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Your Daily Techology News, Tutorials and How To's

Amazon is currently offering 1,464 mp3 songs for free to download. An Amzon account and Amazon’s mp3 downloader is required.

Google Reader one of the web RSS readers. Here are some great keyboard shortcuts that will enhance your Google reader experience and save you time.

Tomorrow Asurion Mobile is releasing new Android application called AddressBook. Address Book App like this has not been seen in Market Store yet. This address book ties most popular social networks such as Twitter, Facebook, Youtube or Flickr with your contacts. With this Address Book you get more functions than your standard Address Book.  You can download this address book via Get Address Book

Some Key Points:

• MixIns – gives users a choice of the content and services they want to build to get a complete view of their relationships and drive their personal communications. Social networking feeds, photos, videos, games and more can be added directly into the contact views of the address book.

• Smart Contacts – allows contacts in the address book to be turned into mini-applications, giving users quick access to the services and information they need when on the go, such as directory assistance, local search, reservations and customer service.

• · Instant Notifications – enables users to view updates from all of their social networks even before they open their address book via the Android notification screen. Users can customize the frequency and content of alerts to include different types of updates, from new photos on Facebook to new followers on Twitter.

• Simple interface – allows users to communicate with the contacts in their mobile phone from one place, with one touch, any way they choose. Users can tap to call, comment, text, tweet, post, email, IM or update their status, for example.

Here are some screenshots that you can visualize how Asurion Mobile Address Book works:

This is your Favorites (callers) quite different from what Android users have. You can see  contacts social network accounts and also latest status update.

You can see Lisas latest tweets, call her, add her to favorites and more, see the image below.

Best part I liked for past week was the notifications, I get all notifications from my friends that are on the contact list. How cool is that?

iFixit has torn down Apple’s new releases which include the new iMac, Macbook and Mgaic Mouse.

They discovered that the new iMacs feature:

• Use of the 27″ iMac as an external display via its MiniDisplayPort connector requires that the machine be fully powered up, as the signal is routed through the main logic board.
• The 27″ iMac unsurprisingly carries the biggest power supply ever seen in an iMac, putting out 310 watts.
• The CPU and GPU are located on opposite sides of the machine and have separate massive heat sinks, allowing Apple to utilize desktop-class processors within the thin iMac’s profile for the first time. In addition to the heat sinks, the iMac carries six temperature sensors and three large fans to aid in heat dissipation.
• The AirPort antenna is routed to directly behind the Apple logo on the rear of the machine, providing better Wi-Fi performance by placing the antenna next to the only plastic portion of the machine’s back.

For more images of the teardown of the new iMac, please click HERE.

The new unibody Macbook features:

• There is no external indicator of battery charge state.
• There is no infrared port, meaning that the new model is incompatible with Apple Remotes.
• The integrated battery offers only 9% more capacity than on previous models (60 watt-hours vs. 55), but Apple claims an increase in battery life to 7 hours from the previous 5 hours, suggesting that the new model is more energy efficient. The new battery is significantly lighter than in the previous generation, offering a power-to-weight ratio that is 23.5% better.
• The hard drive is more difficult to replace than on previous models, but certainly can be done.
• The apparently increased rigidity in the latest model appears to come the use of an aluminum sheet (covered with a rubberized coating on the exterior) for the bottom case and other structural supports within the body of the machine.
• The Bluetooth antenna is routed into the display housing, likely improving range compared to previous models that placed the antenna in the body of the machine above the optical drive.

For more images of the teardown of the Macbook, please click HERE.

They also torn down the Magic Mouse. It is revealed the Magic Mouse uses a keyboard-and-mouse-specific BCM2042 Bluetooth chip from Broadcom for communication. For more images of the teardown of the Magic Mouse, please click HERE.

Last but not least, macminicolo.net has done a comparative dissection of the new traditional and server Mac minis. The two machines pretty much identical with the exception of swapping in a second hard drive for the optical drive (and a corresponding modification to the exterior case to eliminate the optical drive slot) in the server model.

For more images of the teardown of the Mac Mini, please click HERE.

Many a student or office worker will remember spending long sleepless nights on Microsoft Office, praying to Bill Gates that the program wouldn’t die on you, nor would the evil Mr. Clippy come and ask you,

“It appears you are writing a letter. Would you like help with it?”

You bang your hands on the keyboard in frustration, frustration at the fact that you’re not using a Mac, or Linux. But you don’t have to continue being at the mercy of Bill Gates. Instead, there are many freeware Office Suites out there, from the extra-portable Google Docs, to the almost unknown GNOME office. But, the most popular free Office Suite would have to be OpenOffice. Yes, the evil Mr. Clippy is gone, as well as the sometimes annoying page margins, and using the wierd UI with Office 07.

OpenOffice features 6 programs, being the counterparts to Microsoft’s Word, Excel, Powerpoint, Access, as well as providing a Graphics editing suite, and a program used to make mathematical equations, and solve them. While not having the shiny interface that Windows Office possesses, or if you’re fed up with the extremely long time it takes when converting Office 03 documents to 07 documents, perhaps it’s time to move to OpenOffice. It’s portable as well, so you can take it with you, another plus about OpenOffice. And if you’re disatisfied with your Mac Office suite, you can shift to OpenOffice too, it supports Linux and OS X.

We’re sure Bill Gates won’t miss you anyway, if you’re interested, dislike Microsoft, or just want a change, download it from HERE

Continuing on with the theme of ‘Man, I hate Microsoft’s included software $@*($’ we’ve given those that haven’t changed their browser to something other than Internet Explorer, a look at a much better alternative. I won’t cover other browsers at the moment, although Chrome and Opera are worth more than just a mention. I’ll probably compare the three in a later post, in a nice nifty table.

But anyway, Firefox 3.5 clearly outshines any version of Internet Explorer, even with it’s fancy ‘In Private’ button. Firefox is a lot more stable than the old IE, more secure, and allows users to personalize their browsers, by making their own themes, etc. It also has a simple menu when you want to get rid of your History, and whatnot… On top of that, Firefox has a plethora of plug-ins, that range from simple in-browser games, to advanced proxy systems, that can be configured to use multiple proxies to defend your privacy. Firefox is also a lot better optimized that IE, displaying and starting up much quicker than you’d think. Apart from that, it has all the functions that IE has, and much more…
Theree are more websites have been optimized to be shown in Firefox, as well as the odd forum banner telling you to protect your privacy and security… It’s hard to believe that all of these people can be wrong, but if you’re still having doubts, the download is only 7MB. Just try it out today, you won’t be disappointed. You can grab Firefox from HERE

You must have lived under a rock to not know about the success of Bungie’s golden boy, Halo. In it’s three incarnations, it has never failed to impress, surging to the top of the charts as soon as they were released. Halo 3 has been quoted as being the most hyped game release in History, as well as having the most pre-orders, and sales in 24 hours. It seems that gamers can’t get enough of blasting away the Covenant aliens, and each other in Halo’s addictive multiplayer. Unfortunately, as it seems, Microsoft have noticed the allure of Halo, and have pushed Bungie to make more and more sequels to Halo. As a result, Bungie have bought themselves out, and will stop making Halo games after Halo: Reach is released.

The Craptacular SMG in all it's glory

Anyway, perhaps the penultimate Halo game from Bungie has been released recently, Halo 3: ODST. The game revolves around Orbital Drop Shock Troopers, essentially a futuristic hybrid between the SAS, Paratroopers, and Assassins. These soldiers are the best of the best, but they fall short of the almighty Master Chief. These guys can’t dual wield weapons, don’t have the ability to hijack vehicles, brutally melee enemies, and most importantly, when their overshield depletes, they lose health, and have to find a health-pack in order to restore it, much like the original Halo.

Fortunately, the ODST’s aren’t completely cannon fodder, unlike the unfortunate Marines that were in the previous Halo. They have access to a silenced, beefed up pistol, whilst also having zoom functionality. It’s a fairly good package, great for assassinating helpless grunts, but when faced up against Brutes or Hunters at higher difficulties, it’s not the most useful weapon you can have. The ODST also possess a silenced sub-machine gun, which is an interesting offering, but unfortunately, due to it’s high recoil and low damage output, I ignored the gun completely.

The Heads up Display, clearly labeled by Bungie

ODST’s also have a pretty advanced helmet, featuring a Heads up Display that instantly allows them to survey the battlefield, and tell enemies from allies, as well as locating mission objectives COD4 style. The visor outlines NPC’s, making them very visible in both the day and night time sections of the game. The ODST visor also has a night-vision filter, a useful feature, considering that more than half the game is spent skulking around in the night.

Which brings us to the Plot of the game. Without giving too much away, you assume the role of ‘The Rookie’ an ODST with limited experience, etc. Unfortunately, while you are descending to Earth in a drop pod, an accident occurs, and you black out. Six hours later, you wake up in a pile of rubble, and you don’t know where your squad is. Quickly finding out that you’re in an African city called ‘New Mombasa’ you try to reunite with the squad, with the assistance of the city’s AI. When you look at certain objects, they trigger flashbacks, which allows you to see through the eyes of a different member of the Rookie’s squad. Unlike the Rookie’s viewpoint, these missions take place in the day, full of glorious carnage, and insane set-piece battles.

The Campaign is fairly short though, with the help of friends, it’s pretty much assumed that the Covenant will cower in fear, as you massacre them in the hundreds. If you go it alone, on Heroic, it’s still assumed that you’ll be able to finish the game in 5 hours. Not exactly the world’s longest Campaign, but it leads on to the awesome new multiplayer mode of ODST, Firefight Mode.

Firefight Mode= Nazi Zombies times ten

Firefight Mode can be described as being Halo’s equivalent of Left 4 Dead’s final Zombie defence, Nazi Zombies of COD:WaW, or Gears of War 2’s Horde mode. But ODST makes it bigger and better than any of it’s counterparts. The scene is set in New Mombasa in daylight, when the Covenant make their first appearance, landing forces in Dropships to attack the city. As one of (up to four ODSTs) that are part of the cities defense, it’s your duty to kill as many Covenant aliens as possible. Sounds fairly easy, I suppose…

Unfortunately, Bungie have decided to make your life hell, and have added in the problem of having a shared pool of lives. When you run out of lives, that’s it, game over. And the second, more difficult game modifier, is the addition of skulls. Skulls make life insanely hard for even the most experienced player, when enemies throw grenades like there’s no tomorrow, or making the only way one can regain health by melee-ing the nearest alien in the face.

The Halo 3 engine is dated, but still has it's 'Wow' moments

However, the game is a lot like Halo 3 in a lot of ways. The game uses the exact same engine, which has proven to be a bit jaggy and laggy, as well as having no multiplayer component except for Firefight, and Halo 3’s original multiplayer. The music is amazing as expected from a Halo game, but, before going out and buying ODST, consider this first… Is it worth paying $80 for a game that features a short campaign, medium length Firefight mode, and a Multiplayer experience you probably already have? Newbies to the series, buy this game, it has the amazing original multiplayer, as well as an interesting diversion, but for veterans, perhaps this game isn’t the world’s best value for money.

Let’s just say you need photo editing software, you don’t have the money for photoshop, nor internet with a speed higher than 4 kb/s. Let’s also say that you strongly dislike GIMP, and want to try something different. Of course, you could always try the updated version of Microsoft Paint, or use Open Canvas. But, there’s that program called ‘Paint.net’ that’s stuck in your head. It’s a mere 1.6MB, and it promises to be a simplified, but powerful version of Photoshop.
Sound a bit dodgy? Well, it requires Microsofts .Net framework (3.0) for it to function. Because it uses the .net engine, it limits the amount of actual code required within the program. It has layers, layer settings… manipulations, custom brush tools, distortions, curves. Stuff you’d expect to be in any decent image editor. But of course, the advantage that Paint.net has over Photoshop, and perhaps GIMP, is that it features a code lab for making plugins. The fairly large community have already provided a torrent of plugins, providing functions that place it on par with Photoshop CS4 in some areas. The only issue with Paint.net at the moment, is the lack of tablet support currently.  The developers have mentioned having touch screen support soon, which is a bonus.

If this sounds appealing, you can grab Paint.Net HERE

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Most announcements from Microsoft today have been about the impending release of Windows Phone (Windows Mobile 6.5), featuring updates to MyPhone, as well as updates to the Mobile Client and an improved web experience for Windows Live. At this point in time, it seems that it’s only a minor update, with mostly stability issues, UI changes, and the addition of Windows Live Home.

If the features below seem appealing, you can grab it from mobile.live.com. However, thanks to the usual stabillity fixes and so on, it’s probably worth downloading the free update anyway.

Windows Live Home – an entirely new feature!

• View you and your friends “What’s new” feed from Windows Live and other major 3rd party social networking sites.
• View Windows Live photos and comment
• Upload photos to Windows Live and other 3rd party sites through integration with the new My Phone client
• View your Windows Live people
• Update your status and accept network invitations from others

Improvements and Updates like

• Entirely new launcher screen
• Significant touch investments that shine with new Windows Mobile 6.5 devices
• Bing search integration
• Abuse reporting
• Automatic uninstall of previous versions

Virtual memory improvement and reduced installation file size through client refactoring