Just a little info on myself, my day job consists of working for a leading Linux distribution and in my after-hours I write for an Android site. So I am not the typical Apple user much less a customer of a Version 1.0 device that obviously has little to no value, right?  Please read on….

I will spare you countless user videos and multi-angle pictures since Google can find those for your viewing pleasure and just give an honest hands on review of my iPad after five days of use.  From the moment I finally decided to get myself the iPad I had multiple conversations with myself about what I would do with such a middling device.  I finally succumbed because I figured the worst I could do is end up returning it, pay the restocking fee, and get it out of my system and not look back.  I showed up at the Apple store on a Friday afternoon and after waiting for what seemed like an eternity, received an arrival email Saturday morning (funny how something you never wanted or needed before suddenly becomes a must-have object of desire).

True to Apple’s process of putting you in a line to wait for your name to be called to be in another line, I was swept away by a very bubbly Apple rep and after going through the extended warranty pitch got my hands on my iPad.  Again, true to Apple form, since this is not a “real” PC but an Apple peripheral device I did not even take it out of the box as it has to be activated by an iTunes account.  Fine, I did that and powered it up for the first time.

What greeted me was little changed from my 2G iPhone and my bought-and-sold iPod Touch’s BUT the iPad is simply stunning because of its screen.  It is much more touch sensitive than either of the former devices yet not excessive, it just goes when you go and moves when you move.  The swiping between screens is not just fast but FAST.  This thing moves.  I see the genius of Apple not letting their “iP-X” devices run multiple processes, because if they did they would get bogged down by threads, apps that access old data over and over, and what’s more – the dreaded battery life.  As an Android guy I don’t completely agree, but I do understand it.  iBooks is nice to show off but I am still testing to see if it is a real viable option to a physical book.  I suspect this is the future of print and I need to just quit resisting.  Also, my introduction to the device cannot be discussed if the battery life is left out.  I did not charge the device initially and it lasted the advertised ten hours at least, so Apple has definitely cracked the code for an “all day” device.

I proceeded to download my standard apps: TweetDeck, Netflix, ABC player, various radio apps, Skype, an HD KJV Bible and they all work just like on my iPhone.  The TweetDeck, Netflix, Bible, and ABC apps are optimized for the iPad, whereas the other ones are still iPhone ready.  Which means they take up the same screen real estate as an actual iPhone.  No real problem here as they will be come iPad-ized soon but the 2x function leaves them highly pixelated and unsightly, but functional.  The only real problem I have had so far is a stuck pixel to the left of center but I’m going to have Apple look at it this week so we’ll see.  This past week I have taken my iPad everywhere.  After a hard reset the first day, I finally got my Gmail and work e-mail working and it’s very useful to use out and about as I have a portable WiFi device with unlimted 3G, so no ATT 3G version needed.

I downloaded several movies onto it and they look very good, in fact, they look better on the iPad than my full size PC’s and is my primary reason for purchase.  The Netflix app is essentially a mobile Safari browser plug-in and not native but it plays movies over WiFi very well and over 3G just okay.  So I agree whole-heartedly that the iPad is not a device for creativity but for consumption.  And if this is kept in mind by the user then it does actually what it’s made for and then some.  I would be remiss if I didn’t mention the Apple iPad case.  As you can see by the images above it is very slim and it folds back on itself to give a decent angle when typing on a table top and/or your lap, and it can double as a stand, but only on very flat and stable surfaces or else it will topple over as it’s top heavy.

All in all, I am very happy and surprised that I have come to use the iPad almost as a primary device.  It has taken the place of one HP Tablet PC 1100, Dell Mini 9 and 10 netbooks, Asus Eee PC 900, Acer dual-boot netbook, Lenovo Thinkpad, built home desktop, you get the idea.  I am doing 90% of my computing now from the iPad and my Motorola Droid so my actions have spoken louder than my words.

(I purposely left out the argument against Apple’s walled garden approach to developing software as 99% of iPad customers will not care or know how they get their software, only that they do).

I mainly use it to keep up with my babysitting hours. Also to keep up with my kids schedule. Another awesome feature is that this is all online so you can be at your friends house and you need to see something in one of the documents, all you have to do is get online and sign in to your account and there you go! If you would like to play with this cool gadget, go to gmail.com and make a new email account. Then look up into the left hand corner you will see a link called Documents. When you click on it you will see a button on the left side called Create New. When you click on that you will be given the option to create a new Document, Presentation, Spreadsheet, Form, or Folder.

Spreadsheets are awesome for doing your budget (if you could use help with a budget here is a great article). It is like Microsoft Excel. Like Microsoft Word, Google Documents is great for writing letters. When you create a new document you will have the option on the right hand side of the screen to share. When you click Share you put in the email address of who you would like to share it with. Then it will send them a invite. It will also give you the option to let them edit or to just view the document.

Make sure you select the correct option before sending. If you do send it before checking which option it will automatically select for them to edit. You can always go back and change that. If you do not want that person to have access to that document anymore you go into that document click share then click see who has access.

It will have a list of everyone who has been given access and if they can edit or view. Then next to the name click the arrow and that is where you can change their access to view, edit, or no access at all.

Just click None if you don’t want them to have any access, and it is as easy as that. Now if you have sensitive information in Google Docs I would encourage you to read my post on Password Protection. Make sure you have a secure password and you will be set!! I hope this is good info for you. Also we wish you a Merry Christmas!

If you have the CD to which is used to install the program, and maybe you don’t need it installed anymore. Keep your installation disc, but uninstall for the time being to increase your machine’s production speed.

See any programs you downloaded (Weather.com Desktop Gadget, Google Desktop, etc..) that you no longer want or use? Go ahead and uninstall them, you can always download them again.

Head on over to Control Panel and look for either: “Uninstall a program” or “Add / Remove Software”.

As shown in the above picture, you can sort by size to see which programs take up the most resources on your computer.



Easily make it your default voicemail system by activating it through the web interface. After logging in, click on Settings (a link in the upper right hand corner). Look for a link below your forwarded mobile phone like the one below:

This link will give you a number you enter on your phone that enables conditional forwarding (if busy, if no answer) calls to your Google number.

Next, if you hold down the “1″ key on your phone as your means to reach your voicemail, why not also point it to your new voicemail system?

Each phone is going to be different, so you may need to do some research or check your phone’s user manual. Let me know what phone you have in the comments below and I’ll help you find out how to do this. Usually you want to look for  something along the lines of “Voicemail Setup”.

Let me show you what I mean.

Lets say your last name is smith and you make your password at every account smith1. The first thing that is wrong with that password is it’s length. A good password needs to be at least 8 characters long. Also it needs to have a little complexity to it. So let’s say you still want to use that password you can strengthen the original password by using $m1ThHt!ms1. All I did to make that password is write smith forwards and then backwards right after each other then adding a one. That gave it the length that it needed. Then I use similar looking symbols instead of certain letters. Another easy way to come up with a password is to make up a phrase like “I love  listening to songs on my iPod Touch!”. Take the first letter of each word which would be ILLTSOMIPT!. Also put the end character that will add to the length. Also, hold down shift for the whole first half of the password then let it go for the second half it will help it be more complex. So that would be ILLTSomipt1. Now just replace some of those letters with characters. !LLT$0m1pt1. Now remember we held down shift for the whole first half so instead of 1 at the beginning it was a !, same with the end.

Another way to keep this easy is to make the password above for an account with iTunes or something related to that phrase. Try to have a password for each and every account that you own. If you keep the phrase related to the websites they will be very easy to remember! People have been told for many years to change their passwords every 90 days or so. If you have a strong password a hacker will give up pretty soon and try to find another account with a much easier password to break. Don’t feel required to change your strong password unless you hear that the company that you have the account with has put out an alert that their security has been compromised. Also never give your password to anyone. There is something going around called phishing. An example is where you get an email saying that the company that you have the account with are doing maintenance on their site. 99.9% of the time this email will be a scam just to get your username and password. Always go to the actual website (Not by clicking on any links in the email) and if there is real maintenance going on you will be notified there. There will be another blog about phishing soon. This is just one of many examples.

To help you with making sure your passwords are strong enough use this Password Checker from Microsoft. Try to keep your passwords between Strong and Best. You can do it!

Most of what you are doing on your computer right now (browsing the web, listening to music, watching videos) does not require the full access that an Administrative account has. So when you get a virus (hopefully you won’t, but it happens) the virus will not have enough privileges on  your Standard account to spread across your machine. It won’t have access to multiply or to make harmful changes to your operating system.

Since the release of Windows Vista / 7, it has become a little easier to start doing the most sensible thing: Log in as a Standard User for normal operations.

In the event you do need administrative privileges (to install software, make system changes, etc), today’s latest OSes (Windows 7, OS X 10.6) will prompt you for an admin account password to quickly make that change, then return to standard account status.

The answer depends on many factors but hopefully it’s not taking you 10 minutes just to see your wallpaper. I’m a fanatic when it comes to a computer’s performance. I love to get the most out of a machine using already existing hardware and free software to optimize performance and stability.

This is a quick guide to help you understand how today’s latest technology can get so bogged down.

Here are some common causes:

• Hard drive fragmentation
• Physical hard drive failure
• No free space available
• More than one anti-virus
• Malware

Think of your hard drive as your office. If your office looked like the one below:

It would take a long time to find the right files you need to work with. If your hard drive is fragmented, the same truth applies. When in this condition, Windows is frantically searching your drive for the files it needs to run. If out of order and misplaced, this can cause slowness.

There are a few utilities out there that will clean up this state of your drive and be the maid when it comes to putting your files where they need to be.

My personal favorite is Defraggler.

Head on over there and grab a free copy. Below is a screenshot of the installation.

I want you to pay attention to this screen. Many will fly past this screen without noticing what it’s asking you. And this goes with any program you install. Always check to see what additional applications or add-ons it’s wanting to install. So, do you really want the Yahoo! Toolbar? If so, that’s fine and keep going. But if not you need to uncheck that here.

Once you have Defraggler installed, let it analyze your drive. This is to give you an idea of how fragmented your hard drive is.

If you see a lot of red blocks like in the image above, it’s time to run Defraggler.

Do this at least once every few months. It depends on how often you use your computer, but don’t over do it. Running a defragmenter is heavy ware and tear for your hard drive so don’t run it every day.

Speaking of ware and tear, think of your hard drive as a tire on your car. The more you drive on it, the faster it’s going to ware down and need replacement. Hard drives have CD like platters stacked on top one another that spin at a very fast rate. So it’s a moving part, and all electrical and mechanical devices with moving parts are prone to failing eventually.

Even before failing, the platters in the drives can become unreadable much like audio CDs with smudges on the bottom of the discs. When you play a CD in this condition, your music skips right? Much like your computer will when asked to do certain tasks. This can cause your OS to freeze up with a BSOD (Blue Screen of Death) error (example shown below), or extreme slowness.

To test this theory, you need software that can detect reading or writing errors. Most of the professional grade applications are a little pricey but worth their cost.

Typically this is found under the Start menu; All Programs; Accessories; System Tools; Disk Cleanup. Or on Vista / Windows 7 just click Start and search for Disk Cleanup.

Also run CCleaner which is from the same folks that brought you Defraggler. It is an excellent cleanup utility that can clean up some of the clutter that Windows generates it’s self. Including logs, browser history and other miscellaneous items that I promise you will not miss.

The only item I suggest you consider is your browser form and saved passwords history. Many will want to keep this. See an example below:

Two is better than one, right? Not always. Not when it comes to two anti-virus applications dedicated to protecting your computer from viruses, from… the same viruses.

Most anti-virus products provide some sort of “on access scanning”. Meaning, once you open a file, plug in a USB thumb drive, or download something from the internet the anti-virus will automatically scan it in the background. This is a needed and important service, but if you have two products installed scanning the same files, it will slow your computer down quickly.

• Spybot – Search and Destroy
• Malwarebytes – Anti-Malware

Both are great scanners and they will find the sneakiest of viruses and spyware. And they are free!