E-Book Readers

What is an E-Book?
In simple terms, an E-Book is any method of storing the information found in a particular book electronically, usually on a computer or on a device called an E-book reader. Until fairly recently, the most common(only?) way for accessing and reading E-Books was through a computer. For many, this was enough, but for people who liked the portability of their books, being tied to their computer for reading books in an electronic format was a burden.

Formats(Pros and Cons)An E-Book is an E-Book is an E-Book, right? If only that were true. In fact, like anything else these days, there are a number of differing "standards" when it comes to E-Books. One of the most popular, and most accessible is PDF format, which has been around for years. Chances are pretty good that you already have the software required to view these on your computer. It stands for "Portable Document Format" and is most commonly opened through Adobe Acrobat Reader, but a number of other applications are available that work just fine. The popularity of this format stems from the relatively small space these files take up and the lack of any restrictions such as DRM. You can purchase a book in PDF format and functionally have no limit to the number of copies you could create from this file, but the legality of doing so depends on the rights of the copyright owner of said book. The very practical reason why you would want to do this is to prevent yourself from losing the file forever, by making a copy and storing on a CD-R or DVD-R, if your computer fails and needs to be replaced, you still have your E-Book.

E-Pub is a popular format; hundreds of thousands of books have been published this way internationally. Between this and PDF, if the book you want has been published as an E-book, chances are strong that it has been published in one of these two formats. Again, the files are relatively small and your options for programs that will allow you to read these are not limited.

Plain Text is another format, but admittedly, you aren't likely to see it as a format for any books that aren't in the public domain. Plain Text is just what it sounds like. You won't see any illustrations or fancy layouts, just text. The files are quite small, and extremely easy to copy and redistribute, and for that reason alone aren't used in the distribution of for-sale books. Regardless of this, if you are in the market for an E-Book Reader(which we will get to below), you will want one that can handle Plain Text, and it's very likely that it won't be an issue.

Proprietary Formats: Anyone with an E-Book store is likely to have their own format of E-Book files, and this is where the similarities between E-Books and real books really fall apart. A proprietary format basically means that to read their books, you need to use their software or devices to read them. Imagine needing a special pair of glasses for reading books that you bought from one store, and another pair for books bought from another store. The main reason for this is the illusion of control. Copyright owners need to feel that they have complete control over their intellectual properties, and these proprietary formats help them feel that they retain that control, no matter how inconvenient that may be for the consumer. Aside from the already mentioned requirements of these formats, these formats also tend to restrict your ability to duplicate the files, or share them. You may be able to share an E-Book with your friend Mike once, but if Mike didn't finish reading it fast enough, he's out of luck. Some formats will only let you "share" with a certain person only once, for 2 weeks, and never again. Sounds even less like a real book than ever, doesn't it?

Another complication stemming from these proprietary formats is that publishers may choose to only release their E-Book in one format, and if it's not one that you can currently access, the burden falls on you to remedy that. This is not a big deal if you only read E-Books on your computer, it's just a matter of installing a different program. If you own an E-Book Reader however, if the book you want isn't available in a format your device can handle, they expect you to buy another E-Book Reader than can handle it.

Perhaps the most unfortunate truth about E-Books: owning a physical copy of the book does not entitle you to an E-Book version. This is the unanimous decision of publishers everywhere, particularly because they have no way of confirming every book purchase you've ever made, and there is no guarantee that every book you own is even available electronically. The bottom line is that there is no easy way to move from a physical book collection to a digital one, you are expected to purchase every book again. If you aren't dissuaded by that, or suffer from morbid curiosity, keep reading, other wise stop here, the news doesn't get better.

Reader Options: Beyond the computer
An E-Book Reader is simply a device that can display the contents of an E-Book for you to read. Beyond that basic functionality, readers differ in a number of ways, but each of them have a relatively large electronic screen that attempts to recreate the look of ink on paper, the reason behind this is that it is easier on the eyes for long term reading. If you are interested in purchasing such a device, you can expect to spend between $200 and $300, on average. Online megastore Amazon is the company behind the popular Kindle, and Barnes & Noble recently launched their competing Nook. There are a handful of other options available, but chances are if you've already heard of a specific E-Book Reader, it's been one of these two. The bad news is that no single reader supports all of the popular formats, but the good news is that there is enough overlap that in most cases this will not be an issue, and new releases are available in a number of formats.

E-Ink VS. LCD
Besides supported formats, the one element that divides E-Book readers are their screens. The two common screen types found in these devices are E-Ink and LCD. Both have their strengths and weaknesses. E-Ink displays are very easy on the eyes, as easy as print on paper, and use very little power so that these devices can go for days without recharging. The unfortunate reality of E-Ink displays is that transitioning from one page of text to another takes a second or so, if you read quickly this transition may bother you over time. The advantage of LCD displays is that they can display new information on the screen very quickly, and also use fairly low power, but not as low as E-Ink screens manage. A good LCD can still manage to sip little enough power to allow you to go a day or so without charging, but several days less than competing technology. So the trade off is speed for battery life, which is more important to you?

It's a lot to take in, but the main things that you need to remember are these: unless you already have a library of E-Books on your computer, getting a reader means starting your library from square one. Books in the public domain are free, and best-sellers are frequently $10, whereas most readers are priced in the $200-$300 range. E-Ink gives you longer times between charging your reader, but if the lag in "turning" pages bothers you, a reader with an LCD screen might be worth the shorter battery life.

In Short: E-Book Readers

If you are considering purchasing an E-Book Reader, such as the Kindle, or any others for that matter, wait. There are some ugly facts that are true about all E-Book Readers at this time. Some of them may change in the future, some of them will definitely improve. If these details listed below don't bother you, don't let me stop you, you may very well be happy with your upcoming purchase.

1. Owning a physical book does not entitle you to an E-Book version.
This means if you want an E-Book that's not available for free, even though you bought the physical copy already, you will have to buy it again. If it's in the public domain, you can find it for free.

2. In some cases, you never really own an E-Book. If your E-Books exist only on your Reader(Kindle, Nook, etc.) it may be taken away from you. I don't mean stolen; I mean the retailer or publisher can actually pull your access to it away without warning. Whenever possible, you'll want to have back up copies on your computer, and in some cases that's not possible.

3. $200-$300 to get started is a tough entry point for a lot of us. The price will go down, so unless you're in a terrible hurry it's best to hold off for a little while longer.

In Short: HDTV's

If you don't watch live sports, or movies in the genres of action, science fiction or fantasy at least once a month in the comfort of your own home, an HDTV is not a good investment for you.

If you are completely satisfied with your old VHS player an HDTV is not a good investment for you. The same goes for your DVD player.

If you do watch live sports frequently or enjoy a lot of action/SciFi/fantasy movies and are willing to invest in a new TV, higher month bills and more home theater equipment, look into getting an HDTV.

In Short:

Since there is an incredible amount of data to digest in any tech topic, these posts can get rather wordy trying to cover the pertinent bits. The truth is that you may just want the bottom line, and not the owner's manual. With that in mind we are introducing "In Short" posts as companions to our lengthier ones. What this means for you is that if you just want the bottom line on HDTV's and not the entire article, you can just look for the post titled "In Short: HDTV's" and skip a long winded explanation. If you're consistently interested in the bottom line, you can just click on the "In Short" link to the right and look at only the short explanations on these subjects. Efficient!

Tech Glossary: HDTV's

You probably know by now that HD stands for High Definition, but what about all of those other terms people are tossing around?

1080p/1080i + 720p/720i - I'm going to breeze right over this one. A higher number means a more detailed, sharper image. "p" stands for progressive scan, and "i" stands for interlaced. Progressive scan is better than interlaced in terms of visual quality. If you want a more detailed explanation, you can find one here.

Contrast Ratio/Dynamic Contrast Ratio - Contrast ratio is basically a measurement of the range between the lightest and darkest colors displayed on the screen. The larger the ratio, the brighter the brights, the darker the darks. If what your are reading says simply "Contrast Ratio" without "Dynamic", they mean the ratio of just what's capable of being displayed at the same time on screen. Dynamic Contrast Ratio is used to describe televisions where the entire screen adjusts its brightness level, and compares the darkest possible black to the brightest possible white, but those two will never be visible at the same time.

What it means to you: A fixed contrast ratio is the easier to interpret. Small numbers mean that the image on the screen will look a little faded or washed out. Blacks will glow or appear dark grey. Large numbers mean more realistic images, with truer colors. Dynamic contrast ratios really mean nothing to you as a consumer, and manufacturers will not post the meaningful ratios on the outside if they have Dynamic Contrast Ratio listed. They are intended to sound impressive without actually meaning anything about quality(like megapixels when buying a camera). You could ask to see the manuals, or you could simply just look at the display and form your own opinion of the image quality. Look at the black areas on the images, if they are dark enough for you and you can still make out everything else on the screen, that's all you really need. Ignore the numbers.

NTSC/ATSC
NTSC is the "old" analog tv signals that just disappeared from the airways, but are still being sent to your non-HD TV's from the cable/satellite companies. ATSC is the new digital signal. Any HD TV will definitely accept ATSC, and should certainly still accept NTSC, which is important if you don't plan on abandoning your VCR or DVD player anytime soon. Chances are very good that you won't need to be concerned with this for a few more years at least, as it is standard for HD TV's to accept both signals. If you are planning on buying a TV Tuner for your computer, however, you will need to remember this.

HDMI/Component/DVI
These are the commonly accepted inputs for transferring an HD signal to your TV. The main distinction here is that HDMI also sends audio across the same cable, while Component and DVI transmit only video. Technically, component is made up of 3 cables(red, green, and blue) plus whatever audio cables you need(usually the red and white RCA cables), but they tend to sell these as a single cable. There are differences in the video quality across these different cables, but if you are starting off with this guide, chances are good that any of the three would be perfect for you.
-Coax/Composite
These are the old standards of cables for your Standard Definition TV's. Any HD TV will have at least 1 coax(the round, black cord with a single pin in the middle that needs to be screwed in), and many include composite(the red, white and yellow plugs). Having these will be important if you plan on hooking up anything that's not brand new, such as a VCR, DVD player that's a few years old, or any video game consoles from more than a couple years ago. If you have your cable plugged into your HD TV via coax, there are some things to note, which I've mentioned below.

Plasma/LCD(+LED)/DLP/(AM)OLED
The two most common types of HD TV are Plasma and LCD. Plasma's will generally have better contrast ratios and truer motion than LCD and tend to cost more as a result. To address some of the pitfalls of LCD(poor contrast ratios, motion and brightness) some manufacturers are adding Light-Emitting-Diodes to the LCD TV's as a backlight which helps address some of these issues. Pricing for these generally falls between standard LCD's and Plasmas and so does the image quality. These may be marketed only as "LED" TV's but in truth, they are still LCD's, just enhanced. If you are looking for a large TV, 50 inches or larger, DLP is another option. These will not be TV's that you mount to you wall, but rather take up some floor space. They tend to be cheaper than plasmas in the same range, and have a good-quality image. At the time of writing this, any TV with "OLED" in the description is too expensive for anyone, this includes "AMOLED" as well. If future years, they may be priced more reasonably, and I may revisit this topic and speak more on them then.

Noteworthy:
-Garbage in: Garbage out - Unless you have an entirely HD package through your cable or satellite service, you will notice that some channels look horrible on your new TV. They might not be broadcast in HD, so the image quality will be poorer by comparison to everything else. Likewise, if you use coax(the screw on cable) or composite(red, white, yellow) as your inputs, the image quality will not be HD. It's no fault of the TV in these cases, it's just something that you will notice and have to accept with the purchase of your HD TV.
-Network features(Netflix/Youtube/Amazon + Media Extenders) - A number of new TV's have some added features that make use of your internet connection. If you are a Netflix subscriber, you may already be aware of their Watch Instantly feature, where you can watch their movies through their website without the DVD's. Some TV's(and Blu-Ray players) allow you to view your Watch Instantly Queue through the TV, so if you use Netflix, or were planning to, this might be a feature that is worth consideration. In addition to Netflix streaming, many models include access to YouTube or even Amazon's online movie rental service. If that appeals to you, you have some options to look for in your TV purchase. Others allow you to access videos that you may have on your computer through the network. Chances are good that setting up that feature will be a fairly intensive process, so don't expect the world of that feature unless you're willing to put in some significant legwork.
-Upscaling/Upconverting - This is a good feature to look for if you want to get some extra life out of your non-HD gadgets that are hooked up to your TV. This is the process of improving an SD signal to an approximation of an HD signal. It won't look as good as a true HD signal, but it will look better than a non-upscaled SD signal, and for many, that's good enough.
-Refresh Rates - This is simply how many times in 1 second the screen can change the image being displayed. This is important especially on LCD TV's as they can tend to have a ghosting effect, where an image fades away when it should simply disappear instantly. A high refresh
rate will eliminate or greatly reduce the ghosting effect found on
LCD's. Plasma TV's don't usually have a problem with ghosting, so their
refresh rates are not typically advertised.

Email Basics

Pretty much everyone has an email address now, even those of which we are not aware, or that have escaped our memory. If you're still new to email, or want to refresh some of the basics, this is an excellent place to start.

Personality factors:
Before we dive in, there are some important things to consider about yourself. If you're new to email, let's look at some behaviors that you already exhibit. What do you do when you get physical mail? Do you hold on to every personal letter you receive? Do you file everything away in a well organized system? Do you toss everything away as soon as you are done reading it, or are there maybe a few items that you want to hold on to while discarding the rest? Do you look through all the coupons you receive? After thinking about these questions, would you consider yourself more of a collector or a consumer(toss when done)? If you're more inclined to hold on to your letters, would you consider yourself more organized or controlled chaos? The answers to these will guide how you should and will use email.

Included Accounts with ISP's:
If you pay for internet service, you probably have an email account assigned to you by your provider. In most cases, I would recommend against using such an account. The more people know about that email address, the more susceptible you are to identity theft, or being targeted for other scams. The reason for this is that such email addresses are frequently based on your name, so if a less-than-reputable person or business were to come across your address, they could pretend that they already have a rapport with you by addressing you by name. This is not to say that this assigned account is useless, but it's certainly not Ft. Knox, and should be treated with a bit of caution or respect.

Free Email accounts: There are a number of excellent options available for free email accounts, and among the most popular are Gmail, Hotmail, and Yahoo! Mail, which are offered respectively by Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo!. Some of the advantages to using these accounts is that they are web-based: all of your mail is stored on the web, meaning that you can access it from any internet-connected computer. Local email accounts basically live on your personal computer which means they can primarily be accessed only through you own computer. Another advantage to these web-based email services is that you have some flexibility in creating your own personalized address. Picking a name that doesn't include any part of your real name is a bit of added security, and can be a simple to to express yourself in a limited fashion.

Multiple accounts(Pros and Cons)
Web-based or provided email, which should I use? Honestly, both. Web accounts are excellent for keeping in touch with friends and anything that you may do online that's "fun". But everybodyluvskittens@madeup.com(not a real email address, I hope) might not be a good thing to put on a resume. You should be very selective with you you give your email address to, especially if it includes your name. Prospective employers are a safe bet, as are banks(for setting up bill-pay), but for anything else, I would highly recommend using a separate account. There is a simple truth to remember about giving out your email address: the more you give it out, the more junk mail you will receive. Giving your web-based account to everyone that's not strictly work or bill related is a simple way of keeping all of your junk limited to one area, leaving the email you use for more professional business clean and easier to deal with.

Risks Inherent with Emails:
Junk Mail is an insidious part of any email account that's been active at all, and even the best filters are going to let some of it slip through. Most of it is just advertisements, but some of it is actually harmful to a computer. Sometimes simply opening a junk message can install a virus, and many others require you to click on a link, image, or attachment before it can install. If you don't understand the subject, or who the message is from, play it safe and delete the message without opening it. Another risk that you face with email is scammers. They have a colorful variety of names online, but they all do not mean you well. If anyone, and I mean anyone, asks you for any type of account number, password, social security number or other personal identifying information do NOT give it to them. This is the equivalent of someone in a suit or uniform asking you for your wallet. A polite, well dressed thief is still a thief. Something else to be aware of is that email is not as private as you might think. Some one with the know-how and interest can very easily read your email messages, so as long as you keep private info out of your emails, you should be fine. Don't worry, they aren't interested in any secrets of yours that aren't in the form of an account number or social security number. Your secret crush is still a secret. That video of you dancing like a fool at your cousin's wedding: well, that's probably on You Tube by now.

Password Dos and Don'ts

We all have passwords to deal with these days: pins for our credit cards; password for our email; logins for our work computer. We all have to come up with our own password at some point and then we are faced with the challenge of coming up with something that's both easy to remember, and difficult for a stranger to guess. It sounds daunting, or even impossible, but it isn't. Just keep these things in mind and you shouldn't have any trouble coming up with strong passwords that you can remember.

Memory
Do pick something that's easy to remember.
Don't pick something that's on record. The birthday of anyone in your family, your wedding date, your graduation date are all easy for someone else to find out, and guess.
Do pick something personal. As long as it doesn't fall into the "Don't" category above, something personal will always be easier to remember, and be a good start for a password.
Don't pick something that's so obscure that if you forget your password that even you won't be able to guess it.

Security
Do include a mix of numbers, capitals, and special characters whenever possible.
Don't use the same password for everything. At least, not the *exact* same password...
Do variations of a good password for different uses. An acquaintance of mine suggests adding an abbreviation at the end of a good password of the site that you are logging into. For example: if your password is MonkeyP13, and you are using it on yahoo.com, add yc at the end of the password to make it even stronger, and still as easy to remember as the simpler password.
Don't let your computer remember your passwords for you, and don't put them on a note right next to your computer. While a note is safer than letting your computer store your passwords, you're basically giving anyone with physical access to your computer full access to everything you do online.

Additional Tips:
The longer a password is, the safer it is. If a password gets too long, you will have to me more careful to ensure that you type it in correctly. Don't go overboard if you have trouble typing accurately.
Don't type your password in order. For example, say "Jump 1365" is easy to remember for you. Type Jump, then click somewhere near the beginning or middle(but the same spot every time), and type 1, skip a space, 3, skip... so that you end up with J1u3m6p5 as a password that's easy to remember, but difficult to guess. By using the mouse to click back to the beginning, you add an extra layer of security against malicious tools like keyloggers, which can record exactly what keys you type in the exact order you type them. Most keyloggers require physical access to your computer, so don't be too concerned if you live alone. If you live with a family or roommates, as long as you follow this tip, don't be concerned.

HowTo: Keep your files organized in Windows

We've all done it. Downloaded something and just clicked "OK" when it asked us where to save the file without looking. At first it seems fine, but after a while later you come back to that folder to find the photo you just saved has been swallowed by a behemoth that is your "Downloads" folder. So how do you clean it up without just deleting all of it?

1. Create New Folder - Start by clicking the right mouse button in an empty area of the folder you are in(If you see a background image, you're in your "Desktop" folder. Right-clicking anywhere on the image is fine) and select Create New Folder. Type a logical name for the new folder and hit Enter. When getting your computer organized you should really only be creating new folders at the beginning, and very sparingly later on. Also, if you find yourself with a new folder called "New Folder" just select it by clicking on it once and hit the "F2" key. You will be able to rename it to something more appropriate.

2. Create a plan - Technically, you should do this first. You need to figure out how to sort your files into a method that makes sense to you. If you want pictures of your family separated from those funny pictures your cousin sent you you will need to set up separate folders for each. I'd suggest in such a case that you create a folder called "Pictures"(if it hasn't already been created) and in that folder create the folders in which you want your photos sorted. If your family photos start getting a little too unruly in their own folder, you may want to separate them even more. My personal suggestion is grouping them by date. Doing this by specific date can be tedious, but having a folder by Season and Year is simple enough to make and remember.

3. DIY - Don't let the computer sort everything for you. Sure, it sounds like a nice option in theory, but you are basically asking a stranger to sort your files for you, and who knows how they would figure out what the best method would be. You can tell your programs to all save in the same place if you like, but that means you have to check and sort that folder's contents often. If you haven't let it get out of control already, this can be an easy task if you keep up with it. If you let it go, you're back at square one. To keep things neat, specify where you want to save a file every time, if possible. Don't let your photos end up in "Downloads", they deserve better than that.

4. Stay on top - A method is only as good as the effort you put into it. If you've come up with a great method and don't use it, you've still got a mess. Take 5 minutes out of your day to sort files into their appropriate locations and it will stay neat. A great benefit of having neat files is if you ever need to back up your files, you know exactly where to look. Even having a program to backup your files will want to know where they are, and you can tell it with confidence.

Hiatus

We apologize for the unplanned hiatus from this blog. We will return
shortly.

How To Keep In Touch With Geeks

You've got an elusive geek friend or family member that just isn't the best at returning your calls, or sending you emails even though you sent them(and ten of your friends) that really cute story about the puppy, or the student who challenged his professor and won. You know that they keep in touch with others regularly, but if the phone or email don't work for you, what other options are there in the electronic world?

Instant Messengers: These have been around for a while now and are a pretty tried and true method of keeping in touch online. There are a lot of different services out there, so if there's one geek in particular you're trying to keep in touch with, you'll need to be on the same services as them, and you'll need their username as well. Chances are pretty good that they use multiple services(to help them keep in touch with all their friends on different services), but there are a number of instant messengers out their that will handle multiple services at the same time with a little legwork. Different services include Yahoo!, MSN, AIM, GoogleTalk, and others. Each will have their own messenger to access their own service, but if you are feeling daring you can try one of the applications that works with multiple services such as Pidgin or Trillian.

Social Networks: There are plenty out there to choose from, but the trick is being on the same one as the person you care about. There is a bit of a caveat here for parents: if your kids aren't out of college yet, it's probably best for both you and them if you do not have access to their Facebook or MySpace page. Either you will find something that will cause you a great amount of concern for no real reason, or they will make sure that you don't see everything. It really depends on what site they are on, and how they use it. There's also a fair chance that your kids with either reject your friend request(doesn't mean they don't like you, they just don't want you reading anything on their page), or they will all but abandon that account and not tell you about it. If that happens, don't try and fight it on electronic battlegrounds, your kids will win. Talk it out, especially if they are still under your own roof. Now, for all those people to whom the caveat does not apply: each of the different social networks have their own quirks and charm. Twitter is a popular one, and basically just a list of blurbs(or tweets) about what's going on. You won't find a whole lot of depth there, but it can be nice to know what's new. Facebook is another popular choice, but for someone starting off, it can be rather intimidating. There is a lot that Facebook can do, and with their layout changing frequently, it's easy to get lost if you don't know what you're looking for. The good news is that it does do a lot for you. Any updates that your friends and family on Facebook make are brought right to you. If you don't want to read their results on the latest internet quiz, you can easily tell Facebook to stop showing you those kinds of updates. Their are plenty others out there but for the sake of brevity(ha!) we'll move on at this point.

Blogs: In comparison to the social networks, these are very simple to navigate. These are basically public journals. Services vary greatly in how they can restrict viewing, but they all serve the purpose of logging thoughts quite well. These can be considered to be social networks as well, but the focus here is heavily on writing. Parents, listen up: depending on the service your child uses, they might be more willing to share their blog with you than their Facebook page. Many allow you to keep some thoughts private or limited to certain people, and leave the rest available for the public. Even if you don't plan on writing your own blog, their are advantages to signing up for an account. For example, if someone has made their blog viewable to only their friends, you will have to have an account so that they can identify you as a friend, otherwise the site will just assume that you are a part of the "public" and not show you anything. Popular blog sites include Livejournal, Blogger, and Vox.

Something else to be aware about when exploring these different avenues of communication is the difference between public and private messages. The social networks allow both, so be careful on how you reach out the someone. Sending a private message that's meant to be public will be a slightly embarrassing mistake, but a public message that's meant to be private can be much more embarrassing. If it says "send a message to:" odds are good that it's a private message, but if it says "comment" or "post to" there's a good chance it's public.

Tech Glossary: Video Games

The Consoles:
First off, what is a console? Originally, the definition for this was a lot easier: a device designed to play video games. As the technology has improved over the last few years, video game consoles can do a lot more, and to further complicate matters, other devices can play video games as well. The question now is what the device's primary purpose is. A cell phone is a cell phone is a cell phone, but even if it can play games, it's still a cell phone and not a console. The three main consoles people will discuss nowadays are the Xbox 360, the Playstation 3 and the Wii. These are all primarily designed to play video games. There are other portable gaming systems, such as the Playstation Portable or the Nintendo DS, which are intended for handheld use, but these are not consistently called consoles. There's no rhyme or reason to when they are considered consoles or not. It may depend on your zodiac sign, or Jupiter's moon cycles. The point is, if you call one a console, you may get a raised eyebrow, or you may not, and that will be the extent of it. Don't worry about it.

Genres:
RPG: This stands for Role Playing Game. These are games where the player creates a character and tries to develop them in various ways of their choosing. Players can often become invested in their characters and for this reason RPG's are notorious for being some of the most addicting games out there. There are a number of acronyms out there describing basically that they can be played online with other players. MMO, MMPORG, etc. Don't worry about remembering what they all mean, just recognize them as being online games with lots of other people. Stories are frequently Fantasy or Science Fiction in nature.

FPS: First Person Shooter. There's a gun on the screen, and a hand holding it. That's your character. You've got a first-person view of the action, and a lot of targets. Storyline is often seen as optional, especially if the game itself is really fun, but sometimes it can really help you to get into your character's head. These are typically very action-oriented and predominantly based on actual wars, or futuristic settings.

Platform. These games involve a lot of jumping. Some are more precise than others, but the one thing that's fairly consistent is that you don't want to miss your jump by falling short.

Side-scroller. You won't see as many of these games on non-portable systems anymore. Side scrolling basically means the the levels are predominantly laid out in a long, left-to-right manner where you are always looking at your character from the side. As the player advances, the screen scrolls with them, moving the "camera" to view more of the level, while the character stays pretty much in the center of the screen.

Sandbox/Open-ended. These games are growing in popularity. Whereas most games have a guided progression of gameplay, sandbox games let you decided what you want to do, and where you want to go. "The story can wait, I really want to explore this one area..." The most famous(infamous?) games in this genre include the Grand Theft Auto series.

That should be enough to get you started, be sure to check back later for more Tech Glossary terms.

A friendly reminder

You can always ask for help on any technical issue by emailing
help.d.myst@gmail.com Responses will be sent back to you via email and
posted to the site as well, with your personal information omitted.

Howto...

Today we start something new for us, in what will be an ongoing series for this blog. How to Better Understand Geeks. For this initial post, I'm going to break down the basic parts of you PC and explain them in easy to digest analogies. Without further ado: How to Understand What Makes up Your Computer - Part 1.

Kilo-, Mega-, Giga-, Tera-, Peta-
If you see these prefixes before a word, it's basically just telling you how many there are. Kilo is 1,000, and in the order that the rest appear, they are 1,000 times more. So Mega is 1,000 Kilo, and Giga is 1,000 Mega and so on. We are just starting to see items with Terabyte hard drives(more on that later) hitting the market, so you may come across this term, but for the near future, you might not need to remember what the Peta- prefix means.

Megahertz VS. Megabytes(and Gigahertz VS. Gigabytes):
These two terms are often confused among the technologically uninitiated, and if you can't keep them straight, you will stick out like a sore thumb to a geek. Basically, hertz is a measurement of how many "cycles", or thought processes, a device can perform in 1 minute. More is definitely faster. A byte is a unit of data, or information, that the computer remembers. You'll see bytes(Megabytes or gigabytes, usually) describing 2 different aspects of a computer most frequently; RAM and hard drives.

RAM(Random Access Memory) and Hard Drives:
Simply put, this is your computer's short term, and long term memory. Another way of thinking about ram is comparing it to your desk at work. If you have a very small desk, it can be hard to keep organized and get anything done quickly, but with a larger desk, it's easier to keep your tasks organized and separated and you can get work done much quicker, regardless of how sharp you are. Hard drives are your storage for everything that you want, and your computer needs, to keep on hand. These are your filing cabinets, your bookshelves, your desk drawers, and anything else that you use to store your stuff, all combined. Both of these are measured in bytes, but just remember that RAM is like the random stuff you have to remember over the course of the day to get things done, and a hard drive is everything you need to remember for long periods of time.
What more RAM means to you: The more RAM you have, the more programs your computer can run at once. Not all programs are created equal, and some take more RAM than others to run smoothly. More RAM also means these needy applications will run smoother.
What a larger hard drive means to you: The more stuff you can save on your computer. If all you do is check email and browse the web, you don't need much. If you've got a family computer, your kids will use a lot more than you do. Having more storage space means the difference between having a few songs saved on your computer and having all of your music, pictures and videos saved onto your computer. If you're not that ambitious, or plan on keeping the computer all to yourself, you can probably get by just fine with a smaller drive.

The Processor(CPU):
This is easily the brain of your computer. Its speed is measured in Hertz(nowadays from 1.2 to 3.0 gigahertz is common), and number of cores. Not too much to be concerned about here, just that more of either >means faster, and less power usage on the electric bill.
What a faster processor means to you: less waiting. There are still other things than can slow you down on your computer, but a faster processor means that your computer will respond to your commands much quicker. And having multiple cores is just like adding another processor to your computer, it'll respond that much faster. Still with me? You're doing great. Don't forget, you can always bookmark this or print this off to read later.

Wireless(WiFi):
Don't let the name fool you, you will still have at least one wire running to your computer. This just means one less wire adding to the mess. This always comes with a letter describing what kind of WiFi it has(if any), and the later in the alphabet, the faster it can access information from elsewhere, and the further it can be from the access point(the source of the signal). It's basically a walkie-talkie just for computers to talk to each other in their own language. By the way, their alphabet skips several letters, so don't worry about the gaps, just remember later means farther and faster.
What the letters mean to you: "A" means the two computers(or a computer and a router) need to be right next to each other, and don't share very well. "B" is fine for across the same room if all you want to do is browse the web or check email. "G" is enough to cover a small house with good transfer speeds, and "N" means you can stream videos from your back porch to your laptop without many hiccups(see earlier posts if you aren't sure what that means).

Up to this point, you've been armed with enough knowledge to compare the hardware in prebuilt computers that you would find in any retail location, but that still isn't quite enough to help you make a decision if you aren't sure what you need when you are looking to buy.

What are your needs?
Let's start with what you *want* to do with the computer: If you want to go online, do your taxes, pay bills, check email and the news, and maybe watch some videos on YouTubeTM, chances are really good that you'd be happy with what's commonly called a netbook or a nettop. These tasks are not very demanding at all on a computer, and these computers are built with scaled-back components with that in mind. Don't confuse "scaled-back" with "lower-end"; these are new parts designed for low demand usage. They are state of the art, and best of all, inexpensive.

If you'd like to branch out a little bit and do a bit more demanding tasks such as editing pictures you've taken with your digital camera to get rid of red-eye or maybe just brighten it up a bit, record backups of your DVD's(legally, mind you), or record your music collection to your computer, you fall into the range of most computers out there for sale today. A faster processor, and more RAM will really help speed up these tasks, but if you plan on doing a lot of them, you'll need a spacious hard drive as well. How spacious really depends on a lot of things, but100 to 300 gigabytes will please most casual users.

What about games? The answer to this really depends on what you mean. If you play the game by going to a website, or simple puzzle or card games, your needs are met simply by having an internet connection and a computer. If the games involve 3D graphics and look like a real-breathing world inside your computer monitor, you will need a decent video card, and a computer fitting of one of the slightly more demanding users. Video Cards have specifications very similar to the computer itself. It has its own processor and memory, and the good news is, upgrading or installing a video card to your desktop computer is a fairly simple process these days, and can be done long after you've bought your computer. If you are thinking about buying a video card to play games, start by looking at the boxes for the games themselves. They always have a "minimum" and a "recommended" configuration for your computer and video card. Find the games you want to play, read the recommended specs, and find a card with at least those specs.

Now I'm going to make the very safe assumption that you don't need a top-of-the-line, bleeding-edge computer. There are a few people who could really put those to use: people who work with graphics at a professional level, and video game fanatics. Both of these groups have a pretty good idea what their needs are in a computer already.

Tech Glossary: Online Video

We've all heard of YouTube, and may have even watched a video on it. We're hearing more and more about other sites like Hulu and want to know more about watching videos online, but the lingo may sound a bit intimidating. Here are a handful of words you may come across when looking for videos online:

Streaming: basically, this means that your computer is playing the video directly from the website it's on, and not being stored on your computer. It's not a get-now-watch-later situation. The pro is that it doesn't take up any space on your computer, the con is that you generally need a really good connection to watch video this way without interruption.

Buffering: speaking of interruptions, this is the standard way of dealing with slower, or less reliable connections. A buffer is basically a way to give your computer a head-start. If the video is a high quality, your network connection is slow, or some combination of the two is happening, the time it takes to get the video is longer than the actual video itself. A good analogy for watching a video online is like rolling a matchbox car downhill. It won't make it down on the pavement, so you have to lay track down for it. The speed that you can lay down track is like your network speed, and the speed of the matchbox car is the video's playback speed. If you started laying track at the same time as releasing the car, you would have to stop a lot. Buffering gives you enough time to lay down the track before letting the car go, hopefully enough time to let the car make it all the way down without stopping.

Torrents: some of you may come across this term if you are looking for a particular video online. A Torrent is a way of "packaging" a video to download to your computer. You'll need a program that can handle torrent files(BitTorrent, or the browser Opera, are a couple of the more popular options). There's more to these files than I've explained, but this is enough to let you use them.

Codecs: These are like instructions for your computer to assemble the video. If a video was made using a certain codec, your computer will need that same codec to make sense of the video. There are a number of codecs out there, but if you have Flash, DivX, and QuickTime(iTunes) installed, chances are good that you won't have a problem playing videos because of a codec problem.

Another thing to be aware of is the legality of watching videos online. If the videos you watch have commercials in them, chances are fair that it's a legal way to view them. Torrents are frequently used illegally, but not always, so if you have moral objections to watching videos illegally, you're better off avoiding torrents. If you do choose to watch videos illegally, chances are very good that nothing will happen to you, but your computer faces a greater risk of infection from malicious software should you go that route. I'm not going to advise you how to better protect yourself in those situations, as that's a form of encouragement. If you're not very adventurous, but are still curious about viewing videos online, stick with sites such as YouTube and Hulu. YouTube does a pretty good job of making sure the videos on their site have their owner's permission to be there, and Hulu only has videos that are supported by the studios that own them. There are plenty of other sites out there, but these two are pretty low-risk for the uninitiated.

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Digital Cameras

Ok folks, it's time for me to attempt to clear up the mud filled waters in the world of camera shopping. If you've ever even looked at a camera on display or online in the last 4 years, you've heard the buzzword "Megapixel" thrown at you at least a dozen times. Don't be fooled, it's not a measurement of quality, but *quantity. *It's not as simple as how many pictures the camera can store, but actually how much info is stored in each picture. *If you have a nice lens* on the camera, having more megapixels will mean a more detailed picture. So how do you know if it's a nice lens? Easy. Manufacturers call this part Optical Zoom, which on digital cameras is measured by how much it can magnify the image coming in. For example, a 2x optical zoom means that it can magnify the image twice as large as normal. I've come up with a simple little gauge to evaluate cameras, it's pretty easy to remember: Add the Optical Zoom to the Megapixels, save that number. Multiply the same two numbers, and take the average of this answer and your first answer.

Now what does this all mean? If you get a result that's less than 16, this camera is good for those of us who are happy with the pictures you get from those one-time-use cameras you see in the check out lines. If the number you end up with is between 16 and 25, this is a camera that's probably good for those of us who like a sharper picture, and might like to hang up a few around the house. Results greater than 25 are not likely to disappoint anyone looking for great quality from a consumer grade camera. If you're looking for a professional grade camera, chances are you've already got better resources guiding you than this little equation.