Innehållsförteckning för Jun-12 från PCWorld

COBRA TAG With the Cobra Tag ($60), you may never lose your keys again. Attach this sensor to your keys (or bag), and you’ll be able to locate it when you use the associated app on your Android or BlackBerry phone. Cooler still, it’s a two-way finder: If you misplace your phone somewhere in the house, for example, tap the button on the Cobra Tag, and your phone will ring. MAGELLAN WEATHER STATION KEYCHAIN This compact device, priced at about $23, is the perfect gadget for outdoorsy types. Attached to a heavy-duty carabiner, the Weather Station Keychain supposedly can forecast the temperature and humidity anywhere in the world. The keychain also features an alarm clock, a calendar, a compass, and a built-in LED light. FLIPSYNC II KEYCHAIN CHARGE AND…

THE UPCOMING 802.11ac wireless networking standard promises to do to 11n what 11n did to 11g. While the IEEE 802.11ac standard probably won’t be completed before the end of 2013 (Draft 2.0 is under development), and although the Wi-Fi Alliance has issued no interoperability criteria, consumer products claiming compliance with 802.11ac could be available on store shelves as soon as the middle of 2012. Most of these early residential and small-business products likely will spend the vast majority of their useful lives operating backward-compatible to 802.11n. And it’s questionable whether residential users will get much out of 802.11ac, as home Internet connections (to say nothing of residential ethernet switches and router ports) top out well below the 1.3-gigabits-per-second speed that a three-stream, 40MHz 802.11ac product can nominally reach. The improvements…

AS 4G NETWORKS expand and unlimited data plans drop like flies, it’s important that you know how to cut down data usage without compromising your enjoyment of your Android device. Here are a few tips; for more, see find.pcworld.com/72805. Monitor Your Data Usage You can check your data consumption as measured by your phone (which may vary a bit from what your carrier thinks you’re using). For this guide, I used a Samsung Galaxy Nexus with Ice Cream Sandwich (Android 4.0.2), but the steps may differ depending on your phone and Android version. In the Settings menu, go to Wireless & Networks • Data usage. Here you can see how much data you’ve used for the cycle, set a limit that will disable your data connection at a certain point,…

AN EBOOK CAN provide your small business a real competitive advantage by giving you instant credibility and visibility in the marketplace. Also, ebooks are no longer a niche market. As of June 2011, ebook reader adoption had reportedly hit 25 percent in the United States—and remember, that milestone was about a year ago. But the ebook sales market is fragmented. You’ll have to work directly with numerous companies, each with its own formats, rules, and quirky systems. While Amazon is the clear leader, both Apple and Barnes & Noble have solid user bases, too. Prepare your book for at least those three platforms. The Basics of E-Publishing Start with the book: Each ebook seller has its own formatting rules. Spare yourself the headache, and hire someone to handle the task.…

YOUR MOTHER CALLS you to ask why you keep emailing her about “enhancements,” and your coworkers complain that you won’t stop sending them ads. Does this sound like you? A friend of mine recently found himself on the receiving end of a deluge of “bounced” spam email—junk messages that seemed to have been sent from his email account to invalid email addresses and then returned to the supposed sender. But the email address in question is for an account that my friend rarely uses, and he did not knowingly use it to send any spammy email to anyone. Initially he suspected that spammers had hijacked his email account somehow. But even after he reset the email account’s password, the bounce messages continued to flow in. Why was this happening? Were…

HERE ARE A few cheap and simple tools designed to wipe your hard drive, solid-state drive, or USB flash drive thoroughly before you dispose of it. Because different types of drives use different storage methods, you need different tools to deal with each type. Deleting data during everyday use doesn’t remove the data from your drive; instead, it merely erases the pointer to that data. To expunge data permanently, you need an app that writes ones and zeros, literally or figuratively, over your existing data. Before attempting to wipe a laptop’s drive, be sure to plug in the AC adapter; if your laptop battery dies halfway through a drive wipe, the hard drive is likely to become corrupted and unusable. For erasing a traditional magnetic hard-disk drive, try the free…

IF YOU WANT to remove only some of your personal data from multiple Google services, visit Google Takeout, which holds your data from various Google tools and services. Log in to google.com/takeout; then either download your data for all supported services or specify the data that you want to download. After you’ve finished making your selections, click the Create Archive button at the bottom of the page. Google Takeout will create an archive consisting of your downloadable data (this may take a few minutes). After downloading the archive, you can manually delete the data from the individual Google services—Google won’t let you automatically delete the data you download from its servers. Since Google Takeout doesn’t yet support all of Google’s services, you won’t be able to take everything with you.…

TO HACK AMAZON’S Silk browser onto your Android device, you need a Windows PC and a compatible rooted Android device (check the device compatibility list at find.pcworld.com/72818). (Caution: The hack may damage or destroy your device.) 1 Download the latest version of the SilkPort file package from a third-party hosting service (find.pcworld.com/72859). Scan the download for viruses and unpack it into a directory on your PC. 2 Set your Android device in Recovery mode. If it has a physical keyboard, press and hold the up button on the D-pad and press the Power button until the device boots into Recovery mode. On a touchscreen phone, hold down the Volume Down button, and press the Power button. On a Galaxy Nexus with Ice Cream Sandwich, press and hold both Volume buttons,…

Follow us on Twitter @PCWPluggedIn. → FAA reconsidering ban on gadgets during takeoff, landing. How long before smokers seek to reclassify cigarettes as “wireless gadgets” → Twitter sues spammers and spam tool providers. The character limit sharply curtails its allegations in the federal court filing, however. → Israeli law requires magazines to disclose which models have been Photoshopped. Real-world surgical enhancements, though, are exempted. → Yahoo firing 2000 workers to save $375 million. Imagine how much they’d save if they closed up shop entirely. → An AV expert with Sophos says Mac users are more vulnerable than Windows users. Especially to criticism.…

Browser Pros and Cons I was a bit surprised that the April review of browsers (“Which Browser Should You Use?”) left out the really good browsers in favor of the older but slower ones. The only newer browser you tested was RockMelt, but some users prefer Flock. I like Comodo Dragon the best of all. I also regularly use SlimBrowser and Maxthon. I don’t think IE, Opera, or Safari can hold a candle to them. I think you should have included some of the cutting-edge programs and not just the most popular. Ed Paul, South Bend, Washington Editor’s note: The alternative browsers mentioned are available at pcworld.com/downloads/downloads.html. After reading your article, I decided to see if Chrome or Firefox should replace Internet Explorer, which is often interminably slow at loading…

THE NEXT TIME you buy a new smartphone or laptop and then accidentally drop it, you might not have to worry about permanent cracks or scratches in its plastic casing. Instead, your gadget might “bleed” and then heal itself. Researchers at the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg recently announced a new type of plastic that they claim can mimic the human skin’s ability to repair itself after suffering damage. When cracked or scratched, the plastic turns red at the damaged area and then heals when exposed to light or to significant changes in ambient temperature or pH. The university group presented the new plastic in a paper during the 243rd National Meeting & Exposition of the American Chemical Society. The secret to the new plastic’s self-healing properties is a…

I’M AN AMERICAN working for the U.S. government in Italy. Around Thanksgiving, I bought an Asus Eee Pad Transformer TF101 tablet from Overstock.com and had it sent to my FPO mailing address. When the tablet’s screen died a while later, I opened two Asus support tickets: one on the Italian site and one on the U.S. site (since I got it from an American vendor). Asus in Italy merely asked, “Did you buy the tablet in Italy?” I wrote back and explained the situation, but never got a reply. An Asus rep in the United States told me that they could fix the tablet, but would return it only to a family member or friend in the United States, since the company does not ship to AFO or FPO addresses.…

MOZILLA, ADOBE, AND Apple recently released security updates for various products. Mozilla found that attackers could crash your browser via the home button, with your help. Adobe issued a hotfix for ColdFusion after spotting a potential clash of data. And Apple released Safari, iOS, and iTunes updates. Adobe vulnerability updates: Adobe released two security updates this month—one for ColdFusion (rated important) and one for Adobe Flash Player (rated critical)—to address vulnerabilities in the products. A weakness in ColdFusion could lead to a denial-of-service attack through what is called a hash algorithm collision (find.pcworld.com/72866). A “collision” occurs when two pieces of data have the same designation or value, and the problem could compromise your system’s security. Adobe released a hotfix for ColdFusion 9.0.1, 9.0, 8.0.1, and 8.0 for Windows, Mac, and…

BACK IN 2007, Adobe introduced Lightroom to help users with their digital workflow (the process of downloading photos from a camera or memory card, and then managing, organizing, sorting, editing, and eventually publishing, printing, or sharing the best shots)—and Lightroom quickly became the gold standard for such software. Now, the new Lightroom 4.1 has some capable company: Corel AfterShot Pro and CyberLink PhotoDirector 3. All three programs offer lossless editing, essential photo-editing tools, a rich organizer, and convenient ways to print, share, and publish your photos. Still, each has its own strengths and target audience. Corel emphasizes its simplified interface, which lets you reach almost everything in a click or two, and some superb new editing options. PhotoDirector provides a wealth of downloadable presets that offer inexperienced users guidance unavailable…

IN A WORLD of huge smartphone displays, the Samsung Galaxy S Blaze 4G ($150 with a two-year T-Mobile contract) is refreshingly compact. At 4.8 by 2.48 by 0.46 inches, it looks chunky, but it weighs a satisfactory 4.51 ounces. The 3.97-inch, 480-by-800-pixel Super AMOLED display is roomy enough for playing games and watching videos. Viewing angles are excellent, though the screen looked oversaturated in our color-bar and grayscale tests. Running Android 2.3.6 (Gingerbread) and Samsung’s TouchWiz overlay, the Blaze also has a ridiculous amount of Samsung and T-Mobile apps. As far as I can tell, unless you root the phone, you can’t delete the bloatware. Fortunately, the 1.5GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon processor helps the Blaze handle heavy-duty apps and high-resolution video well. The games I tested on it ran flawlessly.…

I HAVE PHOTOS on Facebook, spreadsheets in Google Docs, documents in Box, and videos on YouTube. Which is great—until I want them while offline. I could go to each site to download them. Or I could turn to SocialFolders, a service that syncs Web content to desktops. Its free version limits you to three services and 2000 files; Premium ($10 per year) is unlimited. To get started, you download a utility to your desktop that creates a SocialFolders folder you can access via Windows Explorer. Then you head to socialfolders.me, where you create an account, and identify and connect your social services, which may include Box, Evernote, Facebook, Flickr, Google Docs, Instagram, Photobucket, Picasa, SmugMug, Twitter, and YouTube. You can use SocialFolders’ Web interface to determine how much information you…

PC TOOLS THREATFIRE won’t replace your existing antivirus software, since it won’t effectively clean up malware that has already infected your computer. What it will do, however, is excel at preventing brand-new threats from infiltrating your system. Because of the way Threatfire works, we were unable to test it against our malware zoo of known threats. Threatfire doesn’t use traditional signature files; instead, it relies solely on behavioral analysis—that is, it identifies malware based on how the invader acts on your PC. That technology should make Threatfire fantastic at ferreting out new malware, and our tests bear that out. The tool produced outstanding results when blocking malware in our real-world tests: It fully blocked 92.9 percent of malware, and partially blocked the remaining 7.1 percent, the best showing of any…

HAS THIS HAPPENED to you? You’re sitting at your laptop, typing away, when you glance at the clock and realize it’s time to go. So you shut down Windows—only to be informed that it has to install some updates first. Ten minutes later, you’re still waiting for the job to finish—effectively held hostage by your operating system. That, my friends, is a big-time Hassle with a capital H. How hard would it be for Microsoft to give users a deferral opportunity—an ‘install updates later’ or ‘not right now’ dialog box option? This whole thing about forced updating during shutdown is borderline insulting. Fortunately, if you see the little update-alert icon that appears alongside the Shut Down button, you can bypass it. Here’s how to do it: 1. Shut down all…

TRY BOOTING from a Parted Magic CD or flash drive and see if you can access your files through it. Parted Magic (find.pcworld.com/72815) is a downloadable Linux variation that carries a hard-drive diagnostic program. Double-click the .iso file to launch a program that helps you turn the file’s contents into a CD (copying the file to a CD won’t work). If that’s unsuccessful, download and install ISO Recorder for Windows XP and Server 2003 (find.pcworld.com/72855) or ISO Recorder for Vista and Windows 7 (find.pcworld.com/72856). Then try double-clicking the .iso file again. If you can access the files while running Parted Magic, you can drag them to an external hard drive plugged into one of your PC’s USB ports. If not, try Parted Magic’s drive diagnostic program, Disk Health. If that’s…

Best Buy Closing 50 U.S. Stores, Thinking Small In an effort to stay competitive, Best Buy will be closing 50 of its big-box locations in the next fiscal year, while opening 100 smaller stores focusing on mobile devices. According to the Wall Street Journal, it also plans to increase staff training by 40 percent. What this means for customers isn’t clear yet. Members of Best Buy’s Reward Zone Silver program will see a few benefits, including free expedited shipping, a 60-day return-window and price-match policy, and early access to some popular products. Android Could Eclipse Windows by 2016 An IDC report predicts that within four years, ARM-based devices using Android will dominate computing, supplanting x86-based Windows devices. IDC says Windows’ market share will drop to 25.1 percent in 2016, down…

STM Hood Laptop Backpack If your everyday backpack regularly holds a laptop, a charger, a smartphone, and some papers, your shoulders are probably begging for mercy. The stiff back and dense vertical cushioning of STM’s $85 Hood distributes all of that weight so you barely feel it. find.pcworld.com/72877 MetroTwit If you like the appearance of Microsoft’s Metro interface, you’ll love MetroTwit (free and $15 versions), a clean, colorful Twitter client with lots of cool features. The latest paid version supports multiple accounts. You can also resize columns to squeeze the newest posts from your tweeps into whatever size screen you use. metrotwit.com Western Digital My Passport 2TB Don’t trust the cloud? You don’t need to if you’re packing 2TB of data in your pocket. Western Digital’s My Passport drive ($250)…

CURRENTLY, MANY organizations continue to use Windows XP, often simply because of the costs of upgrading. But since Microsoft has stopped issuing nonsecurity hotfixes for Windows XP and will end all support for XP in 2014, that strategy won’t work much longer. Virtual desktop infrastructure uses server hardware to run desktop operating systems and applications in a virtual machine. Users access the virtual desktops on their existing PCs. This arrangement eliminates the need for workstation upgrades, and lets a user switch between operating environments (Windows XP and Windows 7, say). VDI renders administrative and management tasks much easier, as users of each attached PC use the same image. Here’s a brief look at the pros and cons of VDI. Every desktop user can work with the same image. Pro: This…

IN CASE YOU want to know how reliant on Google you’ve become, the company is now offering users monthly account activity reports on an opt-in basis. The information covers signed-in activity on various Google services, including search, Gmail, and Google Latitude. The reports also indicate where users have signed in from, and which browsers or platforms they’ve been using to sign in. For example, you can see how many searches you’ve performed, what you have been searching for most, and what types of searches you’ve been performing. The reports also count email messages sent and received, and geographical position based on Google Latitude. To start getting reports, you must visit Google’s Account Activity page (find.pcworld.com/72851) and opt in to the service. Once you’ve signed up, the first report takes a…

GOOD NEWS FOR small offices: New high-end multifunction business inkjets—yes, inkjets—offer a compelling alternative to low-end color lasers, which are notorious for being slow and having pricey toner (and mediocre photo quality). High Paper Capacity The Epson WorkForce Pro WP-4540 ($400) does most everything well. Along with two 250-sheet letter/legal input trays, the unit has an 80-sheet, rear vertical feed for legal-size and thick media, upping the capacity to a generous 580 sheets. The scanner bed is letter/A4-size and has a 30-sheet ADF with automatic two-sided scanning; also present is an automatic duplexer for two-sided printing. The only installation wrinkle lies with wireless push-scanning, which requires manual intervention. Epson says it will address the issue; push-scanning via ethernet and USB are not hampered in this manner. The 5.8-inch touch panel…

THE INTERNET IS like a fancy Hollywood party with lots of swag: You can get tons of stuff for free, but not all of it is good. Still, some of the Web services, apps, and downloads out there are great, and they don’t require you to pay a cent. Our 17th annual roundup of free stuff includes dozens of no-cost services, apps, and programs that are worth your time. To help you find the most valuable freebies, we’ve categorized the offerings based on which types of people they’ll help most. Enjoy the free life! The Tech-Savvy Businessperson You’re on a budget, but you need reliable programs that will make your 9-to-5 run more smoothly. One free application that belongs at the top of every tech-savvy businessperson’s list is LogMeIn, which…

MALWAREBYTES’ ANTIMALWARE IS another supplemental free product that can help bolster your existing security software. The makers of Malwarebytes’ Antimalware (find.pcworld.com/72885) pitch it as a tool for detecting and removing brand-new “zero-day” malware, and it uses a number of different technologies to accomplish this task. The software did perform decently compared with other freebies when it came to stopping new malware. In our real-world tests, Malwarebytes fully blocked 78.6 percent of samples—slightly better than average—and partially blocked an additional 14.3 percent. It’s also reasonably fast: It had the lightest overall impact on system performance of any free antivirus product we tested. Malwarebytes isn’t something you’ll want to use as your primary antivirus software, though, as it isn’t great at stopping known malware: It detected a scant 57.1 percent of known…

HOOKING UP your PC to your HDTV is an excellent way to take advantage of the benefits of a gaming PC that packs a beefy graphics card and plenty of extra RAM. Start by plugging your television into your Windows 7 PC as an additional monitor, by connecting an HDMI cable from the HDMI port on your graphics card to the HDMI input on your HDTV. Turn the connected TV and PC on, right-click on your Windows 7 desktop, and click Screen Resolution. In that dialog box you should see a new monitor icon representing your HDTV. In the Display drop-down menu, select your TV as a monitor (usually, it’s labeled as ‘2’), and change the ‘Multiple displays’ setting to Extend desktop to this display. Confirm that your TV is…

Nobody’s Perfect… GRACEFULLY APOLOGIZING FOR an error on a website may be a lost art. Consider Gateway’s big oops on “Ops” (right) as reported by Kelvin Minoru of Oakland, California, or Yahoo’s regretful yet ultimately existential admission that “things may not work” (below), as brought to our attention by New Jersey’s Joseph Anderson-Berzley. Sorry, comments didn’t load correctly; things may not work. In That Case, I’ll Take a Billion of ’Em CHRIS VANDUYN OF West Long Branch, New Jersey, stumbled on a can’t-miss money-making scheme: buying the Railworks 3 Train Simulator. An offer he found at Steam (steampowered.com) would pay him $21 per purchase. The Snows of Kaneohe ON MARCH 5, AccuWeather listed the temperature of Kaneohe, Hawaii—Dean Choy’s hometown—as 70 degrees. “But the report of snow,” he notes, “had…