Say hello to the new breed of budget phones! While in the very recent past a budget cell phone offered little, if any features other than calling and texting (it wasn’t that long ago when they didn’t even offer texting) users of this type of phone may soon be able to access many of the features offered on the higher end phones.

Since phone manufactures consider a phone with the price tag of under $150 a “Low Cost” phone the users of phones in this category may be getting more choices of smart phones in the near future. Android, one of cell phones most popular operating systems, is yet again breaking new barriers. Many carriers are going to start offering phones in the “Low Cost” category with many of the same features of their more costly versions. Just this past week AT&T (Pictured) began advertising for a $29.00 smart phone featuring the popular Android operating system.

Keep in mind, you get what you pay for…While many computers can run an operating system for instance with say 512 MB RAM, it doesn’t mean you’re going to approve of the performance you get with that hardware. The same will apply with many of the budget phones…they have cheaper components in them and well…won’t run as well as the more expensive Android devices will.

My advice, save up a little extra money and spring for a decent phone if you think you need a phone with Androids feature set.

If you would like to read more about the upcoming Android devices expected to becoming out click here.

 

 

Mobile phones have come a long way in the past few years. I can still remember the “mobile” phones that were the size of a small back pack. Anyhow, phone companies have been coming out with many very interesting app’s ever since smart phones have come out from being able to mark your cars location to find it in a parking lot later to using GPS to find a destination half way across the world. What will they think of Next!

Well, a company named “Pet Tracker” has developed a new use for your mobile phone. Pet Tracker has developed a tracking system that includes the tracking device (Attaches to a dog collar) and docking station to charge the collar back up. This system runs on Verizon’s network and currently costs $199.99 for the initial package which includes the first years’ service. Yes, it is a service based application. That’s a cost that some pet owners may be willing to pay since the reward to possibly find your lost dog may be much more than that…

 

If you’re interested in reading more click here.

If you would like to see Pet Trackers website click here.

 

This past week several college students discovered that inside the iPhone there is a file that is “tracking” where its user went. This has some people on edge because Apple, until now, gave no explanation as to what the data was from or what it was being used for.  The speculations given was that they may have been using the data to track your habits such as store you visit and other places you go to help them market better. 

Today Apple gave an explanation as to what the data was actually for however. Apple said that the phones actually use the data to record wireless hotspots and cellphone tower locations to help the user’s phones provide better service. While this sounds like a logical explanation there are some people, such as some of congress that are pushing to have a Federal investigation into the software maker’s privacy policies in order to ensure the confidentiality of the users.

 

All in all if you are going to have a phone with GPS capabilities (like a smart phone), you better realize it is possible for your phone carrier to see where your phone is at all times.  It will be interesting to see what all comes of the possible investigations over the next few months however because keeping this type of information a user’s consent is against privacy regulations.

I remember the days of the old cellular phones that were just barely portable...do you remember that? Today cell phones not only easily fit in your pocket but the benefits of owning a cell phone have also changed greatly. Cell phones are no longer just for making phone calls. With the technology from today you can not only make phone calls from your phone, but, if you own a smart phone there is a slew of other features and benefits available to you which can increase your productivity at work greatly.

The first benefit is the ability to access you email from anywhere, without the need to start your computer up at all. Yes, laptops are portable, but the ability to read and answer emails from your phone saves time and intern increases productivity as it gives you the ability to address an email immediately rather than when you are back in the office or when you have time to access you laptop or desktop computer again.

The second benefit would have to be the ability to access the internet. This feature allows you to be able to browse the internet whenever and wherever you are. This can help you out in many instances. One example of a situation this can be beneficial for is if you were looking for a phone number to a business. You can simply open the internet browser on your phone and search the business name and within seconds you have the number. Some smart phones even allow you the ability to search by telling your phone what you want to search for through speech.

There are some many different tasks the new smart phones can be used for that it would be impossible to list all of the possibilities here, from email and internet browsing to word processing. Cell phones have become a vital part of today’s business world. If you haven’t seen what a smart phone could do for your business yet, I suggest that you do.

Retail giant Best Buy is offering the T-Mobile G2 Smartphone powered by Froyo (Android OS 2.2) and even better it will have full access to the blazing speed of the 4G mobile network.  The phone's price is set at a surprisingly low $199.99 and will start shipping phones to pre-ordered customers by the end of October.  Powered by the Google platform, G2 will have the abilities and functionality of a full blown smartphone with access to all your favorite apps via the marketplace, send/receive email, photos, navigation, GPS, access to YouTube and online media streaming, all on the blazing 4G network. 

               YouTube is now in talks with Hollywood Studios to offer streamed pay per view to their site.  Seems as if YouTube is now taking a shot at Apple and Netflix as Internet streaming video is becoming more and more popular, especially as the next generation of Wi-Fi enabled televisions begin hitting the marketplace.  In what appears to be efforts to combine cable TV, streamed media, and search all into one product, Google and YouTube are heavy hitters when compared to cable or satellite providers, so this could be a huge turn in the way we watch TV and movies in the near future.

Best Buy is now in the broadband market with its new service called Best Buy Connect.  This service gives its users access to mobile 3G data which come in a variation of data plans ranging from 250MB all the way up to 5GB.  Best Buy Connect will offer both a traditional monthly contact, and a non-contract plan which has become heavily popular with consumers.  No official word has been released by the consumer giant but their website has information on their new service.

Airline giant Delta’s mainline fleet, which includes more than 430 aircrafts, are now equipped and offer passengers a Wi-Fi service while well up above 10,000 feet.   

 

More than 100 million users have connected here in the digital mile high club thanks to Aircell, the company who launched “Gogo”, which is the in-flight Internet application behind the whole operation.  This service doesn’t come free though, and will range from about $10 – 13 to purchase Wi-Fi access during flight, all depending on the duration of your flight of course. 

With Wi-Fi enabled devices booming, it is no surprise that televisions are going to be one of the next big bang on the market.  According to a market analysis, there will be over 60 million on the market by 2014.  So what is a Wi-Fi enabled television anyway?  With this capability, viewers are able to stream YouTube videos in high def right to their sets, connect with people on Facebook, and even access their Netflix account and watch your favorite movies, along with thousands of other advantages.  All this is actually done with no additional hardware, as it works from your current wireless Internet connection.    

 

Most of us have experienced grazing the touchpad on our laptop as we are typing up a long story, then looking up at your screen and realize that the cursor has jumped around several times. Yes it is very frustrating and there is a easy fix for it. Touchfreeze is a free open-source utility that disables your touchpad as soon as you start typing, and then it will re-enable it as soon as you stop typing. Yes you can go into your Control Panel and disable your touchpad, but when you want to use it next time you have to go back in there and re-enable it. This tool saves you alot of time and no longer will you have to worry about that cursor moving around on you when you are typing.

 Touchfreeze sits in the system tray and you can have it auto start when your system boots up. Touchfreeze works with Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows Server 2003/2008, and Windows 7.

I found this nice little Do It Yourself for everyone that has been in the situation where their favorite CD or even just a old CD that you would like to save that has gotten scratched. Very simple to do and it will only cost a few bucks at any nearest pharmacy or grocery store. All you need to have or get is a little Vaseline or any type of petroleum jelly. Then just take a little of the jelly and put it on the location of the CD that is scratched. Then make sure you rub it in. Then take the clean towel and clean off any of the extra. Now you are ready to put it in any computer or CD player. By doing this what it does is just fill in any of the cracks that are on the CD.

So I was reading at one of my favorite tech blogs and came across a very interesting milestone the mobile industry, not for all but most mobile phone companies will soon be approaching.  During the CTIA Wireless show in Las Vegas, CEO of Ericsson Hans Vestberg said, "voice traffic accounts for about 140,000 terabytes of data (1 terabyte = 10024GB) sent through wireless networks every month.  For the first time, though, data transmissions are ahead of that", though Vestberg did not say by how much.  Basically cell phone users abroad are spending more of their time with their phones in front of them, rather than up to their ears making phone calls.  We could see a change in the "unlimited" data days, since mobile operators make most of their margins on voice traffic, but with it withering away, structures for data plans may change, especially when the 4G and LTE networks are fully deployed. 

 

So the company, who claims to have the largest 3G coverage in the country, seems to be falling far behind on the implementation of 4G coverage, although its CDMA rival Sprint has had the infrastructure for over a year now.  The companies LTE network has rumored to be in place and up in mid-2011, but nothing official has been released as of now.  This new LTE network is going to support speeds of up to 50Mbps according to Verizon, which should pleasantly increase your experience with today’s smartphones and other devices that can tap into the data networks.

 

From the sounds of it, Microsoft is planning to release a new Windows based smartphone at the Cellular Telecommunications Industry Association (CTIA) conference in March that is held in Las Vegas.  This phone, possibly named the "Zune", gets its name from the not so popular Ipod competitor Zune MP3 player.  The device will feature all of todays latest and greatest platform and application supports, with talks of a built in HD video recorder, and 4.3 megapixel camera.  And, for all of who were impressed with the latest operating system from Microsoft known as Windows 7, well then you should be in for a treat.  The "Zune" will most likely feature Windows 7 Mobile, according to some interviews conducted by BusinessWeek earlier this week.  This could be Microsoft's push into the mobile phone market, as they've watched Apple's success with the Iphone, and now Google with the Nexus One, but RIM still is controlling over 20% of the market with the ever so popular Blackberry aka "crackberry."   

  So you are probably aware of the terrible natural disaster that has shaken up the lives of thousands in Haiti.  An extremely powerful quake has rocked the entire country, leaving thousands and thousands in turmoil.  The relief efforts to date have been quite amazing, but with the extensive amounts of damage, there is so much more needed to get the people and their surroundings back to par.  So if you want to help out and send some relief to the victims caught in this quake, Red Cross has made it pretty simple.  All you have to do is send a text containing the word "Haiti" to 90999 and you can donate $10.00, which will be added to your next phone bill.  This text relief has already raised over 7 million dollars, although much more is going to be needed; this has been a great relief effort by texters around the world!   

     

The race to build smaller, more efficient and less power consuming products has been taking off this year, with the popularity rising in those little tiny laptops, otherwise known as netbooks.

Tomorrow, Seagate Technologies (www.seagate.com) an industry leader in 1", 2.5", and 3.5" hard drives, both internally and externally, releases what will be known as the world's thinnest laptop hard disk drive.  Checking in at an impressively small 7 millimeters in height, they are about 25% smaller than their traditional sister drive at 9.5 millimeters.  Seagate says, "The small drive will enable a new breed of entry-level thin laptops."

Contributing efforts for increasing web browsing speeds for all Internet users, Google has introduces Google Public DNS.  Think of DNS as the "switchboard" of the Internet.  It basically is translating your requests (Example: www.google.com) into the numeric address that gets you to your destination.  The service is totally free; just simply enter the DNS servers of 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4 into your primary and secondary DNS server fields on your network adapter.  If you're interested in learning more about Google Public DNS and would like to help contribute into optimizing web browsing for everyone, check out http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/introducing-google-public-dns.html.   Need assistance in setting it up on your computer?  Email our service team at support@expertsmi.com, it takes all of about 5 minutes to configure, and can be done remotely! 

Everyone that owns a laptop that uses the default keyboard and little touchpa,d knows that just moving your wrist a little can glaze the mousepad while you are typing causing your curser to move your typing indeciator. This can be very frustrating. Now they have a little piece of software called Touchfreeze. This software is very easy to install and will turn off your mousepad every time your typing and then re-enables when you stop. http://code.google.com/p/touchfreeze/

With the growing popularity of wireless, I have been asked "Why do I keep losing my connection?"

Well, this can be do to a variety of reasons, a few I will cover here.

Lots of things can affect wireless reception (basically a radio signal); construction of your house, interference from other devices and reflected signals etc. Being above the router isn't necessarily bad, but generally mounting the router higher in your house tends to give a better range.

Things you can try:
- change the channel that your router broadcasts on to see if any are better than others
- make sure that the router's aerial is upright and give it as much free space around it as possible

Another thing that is important is to update the network drivers (wired and wireless) on your computer to the latest available. along with updating the firmware to the latest version available on the manufacturer's site.

So as we all know that the Internet is big... Really, really big!

The vast amounts of information and data available to users can become absolutely overwhelming.  If you are utilizing search engines the right way, your results can become highly valuable instead of just a bunch of un-useful information.  The key to using search engines lies in the search criteria, and how you are searching for your wanted data.  Boolean operators are a key feature when doing a search.  Boolean operators are typically used to construct searches in a database, and the three most commonly used operators are AND, OR and NOT.  Try using one of these in your next search, for example: If you are wanting to search for salamanders, and not newts, enter the following into your search - "salamanders and NOT newts."

This will eliminate your search results from having content on newts, and focus more on your intended search which was salamanders.  This technique is definatly a best practice. With the right search queries, you will become an expert searcher and find more valuable data and information as you use Boolean operators more and more.  Note, this can be used with any searches, so give it a shot on your next search adventure on the vast Internet!

Over the weekend, I helped a friend out who had one of those catastrophic system failures, and he thought he had lost everything. 

Being one of the many users who has no backup solution whatsoever, he was very thankful for the Windows Complete PC Backup and Restore utility built into the Windows Vista Ultimate operating system he is running.  Unable to start Windows up from his hard disk, we booted from a Windows Vista installation CD, and proceeded with the system restore. 

The feature had been correctly utilized, giving a comprehensive image of the total system.  Everything from the operating system, all user data, and even all installed programs.  In about 2 hours, we were able to get his system back up and running, like it had not even had a problem.  In this case, but not all, no data nor programs were lost, so a it was complete success story. 

If you're one of the folks guilty of having no backup solution in place, take a minute to run through this great tool implemented in Windows Vista as well as the newest version of the Windows platform, Windows 7.  This can save not only your precious data, and programs, but a great deal of time when you're in a pinch. 

As we all know, Google is probably the dominant search engine available for Web users to search the vast data across the Internet. 

Google is involved in everything from applications to virtualization, and everything in between. 

Here are some cool things that Google can also do for you right from the search engine, that many users are unaware of. 

1. Phone Book - simply type in the person/business name, city, and state to return phone numbers and addresses.  They will even provide you with a direct link for driving directions.

2. Need the time?  Simply type in the following string "what time is it in (place goes here)?" Example ---> What time is it in Detroit?

3. File types - You can actually use the search engine to check for only certain file types when searching.  Simply type in your search criteria and add  “file type:pdf"  That would return only documents with PDF (Adobe) files, but you can search for any type you need... Power Point, Word, Adobe, etc....

4. Calculator - Google can do your basic math problems by simply putting the problem into the search engine.  Example would be 1+2 or 1x2. 

5. Frequent Flyer?  Here is a really cool one, for those who travel frequently.  There is no longer the need to go to your airlines website and use their tracking feature.  Simply type in your airline company + FLIGHT + the flight number.  Example would be Northwest Flight 225.  This will show you the status of your flight, and save you valuable time searching on the airline's website. 

Google has these plus thousands of other features, tips, and tricks to make your online time a little easier.  If you want to learn more about these features, simply visit http://www.google.com/help/features.html and check out their extensive features list. 

Every day thousands of computer users' lose power, and have no prevenative solution in place to protect them.  Power spikes, surges, and outages can cause major problems on your network if you are not protecting the infrastructure from such a problem.  Not only is physical damage to your equipment at stake, but you also run the risk of losing your unsaved work, and valuable data if it's not backed up.  Three words come to mind,  uninterruptible power supply aka UPS.  A UPS can be your best friend in a major thunderstorm, or some kind of electrical event if implemented.

So what is a UPS anyway?  The UPS acts as a battery backup to provide power to your computer or other critial hardware when a power problem occurs.  There are typically two kinds of UPSes, which are standy, or continuous.  The standby is activated within milliseconds when it detects a power failure, while the continous UPS is always on, getting power from your AC outlet plugged into a wall.  Either is a super effective way to ensure the proper time to save any of your unsaved work, and properly power down your computer network.