20 April 2021 | How Does it Work?, Networking, Video |
When it comes to privacy on the internet, the new word on the street is ‘FLoC’.
Led by Google, a group of businesses and advertisers is pushing a new standard that would have your browser identifying your particular group of interests by a unique ID number.
This number will be sent to all sites you visit. VOILA! No more 3rd party cookies, and supposedly more privacy!
Of course, there’s the marketing mumbo jumbo and then there’s the reality of the situation.
So: What is FLoC? How does it work? And most importantly: Will it improve your privacy??
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6 April 2021 | Energy, Gizmos, How Does it Work?, Video |
Microwave ovens that you use to cook food operate at a frequency of 2.45 GHz.
This is the same radio band where one finds WiFi, Bluetooth, and so on.
So, why is everything lumped into this one chunk of the frequency spectrum? Is there something particularly magical about 2.4 GHz?
It turns out that there is a common misconception about this frequency and water.
The truth, however, is far more mundane…
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30 March 2021 | Computers, How to, Video |
These days, you might not want too many Windows 10 updates given all the problems they tend to cause.
But the fact remains that if you can’t update Windows at all due to some cryptic error message, you’re still in trouble.
You’re missing out on security and reliability updates that you obviously need!
What to do when Windows Update keeps giving you the dreaded ‘Retry’ button along with an obscure error message that it can’t update??
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23 March 2021 | How Does it Work?, Video |
Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are all the rage these days.
All we hear is how Bitcoin has smashed another record high, cryptos are the future, don’t miss this train, etc.
The question is: How do you know what you’re getting yourself into? Many people are talking of using their stimulus check to buy into Bitcoin, for example.
While there is a lot of talk about blockchains and cryptos, actual simple explanations of what they are and how they work are hard to come by.
How do you understand this stuff WITHOUT getting lost in a bunch of technical mumbo jumbo?
Well, it’s really not that complicated in the end…
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16 March 2021 | How to, Video |
You know the drill: Like, Subscribe, Click the Notification Bell.
These days, it’s just not enough. I’ve received a ton of messages saying people thought I had stopped making vids!
It’s the usual seesaw: we’re all supposed to do BLAH, so then we do it, and then it no longer matters since everyone is doing it! Since everyone has liked, subscribed, and signed up for notifications for all kinds of channels, YouTube doesn’t actually send many notifications any more.
Well, I’m sure they do, but not for my channel according to my subscribers. There’s also the fact that over 43 YEARS of video is uploaded to YT every day – so you can imagine the sheer volume of notifications that must zoom around every second.
What to do?
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9 March 2021 | Computers, How to, Video |
In recent years, Microsoft hasn’t done a very good job with updating Windows 10.
Even those updates that are ‘fully tested’ often end up royally screwing up some computers. Everyone just assumes that a new Windows Update means crashes, blue screens, and stuff that doesn’t work anymore.
What if you could just roll back your PC to before the update, and prevent it from installing again?
Well, you can!
And it’s much easier than you think…
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2 March 2021 | Computers, Do-It-Yourself, How to, Video |
Sometimes, you just need to Print Big.
Historically, this was done with Microsoft’s Paint application. But recently, they noted that Paint will be getting an update.
If recent Microsoft ‘innovations’ are any indication, they’ll remove this terribly useful feature.
What are we supposed to do then?!
It turns out you already have 2 other methods to turn a photo into a giant multi-page poster. You just don’t know it yet!
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23 February 2021 | Computers, How to, Video |
The Cloud may be handy for backups, but what if you don’t want all your stuff sitting on Big Data’s servers forever and ever?
In the past, the best Windows provided was Backup and Restore. Frankly, it was crap.
With Windows 10, things changed: Now with a cheap external hard disk and just a few clicks, you can have a full, incremental, reliable local and PRIVATE backup of all your data.
It’s much easier to set up than it sounds!
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16 February 2021 | Computers, How to, Video |
File History is pretty cool. It allows you to automatically and incrementally backup all your files.
That means smaller backup sizes, easy restore if your puter crashes, and it’s literally ‘set it and forget it’.
The trouble is that File History likes to crash – it just stops backup up your stuff.
There are tons of solutions out there, but this one is the ONLY one I have ever found to work.
It’s a bit tedious, but who cares when it’s free and easy to fix?!
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9 February 2021 | Do-It-Yourself, How Does it Work?, Video |
Most lighting these days uses LEDs. They’re super-low power, provide good light, and last a long time.
But you probably still have some fluorescent lights left.
If you’re like most people, you haven’t quite gotten around to replacing them with LED tubes. You really should replace them though since LED tubes use much less power than fluorescent ones.
The trouble is, it’s complicated. There many types of fluorescent fixtures and rewiring is often required.
So, how do you make it as easy as possible?
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When it comes to privacy on the internet, the new word on the street is ‘FLoC’.
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