows Explorer, choose Properties, and under the Details tab you can change the "genre" to Audiobook or Podcast. Which you use depends on your MP3 player. Some support one or the other, some support both.

Once your iPod or MP3 player sees that the files are audio books or podcasts, it will treat them differently. How you set playback speed from there will differ depending on the specific device you have.

You also asked about "downloading something." You can use Windows Media Player (I'm assuming you have Windows here, you didn't tell me whether you were a ten percenter or not). Start the file playing, then switch to the Now Playing mode. Once you're there, right click on the Player and under Enhancements you will find Playback Speed. You can crank it up as fast as you can stand it, and you can do this for anything. Spoken word, music...anything.

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.

 

Henry in Porterville, CA listening on KTIP 1450 AM asked: "I installed a DVD writer internal drive into a Dell 3000 built in 2005 and the Bios will not recognize. What are things that I can do?"

With a machine that old, you're going to be dealing with IDE drives connected to a standard ATA port on the computer. Today's computers use the newer SATA (that's serial as opposed to parallel, with smaller cables and less bulk). But one of the key things about the original ATA, which some started calling PATA after SATA came out was that the drives needed to be configured for Master and Slave. On any given cable, only one drive could be the Master. And sometimes, if you have say a hard drive and a CD ROM drive on a cable, it would work with one of those being the Master, but not the other, so you had to fiddle things around a bit. Usually, the hard drive would be your Master drive and the optical drive would be the Slave.

So, when you're installing the new drive, check that one of them is set to "Master" and any other on the cable as "Slave." This will be done using some small jumper pins on the drive itself, and the owner's manual for the drive will tell you how to set them, or it's often printed on the drive itself.

If that doesn't work, check your IDE cable. If the cable is defective in any way, the computer won't see the drive and swapping it for a new one will solve the problem. An easy way to check is taking another cable (for example, one connected to the hard drive or another component) and seeing if the BIOS reacts to the new drive.

For more information, tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast.

 

Tune in to Hour 2 of our podcast for more details.

 

 

 

HOUR 3:

Tech News & Commentary

 

Tom in Missouri, called and asked us: "iPhone - I heard rumors that it was going to Verizon in January 2011. Wondering if that was true and if you had any intel on that."

If we did know for certain, we'd be under an NDA that would embargo us from telling you anyway. Now we're not, and we don't know for certain, but that's good because it frees us up to make an educated guess.

The rumor mill has been blazing with the story of Foxconn (that's the company that builds the iPhone for Apple) ordering millions of CDMA chips (CDMA is the network Verizon uses, as opposed to GSM like AT&T).No one at Foxconn or any of its suppliers have officially confirmed anything, but it's an awfully persistent rumor.

With Verizon launching their 4G LTE network without any 4G phones (they only support it for computer connections at this point), the door would certainly be open for Apple to make a huge splash by having their iPhone be the first phone to support Verizon's 4G. AT&T should have their own 4G LTE network out sometime next summer, but Verizon's beat them by a good six months here.

The biggest thing that makes us think there might be something to this rumor, finally, is that the CEOs of AT&T Wireless and Verizon are speaking differently about Apple and the iPhone now, with AT&T making statements about how they are prepared to continue and do well even if they lose Apple exclusivity and Verizon saying they would welcome Apple to get with the program. That sort of shift in public chatter could indicate a lot of behind the scenes work.

We believe the iPhone on Verizon makes sense. It would let Apple sell even more devices, and there are a lot of AT&T Wireless customers who would love to upgrade their current iPhone 3G or 3GS models to a shiny new iPhone 4, on a different network. Are the rumors true? Can't say for certain. But we think their smoke to fire ratio is getting closer all the time.

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.

 

 

 

Group discussion: We discussed some of our listener's favorite Into Tomorrow moments of 2010.

 

 

 

Jamie in Shreveport, Louisiana listening on KEEL 710 AM asked: "International calling, supposedly there are phones for sale that are unlocked that you can purchase and use with SIM cards. You purchase SIM cards from a local carrier in whatever country you're visiting. Want to find out how convenient that is, how existent that is, and on the possibility of using a US phone and how to unlock it."

Unlocked phones can be easily used with foreign carriers, but there are some things you need to keep in mind. Our own Horacio has done this with a few phones.

Let's start with the basics for you to be able to switch SIM cards the phone has to use a SIM card. That means you need a GSM phone. CDMA phones don't have SIM slots. The biggest US carriers that operate GSM networks are AT&T and T-Mobile, but there are others.

The next thing you need to worry about is getting that GSM phone unlocked. You can buy a factory unlocked cell phone, but that usually requires giving up the subsidized price you normally pay with a contract and paying full factory price for the phone, depending on the specific handset you want to use that might add several hundreds of dollars to the price you're going to pay.

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.

 

Facebook message from Tom: "Ok boys, I have decided to challenge your brains. Here is my problem: I have a Seagate expansion 1TB drive that finally crashed on me. So far, I have not been able to re-format it, so i can use it again. I did manage to salvage most of my data from it before the crash. Is there a program that will be able to format it again so I can use it again, or has it gone the way of the T-rex?"

Seagate has a utility they call DiscWizard that can be used to format and partition any Seagate hard drive, internal or external. Visit Seagate's Support Downloads Page, and you should be able to find the DiscWizard link on that page.

If DiscWizard won't recognize the drive, then you have a hardware failure and you should contact Seagate for a warranty replacement of the drive, if it's under warranty. If it's NOT under warranty, then I'm afraid it's time to buy a new hard drive. Let us know how things turn out!

 

For more information, tune in to Hour 3 of our podcast.

If you have any questions about any of this week's show info, please email us here.

This Week’s Prizes for Our Listeners

CCrane: Several CCradio EP Classic High Performance AM/FM Radios.

Balanzza: Digital Luggage Scales – not only for weighing your holiday packages, but this can be your best way to save on baggage fees BEFORE you get to the airport by checking the weight of your luggage.

CTA Products: Several Cloth Addictions – The microfiber cloth that cleans ANY screen: iPads, Phones and Monitors. Take your screens to a whole new level of clarity!

Honestech: Copies of Audio Recorder 2.0 Deluxe – Software to convert your analog music into digital formats including MP3s and audio CDs. Save those great musical memories.

 

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