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Hardware

If you live in Atlanta, you’ll be happy to hear that there’s a new ISP in town. And I’m not talking about just any type of Internet connection. I’m talking about WiMAX (read my Thoughts on WiMAX post). It’s called CLEAR by Clearwire and its launch makes Atlanta the “Fastest Unwired City in the South”. That’s a pretty hefty claim that I’ll have to put to the test later. CLEAR isn’t the first WiMAX provider in the United States – Sprint launched WiMAX under their XOHM brand name in Baltimore last October, and other providers have been helping businesses with WiMAX coverage in major cities as well. But for Atlantans, [click to continue…]

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Not too long ago I mentioned how I moved to a new apartment but was very disappointed to learn that I now live in an AT&T dead zone. A bit of testing has proved that I do not live in an AT&T dead zone (5 bars on the sidewalk outside), but the building’s stucco and concrete with rebar construction dampens reception considerably, to the point where I get no service closer to the middle of the building and just 1, maybe 2, bars next to the window. I did a bit of Google and Twitter querying and found a local Atlanta company called Wi-Ex that manufactures a set of cell phone signal boosters. [click to continue…]

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From time to time, I have confessed my love for the Vudu set-top box that instantly streams up to 720p quality HD movies (or 1080p quality non-instant) over the Internet to your TV. The Vudu player is not subscription-based, so in addition to ponying up for the hardware, you have to pay an average of $3-5 each time you want to rent SD or HD quality movies. After a while of spending over $50 a month with the Vudu box, I decided check out the instant streaming landscape and take a look at the popular subscription-based Roku player. While the Roku player is often called the Netflix player, that is starting to change as it supports more services, most recently with the addition of Amazon Video on Demand. [click to continue…]

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If you haven’t caught wind of Microsoft’s Laptop Hunters advertisements by now, well you’re lucky. They’re a series of (hopefully only) six ads meant to take a jab at Apple’s successful “Get A Mac” commercials. So far four of these ads are out and they are based on the premise that some person is looking for a particular computer for their needs within a certain budget. If they find what they’re looking for, Microsoft pays for the computer. True in Microsoft spirit, these commercials are all full of issues. The first ad was filled with controversy after people discovered an actress [click to continue…]

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Thoughts on Netbooks

April 13, 2009 · 33 comments

With all the noise about netbooks over the last 2 years and a Skribit suggestion on the same matter, I think I’m overdue for a post divulging my thoughts on netbooks. First off, what are these so-called netbooks? You’ve no doubt heard the term countless times. It refers to a small, generally affordable (I’m looking at you overpriced Sony Vaio P) and ‘connected’ lightweight mobile computer. Netbooks are [click to continue…]

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Review: Kingmax Super Stick 8GB USB Flash Drive

January 13, 2009

Over the last few months I have spotted more and more people toting diminutive USB flash drives, similar to 2005’s oddly failed SD Plus form factor memory cards. The flash drives I am talking about are literally one chip with no additional USB adapter. They fit inside the actual USB port. Around two months ago [...]

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Going HD: Part 3 (Blu-ray and Surround Sound)

January 11, 2009

It has been a while since I have written about my move to an HD home theater setup. Going HD: Part 1 detailed the arrival of Samsung’s 50-inch plasma HDTV while Going HD: Part 2 with discussing the build of an HTPC. Part 3 will discuss the addition of a 5.1 surround sound system [...]

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Anonymize Your Web Traffic with JanusPA

December 24, 2008

The in-the-works Janus Privacy Adapter is, hands down, the coolest piece of networking hardware I’ve seen (via hackaday) all year. The so-called Privacy Adapter has two RJ45 ethernet jacks and is intended to be placed in-line between your computer and Internet connection. After plugged in and given around 60 seconds to fire up, it [...]

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Holiday Giveaway: 1.5TB of Seagate Drives

November 27, 2008

Update: Thank you everyone for entering this contest, I was completely blown away by the number of submissions (over 770 comments!). That’s more comments than any other PSTAM.com post has ever received, by a margin of over 300! I used random.org’s random integer generator to produce a value of the ID of the winning comment, [...]

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I Can’t Live Without My Vudu Box

November 23, 2008

Over a year ago I first got my hands on the innovative Vudu set-top box and reviewed its movie streaming capabilities. Unlike the countless gadgets and devices that I come across, I have not outgrown the Vudu box. I use it a ton. It instantly streams rental movies in HD, with the option of even [...]

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Apple Repair Remains Dismal

November 17, 2008

Update: Apple replaced my Air with a new Rev A. I just went to the Apple Store, told them that it had a non-US keyboard from an error on their part and asked if I could just get a replacement so I didn’t have to deal with waiting for it to get repaired again.
I am [...]

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Review: 2.53GHz Apple MacBook Pro

November 8, 2008

I’ve been using the new MacBook Pro as my primary computer for the last two weeks now. Equipped with an already outdated Intel X25-M SSD (SanDisk is working on something “100 times” faster) I put in myself, this is easily the best computer I have owned to date – despite a few issues I have [...]

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PGP Disk Encryption Safe for Solid State Drives

November 3, 2008

After slapping an Intel X25-M solid state drive in my MacBook Pro I received a few inquiries from readers asking if it was safe to use PGP Whole Disk Encryption with SSDs being known for having limited lifespans. I reviewed PGP WDE for OS X two months ago and fell in love with it; utter [...]

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Review: Intel X25-M 80GB SSD

October 29, 2008

It has almost been a year since I wrote about the future of computing and how I thought that it was all about Solid State Drives (this was before I became infatuated with the cloud). Well I finally got my hands on one. It’s Intel’s new X25-M 80GB SSD and it is among the fastest [...]

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Hopping on the New MacBook Pro Bandwagon

October 26, 2008

Ever since I purchased my MacBook Air 8 months ago, it has been my primary machine. I did everything on it, with the exception of HD movie viewing which was outsourced to my HTPC setup. It was a bit on the slow end but I enjoyed the portability. However in the recent months my feelings [...]

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