January 2013 archive

Solar Power isn’t the Complete Solution

Down under I reckon solar power has raised its profile quite a bit given generous subsidies and feed-in tariffs which has stimulated uptake of solar arrays being installed in homes while some businesses have bitten the bullet as well. However, as those incentives are scaled back, it is worth considering if simply installing solar by …

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Windows Live Messenger Shutting Down

Those of you out there that use Windows Live Messenger should have received an e-mail from Microsoft stating as such but if you’ve missed it then the service will be shutting down on 15th March 2013. That’s a little over two months away so if you rely upon Messenger to keep in touch with people …

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It’s MySpace, Jim But Not As We Know It

Stevie Wonder's Top Tracks - MySpace

If you hadn’t realised, MySpace is still alive and, well umm, let’s just say it’s still alive. Anyway, a few days ago I got something that ended up in my junk mail folder appearing to be from MySpace. So I had a look. The mail looks legitimate enough and it contained an invitation to try …

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Cheaper Lightning Cables

Let’s cut to the chase – Apple wants you to lay down $25 for a Lightning to USB cable. You might only need one or two in addition to the one that you got with your iPhone or iPad (i.e. the original cable for home, one for the car and one for work) but $50 …

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Opt Out of Personalised Ads From Criteo

Here’s a quick tip. It appears that Criteo provides personalised ads in Facebook which can end up pestering you about specific items you may have been browsing on the web. Personally, I had been looking at 32GB G.Skill DD3 2400MHz on NewEgg and an ad appeared for the same product in Facebook. Fortunately, you can …

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Thunderbolt and Mini DisplayPort

At the moment, I’m just doing a little bit of research at the moment for a possible desktop upgrade this year. In my efforts to ensure that my 30″ Apple Cinema HD display is compatible with the new kit and the Virtu MVP functionality on Z77 motherboards I’ve looked at the video connectivity options. Normally, …

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iTunes Music Not Syncing

Yesterday, my wife was having problems syncing music from iTunes to her iPhone. She had a playlist that would sync successfully to her iPad mini but would not copy to her iPhone. We tried all sorts of things, including: deleting the playlist off the iPhone and copying it back, reconnecting the iPhone, restarting the iPhone. …

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Logging Out of Skype on Windows Phone 8

If you’re using the beta version of Skype for Windows Phone 8 and you’re conscious of preserving battery life you may have been looking for the option to logout of Skype in the various menus. I’ll save you further grief – it’s not there. For whatever reason, you cannot log out of Skype for Windows …

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Fitbit Companion for Windows Phone

Fitbit Companion - Sleep Screen

Following on from yesterday’s blog about an official Fitbit app for Windows 8 and Windows RT you might want to have a similar experience on your Windows Phone handset. Unfortunately, there isn’t an official app for Windows Phone app just yet but I’ve found one that I really like in the form of Fitbit Companion. The …

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Fitbit App for Windows 8 and Windows RT

Just a quick one. Fitbit have released an app for Windows 8 and Windows RT which will allow you to keep tabs on your personal fitness statistics in full screen glory (or shame as the case may be). It’s a very slick app indeed with the ability to look at step count, weight, floors climbed, …

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