laptop

Mon
29
Apr
Dennis Faas's picture

'Hidden' App Tracks Laptop Thieves Around the World

Back in February 2013, Dom Del Torto's MacBook was stolen from his London, England, apartment. In an effort to get it back, in March Del Torto began using the tracking software he'd previously installed on the device. The results were shocking. ... Using the tracking program 'Hidden', Del Torto found that the laptop had in just one month's time travelled all the way from London to Tehran, Iran. Laptop Outside UK Police Jurisdiction Because the Hidden app allows a user to take pictures of the person using the device on which it's installed, Del Torto was able to see the laptop's new owners. He was ... (view more)

Fri
07
Sep
Dennis Faas's picture

New Razer 'Blade' Laptop Super Powerful, Portable

One of the toughest decisions one has to make when buying a new laptop computer is to opt for portability or power. It's often difficult to do both. For gamers, the term 'portable' has evolved into a uniquely relative term, with most gaming-oriented ... laptops weighing in at a hefty ten pounds or more. But now Razer, best known for its gaming mice and other PC peripherals, has built a laptop that effectively erases the line between power and portability. Unfortunately, the machine is a bit pricey. Razer Blade "Completely Re-designed": CEO Although Razer is a less established name in ... (view more)

Mon
18
Jun
Dennis Faas's picture

Vizio Windows 7 PCs Ship Bloatware-Free

American television manufacturer Vizio has revealed a collection of new Windows 7-based laptop and desktop PCs. This launch marks the company's first venture into building stand-alone computers for the PC market. Included in the recently unveiled ... products are two thin, lightweight laptop computers, one larger and more powerful laptop, and two all-in-one desktop PCs. Pricing starts at $898. Bloatware Banned from Vizio PCs Vizio's plan to set itself apart from major rivals, like Dell, Hewlett-Packard (HP), and Acer, is a subtle but potentially effective one. The company's most visible ... (view more)

Fri
15
Jun
Dennis Faas's picture

New MacBook Pro Expensive to Fix, Tough to Upgrade

Apple recently unveiled its brand new MacBook Pro laptop, which comes with the same critically-acclaimed Retina display found on the company's iPad tablet. While early reviews suggest that the new MacBook Pro is a very powerful device, industry ... experts are slowly discovering that it holds some dirty secrets. Most notably, the new MacBook Pro is almost impossible for the average person to repair, and is also extremely costly to both fix and upgrade. Performance-wise, the new MacBook Pro has a lot going for it. While it's extremely powerful (using the latest quad-core Intel i7 processors), it's ... (view more)

Mon
21
May
Dennis Faas's picture

Ultrabook, Sleekbook, Fauxtrabook: Terms Explained

If you are confused by the differences between a laptop, notebook, and netbook, you may soon find the situation a whole lot more baffling: New portable computer models now carry titles like 'Ultrabook,' 'Sleekbook,' and 'fauxtrabook'. To help you ... break through some of the mystery, here's a quick guide to some of the terminology: Tough Terminology Explained A laptop is a personal computer that combines a screen and keyboard in a single unit designed to be portable. Most of the other computers described here are laptops, too. The only major form factor for a portable computer that isn't a ... (view more)

Wed
30
Mar
Dennis Faas's picture

IE9 Least Likely to Drain Your Laptop Battery, Study Suggests

A new study suggests that the web browser you choose to use may have an impact on the energy consumed by your laptop. If you're a user that's on the go, this study could prove newsworthy, but it's not without its caveats. Watt Consumption, ... Efficiency Measured In the study, Microsoft's Internet Explorer 9 (IE9), Mozilla Firefox 4, Google Chrome 10, Apple's Safari 5, and Opera 11 were tested. Each browser was run on an Intel laptop that measured the watt consumption when the browser was a) left idling, b) displaying a news website or c) running a number of graphics-based web tests. For the ... (view more)

Sun
28
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

Online Holiday Shopping? Read Dennis' Top 10 Recommendations

With over 30 years in computing experience, I'm often asked my opinion about computer hardware. Questions like, "What can I do to speed up my computer?", or "What type of laptop should I buy?" and things of that nature. Like anyone else, I love a ... good deal. In order to find the best deal possible, sometimes I spend an entire day shopping online to compare prices and features of similar components. Unfortunately, many of the "recommendations" I've read recently appear to be forged for the sake of making a sale, which means there's an awful lot of time wasted wading through ... (view more)

Tue
09
Nov
Dennis Faas's picture

Report: Laptop Use Hurts Mojo; Cooling Pads Don't Help

All potential Dads out there be warned: a new study has found that using a laptop as it was intended to be used -- on your lap -- can hurt your mojo. Worse yet, not even laptop pads drastically reduce, or even reverse the effect. The study comes ... courtesy of urologist Yelim Sheynkin of State University of New York at Stony Brook. His subsequent report has been published in a recent medical journal. Sheynkin and his researchers used thermometers to measure twenty-nine male participants, each of whom was tasked with balancing a notebook PC on their laps. Sheynkin and his team found that it didn' ... (view more)

Mon
26
Apr
Dennis Faas's picture

School Issued Laptops Spy On Students, Capture 56,000 Images

The Lower Merion School District (LMSD) laptop spying saga continues to unfold. District investigators have finished their investigation, concluding that web cameras were activated by school district employees about 80 times in the past two school ... years, capturing nearly 56,000 images of students, their homes and copies of the programs or files running on their screens. Laptop Took Photos While Student Slept The system was allegedly used by LMSD officials to track lost and stolen laptops. However, the lawsuit filed on behalf of Blake J. Robbins by his parents claims that the teen's school- ... (view more)

Wed
07
Oct
Dennis Faas's picture

Share PC Programs on Laptop?

Infopackets Reader Alan G. from Australia writes: " Dear Dennis, I would like to use some of my programs which are on my PC by linking them to my laptop. Is this possible? If so, how do I go about it? I am an aged pensioner at almost 80 years of ... age. I have used computers since they were input and output with punched cards, so I am not exactly a newbie to computing -- but there are things that I don't know, and this is one of them. Thank you in advance for your help. " My Response: There are ways to get around to do what you're asking (sort of), but generally speaking, it's not possible to ... (view more)

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