Recovering data from older hard drives

I had a friend tell me had saved many of his hard drives from older PC’s he had and wondered if he could hook them up and look and recover his old data. There are a number of ways to to this.  I suggested to him that he could use a hard drive enclosure or a some type of hard drive docking station. Most of which connect to your PC by USB port. They can be commonly found at places like NewEgg.com and Cyberguys.com and other geeky shopping places online. One thing to be careful of is the type of interface your drive has. Today the vast majority of drives have what is called Serial(aka: SATA) interface. If you’ve got a drive from an older machine chances are you have an IDE(or Parallel). Be careful when ordering to be sure which type you have. One will not fit into the other so there’s no danger hurting anything. Just the aggravation of having to get the right one. Good luck!

3 out of 10 laptops fail within 10 years

According to a study by SquareTrade (a warranty company) 31% of laptops fail within the first three years of ownership. This isn’t too surprising given that laptops by there nature take a lot of use and abuse. It also shows that the popular netbooks are 20%(a projected amount) more likely to fail than there more expensive counterparts. ASUS and Toshiba have the best rates at about 16 % failure rate. Premium laptops tended to fair better. This may be due to that if someone pays good money for a big ticket item they’ll take care of it better. I thought this would be a good comparison if your looking to buy a laptop this coming Christmas season.

Source: Christopher Null: The Working Guy

GH: World Tour: Hotel California Expert Guitar, 100%, 355k (FC)

I recently got this game for my birthday. It' very addicting. This is one of my favorite tunes on it so far. I'm only on "medium" level though. I do hope to get this one on "Expert" someday.

Are you computer literate?

I’m not asking whether your a computer geek or nerd. Kind of like you don’t need to know how fuel injection works on a car in order to drive one. Some people still in 2009 have a fear or apathy towards computers. As sort of a computer geek myself I find this incredible. I’ve taken college classes where people would (and still do) turn in papers hand written. Many times they cite they don’t have a computer or have one but don’t have the time to figure out how to use it. I’ve heard of some universities providing laptops for there students. It is practically an essential piece of college life .

Computers are used in almost every business (and homes) today in some shape or form. They are quick and efficient for communication and information. Of course the primary means of sharing this stuff is by the Internet. Almost every business big or small has a website these days.

Being computer savvy has many benefits:

• You can use your computer more wisely and be an educated consumer.
• The ability to use a computer is almost essential in most careers and jobs.
• When your computer literate you’ll be less intimidated by technical jargon and be able to take advantage of new technologies.

One of my goals in writing this blog is to help others overcome this fear or apathy. I was a computer newbie at one time also. I remember when I used to think when my PC told me I performed an “illegal” function I thought for a moment that the authorities were going to start busting down my door(or something like that).  I’m not kidding. It’s a lot like taking care of a car. You don’t need to be an expert mechanic and be able to tear apart and build a car. You just need to know how to care for it and use it wisely and safely. 

Illegal downloaders spend more music

I have never understood the heavy handed tactics of the RIAA and others in cracking down on those who download illegal stuff.   A recent study I found through Tech-Ex says that those that download illegally spend more on music (legally) than those that don’t. In other words they are biting the hand that feeds them.

Many of those who do download the stuff are more than likely music fans already and probably do spend more money on music in the first place than those. Instead they chose to take the “Us versus Them” mentality which turns off your strongest consumer base.

It also puzzled me why Youtube would crack down on video’s that use music. We’ve probably all come across those videos that the audio track has been removed. I think many people discover or re-discover music they like through video sites like YouTube and the like. I know I’ve spent many nights re-discovering music from my youth. You can find old music videos, interviews and other archive video from a particular artist that say ten years ago you’d never be able to see. It’s like a video archive that’s just waiting to be tapped. I don’t think the music industry in general can quite grasp what a gold mine they actually have.