If you’ve ever wondered what parts go into the making of a computer, ExtremeTech has an article for you. A Beginner’s Guide to What Goes on Inside that PC thoroughly covers all the parts in a computer and their function. It covers everything from power supplies and hard drives all the way to the POST and boot routine.

After a long, hard day of fetching and editing tables, MySQL can become overburdened and create overhead. This can be almost directly compared to how defragmentation occurs on a hard drive. For example, something needs to be replaced in one location but there is not enough space so part of it goes here and part goes there; discontinuous. Over time, overhead for very active tables in your database can reach high levels and the result will be something like what happened to me in March. You can ensure a healthy database by following this quick fix every once in a while. Continue Reading »

The night before a squirrel killed my internet connection, I had spent some time on making my site a little more tolerable when viewed in Microsoft’s Internet Explorer browser. Over of a fifth of my readers commute here via Internet Explorer. As many people already know, Internet Explorer does not fully support up and coming web technologies and does not completely embrace web standards as set forth by the World Wide Web Consortium. The point of this post is for me to find out why people still use Internet Explorer. As readers of this tech-related blog, you must know the joys of using a browser such as Firefox or Safari. Continue Reading »

After the closing of a case filed by Apple, a California appeals court judge has ruled that internet journalists and bloggers alike are protected by law just as traditional journalists are. Apple filed a case claiming that AppleInsider and PowerPage make known their sources for a 2004 story on those websites revealing an in-development Apple product dubbed Asteroid, which is to be a breakout box for Garageband. Continue Reading »

Sorry for the lack of updates and replies to emails lately. For some reason my Time Warner RoadRunner cable service at home has stopped working. I’ve been without internet for the past two days, with the exception of checking email via my phone’s Opera Mini browser. Hopefully a technician from Time Warner will stop by tomorrow anytime between 8AM and 8PM to fix everything.

Flickr has come a long way since its debut in February of 2004. In fact, Flickr’s traffic grew nearly 500 percent during the period between December of 2004 and 2005. There’s no doubt that Flickr wouldn’t have had this type of growth if it were merely a photo storage site. Instead, Flickr offers impressive photo-sharing features such as discussion groups and photo pools that encourage lively interaction amongst its treasured users. Continue Reading »

Colin Devroe has posted an excellent article about the first week with his black Apple MacBook. He dispels rumors of the glossy screen and other features of the MacBook that have since attracted negative attention. Continue Reading »

Update: I have written a follow-up post after having used Nike+. I was also in a Nike advertisement for Nike+.

Not quite, but it’s close. Apple and Nike have joined forces to create an innovative offering. Nike+ is the unique combination of a sporty Nike shoe that has a spot for a wireless pedometer that can be tracked by your iPod Nano. Your Nano, once equipped with a receiver plugged into the base, keeps track of your running pace as well as a slew of workout stats. It also has the ability of telling you your pace through your earphones so you don’t have to look down at the screen. The iPod add-on transforms your center button to a “power song” button. That’s right. When you want to speed Continue Reading »

Everyone from multimedia enthusiasts to coding mavens can all appreciate extra disk space. However, not everyone has room for an extra internal hard drive in their tower or Mac. External drives are a quick and easy addition to any system. Unfortunately, pre-made external hard drives from companies like LaCie are overpriced and lackluster when it comes to features for the exorbitant price. The solution is to purchase an affordable internal hard drive somewhere like Newegg and stick it in an external enclosure such as the Vantec NexStar 3 I will be reviewing today. Continue Reading »

I have decided to roll out a new feature here on PaulStamatiou.com. Sponsored Links will be a cluster of links that sit in the sidebar and are visible on every page. I have always been against monetizing this site and have kept the advertisements as low-key as possible. However, Yahoo doesn’t seem to be providing relevant ads and what ads exist don’t pull in much at all. I figured I would let Continue Reading »

Not even a week after they were released and reports are coming in that the Apple MacBook gets just as hot as its older brother, the MacBook Pro. Similarly, both have way too much thermal paste applied on the processor and northbridge chip. Take a look at this MacRumors forum thread. One MacBook reviewer stated that the heat led to a kernel panic. He was unable to get the MacBook to boot until after it had spent five minutes atop an air conditioner. However, what was more impressive was the photo found in this MacNN thread showing what the Continue Reading »

Bloggers, techies, professional journalists and college students all seem to share one thing in common. They love staying in-the-know. Roommates talking about the new Nintendo Wii? No problem, RSS aggregators can help you out by allowing you to subscribe to many video game sites, per this scenario, and get informed so you won’t have to ride in the back seat. There are many RSS readers or aggregators out there, but which one do I use you ask? Continue Reading »

Macworld has put together a short video on YouTube that shows how to remove the RAM and hard drive in the new Apple MacBook. Apple’s MacBook has been receiving a lot of attention due to its user-replaceable hard-drives. However, people have been complaining about the MacBook’s new glossy display and Continue Reading »

A while back Google announced that they would be offering Gmail for hosted domains. This meant that you could route email from your personal domain name and webhost to a Gmail interface. Google began sending out invites about two months ago and now I believe anyone can apply for a beta account here. The only thing necessary to get it working is an email account setup in your webhost’s control panel and changing some MX records. Continue Reading »

In response to rampant pirates that tweak the x86 (Intel) version of OS X’s kernel to get OS X to run on ordinary PCs, Apple will no longer be offering the source code to this kernel. However, there is another side to offering the kernel to the public. Many advanced users will modify the kernel to optimize OS X for the specific application they primarily use OS X for. Macworld UK argues that this is a bad strategy on Apple’s part and might cripple their hardware sales for new products like high-performance servers where Continue Reading »

Two months ago I ordered an Intel Mac Mini and told you what I thought about it. I had purposefully opted for the cheaper 1.5GHz Core Solo model. The Core Duo Mac Mini has a 1.66GHz dual-core chip. However, I waited a while, knowing that one could easily upgrade to any Core processor they wanted. With that bit of knowledge I held out until the the prices became a bit cheaper and snatched a 1.83GHz Core Duo the second Continue Reading »

Online photo sharing web service and community Flickr has made the leap from Beta to Gamma. New features include a majorly redesigned interface, a new Organizr and a Person menu. You can see what everyone is talking about on the Flickr blog and then experience it yourself.

No not the MacBook Pro, just the MacBook. This will be the iBook replacement and boy is it looking good. Thinner than the old iBook (the MacBook is 1.08 inches thin) and featuring a 13.3 inch display with 1280×800 resolution, iSight, Front Row, MagSafe and the Intel Core Duo processor - the new MacBook is pretty much the MacBook Pro’s little brother. Except for one thing; if you opt for the high-end model, it comes in black. Continue Reading »

As reported by Linux Watch, O’Reilly publishers are starting a new trend, beta books. Dubbed “Rough Cuts“, these are books that have not been fully edited or lack complete formatting. I think this is pretty interesting. You get to see the book during its production when you purchase a cheaper online access pass. You can even send suggestions or bug fixes to the publisher to get incorporated into the final product. So what’s the point of buying a book that’s not even finished? You get to see it way before it comes out as a book. Continue Reading »

I may have already shown you how to boost your blog traffic, but let’s go back a step. How do I even start a blog? What is involved with maintaining a blog? What do I need to know? These are all questions that run through the mind of someone looking to create a blog for their first time. I hope to tackle these issues in this latest how to. If you are reading this and want to start a blog, you’re in for a treat. If you already have a blog, stick around and you might learn something new. Continue Reading »

The Shuttle project began over a year and a half ago, aiming to beautify the WordPress administration panel. With the help of Khaled Abou Alfa, Michaeil Heilemann, Chris J Davis, Joshua Sigar, Joen Asmussen, Ryan Boren and Bryan Veloso (all top-notch designers), Shuttle has finally taken off. To get a better sense of what Shuttle is, I recommend you take a look at some of the screenshots. Shuttle is not a plugin you can download, instead it will be integrated into the next version of WordPress. The Shuttle team has worked closely Continue Reading »

While messing around on my linux box running Ubuntu 5.10 Breezy Badger, I had the idea to add some repositories to allow the computer access to various packages and upgrades from the Dapper Drake beta. Repositories, in this case, are online reserves of thousands of linux applications, files and packages. Just about anything your linux computer needs to upgrade or stay secure can be found on repositories. If you are not checking enough repositories, especially frequently updated ones, your computer could be Continue Reading »

After talking with a few people that dual-boot OS X and Windows XP through the use of Boot Camp, it appears as though there is a slight bug. If the user boots into Windows and then boots back into OS X (or vice versa) the time changes by itself. Changing it back has no effect as it becomes altered again on the next boot into the other OS. I’m not sure if this is the result of using Boot Camp or whether it stems from the shortcomings of using these two operating systems which might poll the Continue Reading »

Similar to how Google slowly unrolled Google Talk within Gmail, users of the popular webmail service will be experiencing a new feature shortly. “Gmail Pictures” is much more akin to avatars than pictures, however. The images will appear when hovering over a user’s email. It is unclear at this moment whether or not a person must be in your contacts list to make use of the picture. You can spot some screenshots on Continue Reading »

Switching computers or upgrading to a new rig may have you in a flurry trying to backup your iTunes music. Luckily, Konstantinos at HiFi Blog has put together a thorough how to for accomplishing this task.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the gravatars on your K2 and WordPress-powered blog actually linked to the author’s website instead of gravatar. For those out of the loop, gravatars are globally recognized avatars. Once a person has registered their email address with gravatar.com and paired it with an avatar, they can go around commenting on gravatar-enabled blogs (most blogs are these days) and have their unique avatar appear adjacent to their insightful comment. Continue Reading »

Fluxiom is an innovative online storage solution aimed at the creative professional that needs to safekeep mission critical files while assuring interminable connectivity. Rather than being called online storage, Fluxiom is a digital assets manager as it does much more than just store your files and documents. Continue Reading »

The iPod accessories market has always been a fierce battleground. Hundreds of manufacturers creating the latest little trinket for you to hook onto your iPod. Only a select few iPod accessories are actually beneficial, do what they say and are worth your hard-earned money. ifrogz is a relatively new company offering rugged, silicone cases for the iPod Nano, iPod Video and the 4th Gen iPod. Continue Reading »

The creative geniuses at Intel have found a name for the upcoming desktop and mobile processors, the Intel code-named Conroe and Merom processors. Both will go by Core 2 Duo with Merom likely having another word attached to it to denote the differences. The Conroe processor will also have a faster, more expensive version similar to the Pentium’s Extreme Edition processors. These will go by the name Core 2 Extreme, as outlined by Continue Reading »

After surfing across Lifehacker’s post about how to easily get a Yahoo! Mail Beta account, I decided to take it for a spin. Following those directions was easy enough and I found myself with a new Y! Mail Beta account within 5 minutes. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect. I had seen screenshots of the fancy interface, which was purported to mimic a desktop email client, floating around the internet months before. Hopefully Yahoo has their eyes set on the future with mail beta and plan on setting themselves apart from Google and their popular Gmail. Continue Reading »

I just got back from my Computational Media final, which marks my last final this semester. This week has been hectic to say the least, but all seems well and good now. I even passed computer science which was by far a shock to me. The past few days I have been pulling all-nighters back to back. Last night, the fire alarm went off not once, not twice but three times - all after midnight. After coming back from my final this morning, it had gone off yet again. Gah. To top that off, earlier in the week, East Campus and the library completely lost power around midnight. That must have been a horrible situation for those Continue Reading »

Google constantly amazes me, especially when I discovered just a few days ago that Google had been keeping my search history whenever I search logged in. I have been using Google’s personalized ig homepage for several months now, which requires me to be logged in with my gmail account to use. If I make a query over to google.com/searchhistory, I am greeted with an intuitive interface that catalogs all of my personalized searches, Continue Reading »

Update your Firefox with the latest release from Mozilla, version 1.5.0.3. Firefox might even download the update itself and prompt you to restart the browser. This version fixes the widely discussed vulnerability that allows malicious code to, in theory, crash the browser.

Check out these hilarious Apple ads that spoof the PC. My favorite is the networking one. I take it these are part of an updated ad campaign to replace the great “switch” commercials a few years ago. This collection is entitled Get a Mac.

If you read my recent article Boot Camp Installation Tips, you know that I currently have a dual-boot OS X and Windows XP Intel Mac setup. I generally blog in my Mac realm but I was a full-time Windows user for over a decade, so I will discuss some of the applications I have loaded on my new XP installation. Feel free to leave a comment at the end if I am missing some application you can’t live without. Continue Reading »