Check your PC’s RAM usage by opening Windows Task Manager. Press Ctrl-Alt-Del (Vista users will have to click Start Task Manager) and click the Performance tab. If the figure next to ‘Available’ (or ‘Free’ in Vista) under ‘Physical Memory’ hovers around zero and your PC seems sluggish, you need more RAM.

How much RAM do I need?

The average Windows XP user should be satisfied with 1GB of RAM. Our tests, which involve working with images and using Nero Express to burn CDs, ran one-third faster when we upgraded from 512MB of RAM to 1GB. Power users who simultaneously run lots of demanding applications, or anyone regularly working with digital video or other large graphics files, will want at least 2GB. If you’re planning to upgrade your PC to Windows Vista, you can still get away with 1GB, but for a more comfortable experience we recommend 2GB of RAM.

What kind of RAM works on my PC?

RAM comes in many flavors, including DDR, DDR2, and DDR3. Newer technologies offer faster performance, but most motherboards accept only one type of RAM. Check your PC’s manual to find out what type of RAM modules you need and how they have to be installed. RAM dealers such as Crucial and Kingston offer handy online tools for identifying the right RAM for many PCs and motherboards. Most PCs being upgraded today use dual-channel memory, which you must install in pairs for maximum performance, so adding two 512MB modules instead of one 1GB module may be better. Again, check your documentation.

Paying a few dollars more to buy RAM from a reliable manufacturer like Crucial or Kingston is usually worthwhile, as RAM quality isn’t the place to save a few bucks.

Need help selecting RAM? Call Preemo!

Read the entire article: PC World

What Is It

Google Apps is a service from Google for using custom domain names with several Google products. It features several Web applications with similar functionality to traditional office suites, including: Gmail, Google Calendar, Talk, Docs and Sites.

The Standard Edition is free and offers the same amount of storage as regular Gmail accounts. The Premier Edition, which offers additional e-mail storage, is available for an annual fee. The Education Edition, which is free, combines features from the Standard and Premier editions.

How Does It Work

Google Apps is a web-based hosted solution, which means you can access Google Apps at anytime, anywhere you have an Internet connection. You might hear this type of technology referred to as “software-as-a-service” or “cloud computing”. “Cloud computing” or “software-as-a-service” is a computing model in which IT applications are provided “as a service”, allowing users to access these applications from the Internet (“in the cloud”) without needing to maintain the infrastructure that supports them. A simple way to understand the model is how people currently allow companies to run and manage their electricity rather than generating it within their home/office themselves.

With Google Apps, your data and the applications themselves are served from Google’s highly secure, scalable, and reliable data centers. Google actually builds its own data centers from scratch, so we’re able to have one of the lowest cost-per-server infrastructures in the world; which means that those savings are passed on to our Google Apps customers. Your business is able to offload the infrastructure costs and the effort it takes to maintain an on-premises solution, and focus those savings on more strategic IT initiatives.

And since Google Apps is web-based, your employees can be productive from anywhere, whether they’re at their own desk, using a different computer, or on the go with a mobile device.

Request A Free Google Apps Consultation

What Google Apps Are Offered?

Here is a list of Google Apps that you may (or may not) find useful in your business.

• Gmail – Touting 100 milion+ users, Gmail is a great option for email
  Benefits – Offers email and chat with contacts also on gmail, large storage size (7GB+ on publish date), good spam filter, automatically saves drafts of emails every minute
  Competition – Yahoo! mail, Hotmail, AOL mail, your ISP mail, company mail
• Google Docs – Online word processor, spreadsheets, and presentations
  Benefits – You can upload files, email files, or create files within Google Docs, can be saved in multiple formats, automatically saved to prevent data loss, revision history is saved, can be edited by multiple users simultaneously
  Competition – Microsoft Live, iWork, Zoho Office, OpenOffice, OpenGoo, ShareOffice, ThinkFree Office
• Google Calendar – AJAX driven (sexy) calendar web app
  Benefits – Access to calendar anywhere, can share calendar with others, set up email reminders, drag and drop events, comment on other people’s events, offline access
  Competition –  Microsoft Outlook, iCal, 30boxes, Zoho Planner
• Google Talk – Instant messaging and VOIP client
  Benefits – Integrated with Gmail, voice and video chat (also available between Google Talk and Gmail users on select OS’es), voicemail and file-sharing
  Competition – Skype, MSN Messenger, AOL Instant Messenger

Advantages of Google Apps

1. Accessible everywhere – No longer will you be tied down to a particular computer. Any computer that has the internet can access your documents.
2. Doesn’t require installation – If you frequently bounce between different computers, you may soon grow tired of installing the same applications over and over on each computer. Since these apps are online, all you need is a web browser.
3. Collaboration – If two people want to work on the same document, traditionally they have to email it back and forth. After 10 rounds of back and forth, they may have a finished product. Google Apps allow people to edit the documents simultaneously and save changes as different revisions.
4. Cost savings – Some software can get quite expensive. Microsoft Office Professional can cost as much as $500. Open Office is free and can read and save documents as a Word document. Google Docs can do that, too, while giving you the other benefits listed above.
5. More options with paid version – If you want more users to collaborate on the documents, or need more space or other options, Google offers paid upgrades. The service is scalable to your needs, in other words.

Additional Information on Google Apps:

Webinar on Google Apps

Walkthough of Google Apps

Request A Free Google Apps Consultation

Want to know how Google is about to change your life? Stop by the Ouagadougou conference room on a Thursday morning. It is here, at the Mountain View, California, headquarters of the world’s most powerful Internet company, that a room filled with three dozen engineers, product managers, and executives figure out how to make their search engine even smarter. This year, Google will introduce 550 or so improvements to its fabled algorithm, and each will be determined at a gathering just like this one. The decisions made at the weekly Search Quality Launch Meeting will wind up affecting the results you get when you use Google’s search engine to look for anything — “Samsung SF-755p printer,” “Ed Hardy MySpace layouts,” or maybe even “capital Burkina Faso,” which just happens to share its name with this conference room. Udi Manber, Google’s head of search since 2006, leads the proceedings. One by one, potential modifications are introduced, along with the results of months of testing in various countries and multiple languages. A screen displays side-by-side results of sample queries before and after the change. Following one example — a search for “guitar center wah-wah” — Manber cries out, “I did that search!”

Read the entire article: Wired Magazine

Edward says Best Buy shipped off his busted work computer without letting him know, leaving him computerless for up to two weeks. While Edward admits he signed off on the possibility that his computer would be sent away, he wouldn’t have agreed to the service had he known parting with his machine was a likely prospect.

He writes:

But instead, no one called me back – I had to call myself – and found out that my computer had been sent out to get repaired without my knowledge or approval. I know that it says “I authorize BB to send out my item for repair” on the terms of acceptance, but I thought it was clear that I would get a rundown of the situation before any of that took place. At least that’s what I had been told.

This is my work computer, with all of my files and documents and gradebooks (I’m a TA). Had I known it would have to get sent out for up to 2 weeks, I would not have allowed it at this time. Hell, it’s approaching midterms and I have all kinds of record keeping to do… plus papers and research for my own classes. And I still don’t know what’s actually wrong with my computer.

I spoke to a store manager and two people from consumer relations, and got apologies. That was nice. But when I asked if I could have a loaner computer to use while my work computer was unknowingly whisked away to who-knows-where, they said they couldn’t help. The best they could do was let me buy a computer and then return it sans restocking fees when mine came back. Needless to say, unacceptable.

Read the entire article: The Consumerist

Forget the geeks – call Preemo today. 305.669.6049

Ideal for the consumer that values portability while demanding more performance than you’d get from a netbook, these notebooks stand out for their low weight and small footprint. Ratings and rankings can change due to pricing and technology changes, so check back frequently for the latest info.

View them all at: PC World

It is, unfortunately, that time of year again. If you’re thinking about buying tax software from TurboTax or H&R Block, or using their free online deduction tools, the New York Times and Consumer Reports have done the legwork in comparing the two.

The Times considers TurboTax and H&R Block at Home as ease of mind purchases for those with taxes that aren’t quite corporate enough to warrant a full-fledged accountant, but not so simple as to require just a few checkboxes. Neither software, however, is a perfect solution:

Before you buy a tax-preparation program, understand that it won’t be a panacea. You still have to keep good records – they matter mightily if you’re audited – and, in complicated situations, you may need to research tax laws yourself. The software can’t tell you whether tuition for your Spanish class is deductible, only that job-related educational expenses might be. What’s more, it won’t ease the headache you may get by trying to find answers on the I.R.S. Web site. The agency provides reams of guidance, but the rules can be murky for people who muck about with them only occasionally – even pros.

Meanwhile, for those with a good number of charitable and other deductions, Consumer Reports tackles the pros and cons of each software provider’s free online offerings to help you value and deduct the proper amount for donated goods and resources.

Read the full article: LifeHacker

Squeeze the very best performance out of your PC with these Windows 7 optimization tricks.

Windows 7 comes as a significant performance improvement over its predecessor, Windows Vista. But if you want to get the very best performance possible, you should make a few system tweaks to eliminate resource-hogging programs and features. In this guide, I’ll show you a few good ways to boost your PC’s performance without upgrading your hardware.

First, one warning: A quick Internet search will lead you to treasure troves of advice for making the most of your OS, but beware — many of those suggestions are fool’s gold, myths inherited from Vista and XP optimization guides that could actually do more harm than good for your Windows 7 system’s performance.

The tweaks and suggestions I offer here won’t transform your rusty old junker into a screaming new Porsche, but they will help you squeeze some extra speed and space out of your native Windows 7 installation.

If you intend to perform additional modifications to Windows 7 beyond the options I describe here, be sure to run a quick search for “Windows 7 performance myths.” Don’t be fooled by the more outlandish tweaking claims and tutorials you’ll find on the Internet. Investigate the changes you intend to make to your system before you do anything, or you might find yourself in an undesirable (or even irreparable) situation.

Speed up a fresh Windows 7 upgrade

When you reach the first, fresh desktop after completing a successful Windows 7 installation, you might be stunned to find your components in perfect working order. For the most part Windows 7 is quite good about setting up drivers for networking, video, input devices, and other elements — good, that is, but not great.

Read the entire article at: Computer World

TwitterCounter is a great twitter service that offers updated statistics of your followers, following, and daily tweets. You could further compare absolute growth of multiple twitter accounts or also compare them with your competitor’s expansion. Track, measure and redesign your strategy on twitter.

2.Twitteranalyzer

It is an interesting tool that helps to get all kind of statistic chart about you and your friends behavior at Twitter site. If you love using Google Analytics then this tool is sure to impress you. Some exciting features of Twitter Analyzer are – you can see how followers are online presently, who retweets your messages, what people are writing about you, Twitter following stats, your Tweeting habits and many more

Full Story At: HoneyTechBlog

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