PanDigital Photo Frame Review

By Jonathan

The Tech Lunch got their hands on the new 7 inch Digital Photo Frame from Pandigital this holiday season and it is fantastic.

Sneaky Youtube rolling out HD?

Techcrunch today posted an article discussing what looks to be the roll out of HD content on Youtube. No announcement has been made by Youtube who also updated the look of their site and went widescreen within the last few weeks. The chatter has been that Youtube may be evaluating HD worthy (content that meets the HD resolution requirements) content and offering it as an alternative version to the standard definition.

Top Seven Chicks of Tech

1. Morgan Webb – Former cohost on “Tech TV”

CLICK HERE FOR THE UPDATED ARTICLE

R2D2 Mail Box in Miami

By Jonathan Brownfield

You can find this box on the corner of Lincoln Road and Washington Avenue in South Beach – Miami, Florida.

Stay-at-home system administrator

By Erwin Blonk, November 30th, 9:55PM.

With the rise of home networks, a form of system administration has slowly creeped into the home. Windows Home Server has preceded Linux in this category but these, whether that is correct or not, appealed more to the techno-savvy consumers. With centralizing data and functionality comes the necessity of keeping it organized.

Microsoft has released version 1.1of the Windows Home Server Toolkit. Main parts of lie in two basic funtions: troubleshooting connections and error reporting. Being a system administrator in the corporate world this sounds familiar, and it will be interesting to see how Microsoft will balance the need for home system administration with users that don’t necessarily care to know every nut and bolt of their computers.

Vista Transformation Pack

I’m sure a lot of people out there have heard of the Vista Transformation Pack, a software bundle that ads a number of Vista’s features (as well as a clone of Vista’s ‘Aero’ theme) to Windows XP. I used it a few years ago and have to say, it’s not great. It does add some useful things to XP but it slows the computer down considerably.

Vista Transformation Pack dosn't always work properly.

Some of the features that I liked included Vista SideBar, a tool that mimicked the SideBar in Vista, ViStart, a clone of the Vista Start menu (rather buggy though) and WinFlip, a peice of Software that simulates the Start+Tab flip hing in Vista. I ended up removing the pack because it drastically lowered my system performance. In some cases it took 5 times as long to do something in XP with the Transformation Pack than in XP without it. Unfortunatly the Pack also messed up my Audio Drivers.

When compared to the speed of real copy of Vista on the same machine, the Pack was faster but by so little it hardly mattered. If you have an old PC, I don’t suggest trying the pack or attempting to install Vista itself, just stick with what works for you  -  XP.

17 ways to survive a Mac Disaster.

By Jonathan

Mac Life has came up with 17 great ways for you to survive almost every Mac disaster.

Take Full Advantage of your Gmail

By Kris at 5:48PM

It is very likely that a lot of people don’t know the full potential of their Gmail account. In this article, I will give you some tips on how to take full advantage of your Gmail account, with its biggest feature: Gmail drive. Gmail Drive is a tool that lets you create a hard drive out on the web that can be accessed right from your computer. Read on for the instructions.

Chuck, the iPhone and Agent 18

By Jonathan Brownfield at 2:07 AM

For those of you not familiar with NBC’s TV series Chuck, the show is about an average Joe tech geek who ends up secretly working undercover for the CIA.

Many of you may have noticed that Chuck uses an iPhone, but most of you probably haven’t been able to figure which case he is using, The Tech Lunch has the scoop.

iPhone Battery Pack Showdown

By Jonathan at 12:23 PM

Anyone who owns an iPhone can testify that the battery life on both the 1st and 2nd generation is horrible. When you are going from using smart phones that lasted a week to a phone that must be charged every night, it takes some getting use to. My previous Nokia Communicator would easily last an entire weekend of heavy use on a single charge. We here at The Tech Lunch have found three options to help ease your power issues.

Breaking News: Flying Spaghetti Monster

By Jonathan at 1:17 PM

Breaking News: The rumors of a flying spaghetti monster are true. The monster was last seen terrorizing Apple Head Quarters in Palo Alto California.

MAC MINI ROBOT

By Jonathan at 2:23 PM

Ever wanted to talk in Binary Code?

By Jonathan at 11:46 PM CST

Ever wanted to learn or communicate in Binary Code? Thanks to Roubaix Interactive, its easy!

Binary code is the system of representing text or computer processor instructions by the use of a two digit number system. This system is composed of only the number zero, representing the off state, and the number one, representing on state, combined in groups of 8. These groups of 8 bits can represent up to 256 different values and can correspond to a variety of different symbols, letters or instructions. An example of this is the uppercase A, which in ASCII binary is 01000001.

A Mac Lover’s Dream Car

By Jonathan at 12:00 AM CST

This Hyundai Genesis is the ultimate car for any Mac Fan Boy or Girl.

The Fastest Browser

By Kris at 8:58 PM

Well Mozilla recently released Firefox 3 and you’re probably guessing that the developers are taking a break and celebrating the new release. Well that’s not the case because Mozilla is already cooking up a new build for the next Firefox called Minefield. As of now Mozilla is focusing on the browser’s speed and they’ve done a good job so far. Mozilla hasn’t changed much to the UI but the speeds are amazing. It’s said to be one of the fastest java script engines ever built for a web browser. Oh did I mention that it’s fast, I’m sorry for repeating myself but this browser is a killer compared to Chrome, Opera, Safari, etc. Although Mozilla doesn’t recommend downloading Minefield because it’s unstable, but if you’re feeling lucky then here is the link. Also Minefield installs as a separate program from Mozilla so don’t worry about losing Firefox 3.