Metro

I am a fan of Windows Phone 7s UI, more technically referred to as “Metro”. It is great for phones, and even tablets for that matter, because it features large-enough UI elements for easy use as well as maintains a sharp-looking GUI. Here is where Microsoft hits the brick wall when it comes to Windows 8. They took the “Metro” style from WP7 and without much modification just slapped it into Windows. The reason a general computer user uses a mouse for precision; just in case you aren’t getting the point, you don’t need huge buttons when using a mouse.

File Browsing

Ever seen a project with a good design overuse it to the point where you wanted to barf? In Windows 7, Microsoft updated Paint and WordPad by adding the “Ribbon” bar which was first introduced in 2007 in their Office suite. After getting used to the ribbon it was really handy, but in Windows 8 they added this bar to Explorer. If you are part of the more novice group of computer users this is the application you use to navigate your neatly organized hierarchy of  files on your computer. Up until this point the GUI of Explorer was very basic, it is one of those applications that all you want it to do is what you need, and that is it. Well, now there is a ribbon in Explorer so all of those features you will never use are shoved in your face and are cluttering your view. Not to mention the changes in the theme that make all of the Windows sharp enough to cut through a diamond.

Layered

For the sake of interest, lets create an analogy. Picture an onion, fresh out of the ground; that layer of dirt and grime on the outside, that’s Metro. I feel the need to wash it off to expose the Windows experience that would be best for my productivity. With Metro in every way looking like an after thought, that I wish was never conceived for the desktop interface, I find myself scrambling to get back to the true desktop. The start menu, is now awkwardly replaced with the green jumble of everything you don’t need surrounding everything you do. Launching Explorer to a location like “My Computer” which once was a two click operation now involves opening the Metro interface, finding and clicking the Windows Explorer block, and lastly navigating your way to “My Computer”. It doesn’t just sound counter intuitive.

Menus and Panels

The Windows Control Panel, in its spread out view, is not something for the faint hearted novice user, but why not add two versions of it? Makes sense right? Through the Metro UI you can launch a Control Panel where you can toggle all of the basic settings like Windows Updates etc. but if you want to tweak some of the more “in-depth” features you have to navigate to the classic control panel. There truly is no better way to conjure confusion in a user than to give them two different ways to do one thing.

Inside of any of the pre-installed full screen apps the only way to access control is to right-click, each time you want to change something. It took me a while to even figure out how to do this, more or less a less tech literate user.

I want to reiterate that this is only the pre-beta developer version and these are solely my opinions. Anything could change between now and the release date.

The only good thing they changed in Windows 8: The BSOD

We have been seeing some iOS 5 beta’s around for a little while now, but we see a new Apple beta rise, the iCloud.

During the WWDC conference Steve Jobs announced iCloud and that it would be free to your apple devices. Your Mac’s, iPhone’s, iPad’s and your Windows PC. You will also be able to back your device up wireless and store everything in the cloud.

This week apple finally announced that iCloud will now be available to use for developers, however some non-developers were also allowed a sneak peek. To see if you are eligible then just visit iCloud.com, you will be prompted to sign up. Also this will only work on OS X Lion and iOS 5.

What you’ll need

• A Mac with the latest version of Snow Leopard (10.6.8)
• 8GB of free disk space
• App Fresh – A free application that keeps all of your software to the latest version
• Omni Disk Sweeper – A free application that shows large files on your hard drive
• OnyX – A free utility program, similar to CCleaner for Windows but with more options
• Backup your hard drive with Time Machine,  Carbon Copy Cloner, or any other piece of backup software you prefer

Here’s something that you might have done already, but if you’re not sure if you have the latest version, go to the Apple Menu > About This Mac. If you have anything lower than 10.6.8 (latest version), click Software Update.

OS X Lion will finally discontinue Rosetta support, so your Power PC application will no longer work. If you still use a Rosetta application, you should update to hopefully, an Intel version. If there’s no Intel version, you’re out of luck. To find out if you’re using a Power PC app, go to your Application Folder > Utilities > Activity Monitor.

Upgrading to Lion may cause incompatibility to some of your applications. Some apps are already pushing out updates that prepares it for Lion. To update all of your apps, it’s recommended to use App Fresh.

OS X Lion recommends at least 8GB of hard drive space, and possibly more for the recovery partition that Lion will put. If you already have 8GB or more free, it’s still a good idea to de-clutter your hard drive. By using Omni Disk Sweeper, you can see which folder or component in your hard drive is the biggest. You’ll be surprised how much clutter you might have on your hard drive.

There is an alternative to Omni Disk Sweeper called DaisyDisk. It has a hefty price tag of $19.99, but it gives you a graphical representation of your hard drive and it has much more features.

Another great utility application is called OnyX. OnyX is almost like CCleaner for Windows, but with powerful tools like checking the S.M.A.R.T status and maintenance utilities. There’s a lot more that goes with OnyX that you can check out.

Possibly the most important step to this guide is backing up all of your data.

Obviously with this step, you’ll need an external hard drive, which is relatively cheap. When picking out an external drive, you should always pick one with a bigger capacity than your current hard drive. There are two pieces of software that you should use for backup: Time Machine and Carbon Copy Cloner. I recommend Time Machine due to the simplicity and it’s built-in to OS X. If you’re tech-savvy, you can use Carbon Copy. 

Official video

Touch-friendly UI

The first thing you’ll notice about Windows 8 is its all-new finger-friendly user interface, which should look familiar enough to anyone who’s seen Windows Phone 7. This makes using Windows on a touchscreen device extremely intuitive, and puts the most important stuff right in your face when you first turn your computer on. The classic Windows Explorer user interface – with a ribbon in folder windows – is also available, in order to allow older programs to run.

Multi-architecture support

It’s old news by now, but Windows 8 will support ARM SoC (System on a Chip) devices as well as the traditional x86_64 platform. How is this feasible? The .NET Framework compiles CIL applications on-the-fly into whatever machine code the current processor supports, and the new Silverlight, JavaScript, and HTML-based features will obviously work anywhere.

What does this mean to the average Joe? More Windows-powered devices, including thin, light, and energy-efficient tablets that previously could only run Android, energy-saving thin clients, and battery-sipping laptops.

Performance

It used to be that the next version of Windows slowed your computer down to a crawl and mandated expensive hardware upgrades. While this is inevitable to some extent, the fact that Windows 8 is designed to run on low-power ARM tablets should say something about its performance on existing PCs. That new Core i3 just might last you longer than you expected.

Full-screen Apps: Tools or Toys?

Windows 8 seems to be designed with the “one app at a time” paradigm, with rich, beautiful, graphically-intensive applications taking up the entire work area. This is great for smaller tablet screens, and looks impressive on bigger screens… more on this later. It’s possible to multitask by just sliding your finger (or mouse pointer) inwards to “dock” apps to the sides and thus have instant access to vital information.

On the downside, this seems like a technological regression. I use 3 monitors and regularly juggle windows back and forth. While making many “tiles” is quite convenient on a single large monitor, I have no idea how well this will play out with multiple screens at different positions. The whole point of a larger monitor isn’t to stare at bigger pictures – it’s to fit more work in. Thankfully, Windows 8 still provides the mouse-and-keyboard-friendly Explorer interface as a choice.

Overall

Let’s face it: this is probably the biggest change in the Windows user interface since Windows 95. Unlike Windows 95, though, this one seems to simplify the user interface to an almost no-brain-required simplicity, which has its merits and pitfalls.

And myself? I’m pretty excited, but also a bit humbled. It’s a new Windows world out there, and that means it’s time to update my programming skills to match the new architecture. If I’m lucky, I’ll get my hands on a pre-release copy and then I’ll do a full review.

Lumier is a company launching today at TechCrunch Disrupt in NYC that plans to retheme your Windows and give it a Mac style dock and a nice slick feel that will make it easier to use windows and navigated between your applications or running windows.

A lot of the facts/style is unknown as it is still under major development but it seems like it is going to be great for a lot of users. (Or my grandma who doesn’t know how to use Windows)

The DS-90U is one of the main iconic products that made DoubleSight Displays the brand it is today. DoubleSight is known for manufacturing monitors, but when they released their USB Monitor, the market slowly started to take advantage of the new idea.

Design

The DS-90U’s Black matte finish looks very nice and blends in most computer enviroments. Though in coffee shops’ it may seem a little strange. The screen itself is not high-def but has a high pixel density of 1024×600. Now for most screens, this is relatively low, but this is just a 9″ screen.

Usability

The DS-90U has a two stands that are included. The first of which is a stylus stand that acts like the Archos tablets as in it consits of a piece of plastic with some rubber at the bottom to make it not fall down. The second is a stand that you may see on some full size monitors. It pivots at 2 points so you can fold it up and put it away or store it. The second stand is attached to the screen by way of a knob that also can adjust the height of the screen. The monitor can be turned 90 degrees to make things like Chat, IRC, or a stream of news fit better. The actual positioning though is done though their built in software. Currently it only works with 2000, XP, Vista, and even though it dosn’t say it in their installer, 7. To install it on Windows 7 all that is needed is for you to plug it in and it will automatically download the driver.

What’s To Improve?

There are a few things that should be improved in the product before it gets a refresh (in my opinion). First, most netbooks only have 2-3 USB ports. For the few of them that have 2, the monitor does not leave room for other devices such as a camera, thumb drive, or printer. Yes you could use a USB Hub but that is just another thing to buy on top of this. My idea for fixing this would be to either allow the user to put batteries into the device (since it only uses 5-10 volts) or to have an add-on port for an AC adapter. Second, the monitor does not have Linux support. As this is not a huge gripe at the moment, it may become one because of the increasing market of Linux based OS’ (especially the new Chromebooks). Lastly, the monitor is as thick as normal desktop monitors. This makes it so you would need to purchase a new laptop bag for those who wouldn’t have the space in their current one.

The Issues I Had

When I was installing the software on my current PC (Vista Home Pre. 32bit) it wouldn’t work for awhile. I fixed this by restarting a few times. I think the reason behind this was because of how I already had a second monitor on that PC. I did try it on a Windows XP machine (said it would work in the installer). The monitor was recognized but it would not install.

Final Remarks

The DS-90U is a fair price of $129. For the current way it is and what should be improved I will give it a 7. I would like to thank Dario DellaMaggiore of Doublesight Displays for sending the DS-90U over to me for this review.

What do you guys think of Microsoft’s recent effort with IE 9? Leave your comments below.

Now, what’s the pricing? Well, the prices are fairly comparable to the MacBook Air. The 11-inch model starts at $1,199, and the 13-inch model starts at a higher price of $1,649. If you want Windows 7 Professional on the 13-inch model, you’ll have to pay $50 extra.

Do you think that this is a MacBook Air competitor? Put your answers in the comments below.

Photo courtesy of The Planet

When I switched Tech Cores to a VPS back in early August of 2010, it was a turning point for us. Before that, we were using shared hosting which in the long run, started to hurt us more than anything. We switched from InMotion Hosting to a VPS for many reasons and quite honestly, I was done with shared hosting.

I manage quite a few websites for friends and colleagues; if you add them all up, you’re talking about at least twenty websites. I’ve worked with a good chunk of the ‘best’ shared hosting companies so let’s just list them out:

• InMotion Hosting
• iPower
• iPage
• Yahoo Small Business Hosting
• DreamHost
• HostGator
• GoDaddy
• WebHostingPad
• FatCow
• JustHost
• BlueHost
• HostMonster
• And some other smaller ones…

Yup, that’s pretty much every popular host out there. Now this isn’t a post on my thoughts of these hosts, but if you want to read my thoughts on InMotion Hosting, feel free to do so. But enough of that, let’s get into the real part of this post.

Shared Hosting

The biggest problem with shared hosting would have to be that many shared hosts get away with over-selling their services, or in other terms, selling too much for their servers to handle. There are tools out there to determine this but I won’t get into that. The main thing people need to realize is that most of these popular hosts have easily 2,000+ accounts on one server! And the #1 reason why most hosts kick their customers from their servers is for over-use.

Most shared hosts offer ‘unlimited’ deals to get you to buy their services. But with all honestly, it’s nothing but a gimmick! Let’s take a look at InMotion Hosting’s ToS, shall we?

Unlimited Disk Space & Bandwidth - IMH Personal & Business Class hosting are shared hosting environments, so to ensure fast & reliable service to all of our clients, accounts that adversely affect server or network performance must correct these issues or will be asked to upgrade to a virtual or dedicated server.

Practically every shared host claiming to unlimited hosting and bandwidth will have something like this in their ToS. Basically what it means is if you’re using too much of their server’s resources, which is very easy to do, they’ll terminate your account with no notice at all beforehand.

When I was hosting with InMotion Hosting, they terminated our account once because we were using too many resources. They never informed me of what exactly was causing it, but all they did was recommend for us to turn on caching. It’s not that heavy of a load and it’s for sure not using too many resources for a good amount of time; at most, it was for five minutes.

Some shared hosts are very easy to take down when using too many resources and others you need to purposely try to get your account terminated. The main thing you need to know is if you’re going to be using a terabyte of bandwidth and having 100,000 visitors each month, you can expect for the shared host to terminate your account and tell you need to upgrade to a VPS or a dedicated server.

The second thing about shared hosting is that most shared hosts rely on the cPanel control panel. cPanel is fairly easy to use but it has too many quirks to name.

Lastly, you’re typically guaranteed free technical support if you have any problems. But keep in mind that not all support reps may be as helpful as you may think. One time, it took over two months to get a rather simple issue sorted out with InMotion Hosting. The main thing that caused it was that cPanel was controlling too much and the system admins weren’t entirely smart about how to fix the issue. I ended asking them to transfer my account to a new server and that fixed the issue. I’m betting some configuration file was messed up, but the system admins didn’t bother to look to greatly into it.

But don’t think that all shared hosting support is bad. People always criticize me for this, but actually, Yahoo Small Business Hosting has some great support representatives! It’s almost like every one of ‘em are system admins. Of course, if you’re not too shabby at computers this won’t matter to you, but if you want to geek out with them and ask them some higher-level questions, they will answer it. I like that much better than having those support reps who rely on the help documentation their company provides them… cough InMotion Hosting! It’s almost like every question I ask they respond with, “hold on… let me research this.” I shun those people; they need better training.

VPS Hosting

VPS hosting, unlike shared hosting, is practically open for anything you want to do… that is, legal of course. If you want to install some special server software, you can do that. If you want to to set up Apache to use 500MBs of RAM on a 2GB VPS, you can do that. The possibilities are endless.

The thing with a VPS is most of the cheaper ones are unmanaged. With an unmanaged VPS, you’re basically setting yourself up for trouble if you don’t have a knowledgeable server admin. Managing your own VPS is a big pain. You never know what can happen to your server that you’ve spent days setting up.

Recently, one unfortunate outage happened to us; some software on our server started removing itself. That was not a good thing at all but luckily, all data was retained. Took us nearly an entire day (working for at least ten hours straight) to get it fixed.

Some VPSes, are managed. This means if you need something done, even if you’re not all to knowledgeable, the hosting company will do it for you. This is a great thing for most people because some people 1) don’t have time to working in a terminal or 2) don’t even have the ability to do things with a VPS. Sure someone can use Google on how to set something up, but if you’re doing it for the first time, your chances of getting stuck somewhere are pretty high.

The only problem with a VPS is that they typically cost more than shared hosting. If you don’t set up your server correctly, you could be using more resources than you need to be and you’ll need to upgrade the VPS, which is typically very expensive. Unlike shared hosts, you don’t find unlimited resources on a VPS. You pay for what you get in other words. You’re not going to get unlimited hard drive space, memory, or even bandwidth. If you need 1TB of data, you might as well look into a CDN like the Rackspace’s Cloud Files.

So… What to Get?

This is the big question for most people trying to start up a website is whether or not to go with shared hosting or VPS hosting. If you’re just starting out small, I would stick with shared hosting. If you’re planning on getting very popular or you need more freedom on how to set up your website, get a VPS. Shared hosts are very restrictive and you can only do so much until your host starts sending you warnings. With a VPS, as long as you stay legal and following the terms of service, they won’t scream at you.

The choice is yours. What are you going to use to host your website? A stringy shared host or an open and capped VPS?

*I would like to thank Macally for sending this out for review

*Video Review coming soon!

Unboxing

Design

The EZ-BookPad has a really nice sleek design. It’s made out of aluminum (hence the name), but has a very nice soft-touch finish. As you see the photo on the left, the bottom is perforated. The reason why it’s perforated is so you could change the fan postion anywhere you like and I’m thinking another way to cool down your laptop. There are two plastic feet on the bottom and two rubber pads on the top to keep your laptop secure.

You can set the stand into two positions: one in a lower angle (on left) and one in a high angle. If you want to use the high angle, you’ll have to use the bundled legs that comes in the box. In my opinion, those legs aren’t secure.

One major issue that I’m having with the stand are the little rubber pads on the top portion on the stand. Those pads stick on to the MacBook’s bottom casing. So when ever I want to take the laptop out of the stand, the stand would stick on the MacBook. I’ve tried putting a piece of paper over the pads, but the MacBook would sometimes slip down a little bit.

Fan

When you get a cooling stand for your laptop, you expect it to do it’s job: cooling your computer. This stand does do a really nice job of cooling. Usually without the stand’s fan, my MacBook Pro’s temperature would rise up about 170-180 degrees Fahrenheit without changing fan speeds through SMC Fan Control. But with the stand’s fan, it would cool down the laptop to around 160 degrees.

I do have two issues with the fan though. The first issue is that’s quite loud. According to the specs, this fan is 2000RPM, which isn’t supposed to sound loud. The other issue I have is the USB connector. The USB connector is unique. The cable comes out of the side, which is quite annoying. To fix that issue, Macally has added another USB port on the end of the connector. Although this fixes the issue, it would be pretty nice to have a third USB port.

Overall, this is a really nice laptop stand. It does the job well and if you have a uni-body MacBook Pro, it blends in the design pretty well. When you get the product, you might have to watch out for the fan noise. You can get the EZ-BookPad at Macally’s website for $39.99.

Today, Facebook announced a new system of messaging between people at once where the control of the conversation is in the users hands. In the next few months a few new changes will be added Facebook to help make instant communication more centralized. In the video Facebook’s Joel Seligstein created, he categorizes the new system into 5 major new chapters.

Chapter 1: A Person And A Message

In the online world there are 3 main forms of communication, E-Mail, SMS, and Social Network Messages (IM & PM’s). Facebook’s thoughts are to make this simple so the user doesn’t need to use different services to just send a message.

Chapter 2: A Conversation

Facebook wants users to be able to choose how they would like to connect. So Facebook will be releasing an option for users to get an @facebook.com E-Mail address. It will allow users of E-Mail to connect with you via Facebook. The New E-Mail system is based on the idea of chat, specifically the simplicity of it. The E-Mail system for these Facebook Emails will feel like a Chat session you and a friend would have using Facebook Chat.

Chapter 3: The Social Inbox

Facebook wants users to have their users to have only their friends to send them emails, not so they are together with spam and a bill. The Social Inbox will only show messages from your friends and their friends, not your bank.

Chapter 4: This Is NOT E-Mail

E-Mail addresses are to easy to get into the wrong hands and once they do, one must go about living with it or changing the email address all together. Facebook wants to make it so you can select who you want to receive Facebook E-Mail from. So if someone tries to annoy you, you can click Block. Also for people who don’t use Facebook, their emails can be added to your Social Inbox so you can see them.

Chapter 5: Social Context

Conversations should be centered around the person and not the subject, so Facebook decided to make a simple setup that just shows the senders name and their message. Facebook is also making it easy for people to respond via their method of choice.

The main goal around all of this is so integrate Seamless Messaging into the lives of every Facebook user.

See the informational video on this:

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Examples:

Mobile phones
Portable audio devices
Gaming consoles/games
Tablet PCs & eBooks
Laptops
Netbooks
Desktop PCs
Computer/mobile phone software
Etc..

In my opinion, I really think mobile phones have shaped 2010 a lot. The iPhone 4 came out and sold millions with its new Retina display, front & back facing cameras, and its A4 chip. Galaxy S phones have been a hit, HTC shined with their outstanding Android phones, and Verizon, T-mobile, AT&T, and Sprint all came out with stunning phones. Mobile phones are becoming more like Netbooks, and soon they will become more like laptops, then they will finally take over the world! Please comment below with your thoughts.

Thanks

Do you think the HP Slate 500 will succeed? Is it worth $800? Leave your answer in the comments.

Now, there’s not a lot of detailsl about this computer, but we know it has an Intel Atom processor, a 10 inch touchscreen, and Windows 7 Home. So far, there’s no word on pricing yet, but it should be coming around April.

Many websites have easter eggs. Google is known to be one of the main places to see an easter egg from their yearly April Fools Day Joke to… wait, what’s this? Google Docs? Yes! Recently Google released an easter egg in Google Docs that allows users to mindlessly flip the document they are working on. This is a video I did for my YouTube channel about some of the places where you can see the code! Enjoy!

[youtube 9aV_fVY1Xk0]

Can’t see the video? Click here to view it.

Apple has announced it will be holding a “Special Event” on September First! There will be live blog posts from Engadget keeping us here at home updated on the latest news of the event! So, I have compiled a small list of some of the posts here on Tech Cores that might be on topic for this event! Post you predictions about this event in the comments section, I can’t wait to hear what you think is going to happen! I personally am hoping for the release of iOS4 on the iPad and some type of Facetime feature on the iPod touch!

The Countdown is Dwindling while the Rumors are Piling Up: iPod touch 4G

iPod Touch 4G – What’s Going to Happen?

The Core i3 is basically a dual-core processor. I advise this processor for working with normal text documents, web surfing, and basic photo editing.

The Core i5 is, on the lower end, a dual-core processor with hyperthreading and, on the the higher end, just a quad-core processor. I advise this processor for working with photo editing, basic video editing, and gaming.

The Core i7, however, is a quad-core processor with hyperthreading. All-in-all, an 8-core processor. I would advise this processor for heavy photo editing, video editing, and extreme gaming. In a nut shell, the Core i7 can handle almost anything you throw at it.

In the end, it is really simple.

Taken from LordRehan’s blog.

iMac Updates

Let’s start off with the iMac. They still have the 21.5 and 27 inch models, but they both got some new hardware.

The base line 21.5 inch iMac has a new 3.06GHz Core i3 processor, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, 500GB hard drive, and has one of ATI’s Radeon 4670 with 256MB vRam. Apple also updated the the higher end 21.5 inch iMac ($1,499). They still have the Core i3 processors but instead of 3.06GHz, it’s now clocked to 3.20GHz. Apple also upgraded the hard drive to 1TB and the graphics to the ATI Radeon 5670 variety.

The $1,699 27 inch iMac has the same guts as the higher end 21.5 inch iMac, but the 27 inch model is upgradeable to a 3.6GHz Core i5, 2TB hard drive, a 256GB SSD and 16GB of DDR3 RAM. The highest end 27 inch iMac now has a 2.8GHz quad-core i5, ATI Radeon HD 5750 GPU with 1GB of vRAM, 1TB hard drive and upgradeable to a Core i7, 2TB hard drive, 256 GB SSD, and up to 16GB of RAM.

Mac Pro Updates

Possibly the most substantial update has to be the Mac Pro. Apple updated the Mac Pro to have 12 processing cores! (WOW!) It’s quite impressive to have that many cores, but it doesn’t come in a cheap price. If you want the 12 core Mac Pro, you’ll have to spend a whopping $5,000! Now, if you want a cheaper solution, you can still get a quad-core model for $2,499 or an 8 core model at $3,499. Apple updated the graphics card to the Radeon HD 5770, which is upgradeable to the HD 5870.

Apple does provide some good upgrades for the Mac Pro. Apple allows you to have 32GB of RAM, 4TB of storage, and a crazy option for four 512GB SSD drives!

New accessories

With all the updates out of the way, Apple made some cool accessories. Let’s take a look at them:

Magic TrackPad

The Apple Magic Trackpad is interesting. It’s basically the same glass multi-touch trackpad, but bigger. It still has the same gestures as all the Apple laptops. This product is mainly designed for desktop users. If you want this for your Apple computer, you can go get this for $69.

27 inch LED Cinema Display

The Apple 27 inch Cinema Display is no different from the 24 inch model. The new 27 inch Cinema display has a resolution of 2560×1440 and a new price of $999 Those are basically the main differences.

Apple Battery Charger… wait, what?!

Yes, you heard me, Apple is making re-chargable AA batteries. This could be the strangest thing that I’ve seen Apple to release to date. Now, Apple is pretty serious about this. Apple claims that it’s battery charger has the lowest vampire power draw than any charger on the market. You can get this thing for $29 and it will come with six AA batteries.

What Makes This So Special?

Think about it, an interface were you can group tabs and these tabs can help you find a good vacation spot, or a camera to take pictures of that vacation spot, pretty cool, huh? If you have tried Google Wave then most likely you have shared a document or a picture, but what about a webpage, or a group of them at this matter? This problem or situation is solved by Tab Candy. Along with many others mentioned in the video preview of Tab Candy!

[vimeo 13560319]

The Mozilla team is always busy designing, scripting, and planning their next browser. A couple weeks ago they opened their public doors to the next generation of Firefox, Firefox 4 Beta 1. Firefox sports a new, “more aero enabled” theme and a similar feel to Google Chrome. On that note the tabs are now closer to the top of the window. Also they have added a “Firefox” button that gives you quick access to things the would be found in, the now disabled by default, menu bar which can be seen in the picture below.

The New Interface

The new interface is a total over haul of the interface seen in previous versions of Firefox 3 and below. So, what about speed? The theme isn’t the only thing that feels like Chrome, the browser not only loads faster but is now seeing faster browsing speeds. Now with any application you are going to bog it down if you add too many add-ons especially if used in excess. Now with two simple add-ons No Script and AdBlock Plus, I have found no slow down once so ever!

Remember it’s a BETA

They don’t put the word beta in the title for nothing! There are still some glitches and add-on compatibility issues in the browser, so unless you know what you are doing Firefox 4 isn’t for you just yet, for the everyday user its better to just stick with the current “stable” version for now, and let the team work their magic to get it ready for you!

Marc Billow

Tech Cores Administrator

If you have a jailbroken iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch and you call Apple Care they now have the tools to see if your device is jail broken and refuse you support for that device and are then able to void your warranty, the consequence normally handed down for a device found to be jailbroken.

The next bit of information is that when using Apple’s new and instantly popular FaceTime app, it automatically sends you and you FaceTime partners location and name to Apple servers.

It wouldn’t be a full leak if AT&T want involved! Now if you use your device on a non authorized cellular network, you device will still receive AT&T updates, hence messing up your other connection!

Now this is a leak and could, in time, be proven wrong or corrected. If you would like to read more about this you can read the original post at http://www.addictivetips.com/mobile/leaked-apple-stealing-all-facetime-information-att-locks-user-via-ota-updates/ were the information was originally leaked to!

So, what do you think about this Apple leak?

Apple will still have a Mac mini Server configuration, which is basically a Mac mini with two 500GB hard drives, 4GB of RAM, 2.66 GHz Intel, No Superdrive, and Mac OSX Snow Leopard Server.

Picture Source: Engadget