Woody Leonhard

A long-time Windows supporter and analyst for all the past incarnations of Microsoft’s OS is haunted by the notion that Windows 8 is leaving him and his colleagues behind. Woody Leonhard, of Windows Secrets Newsletter, expresses grave doubts about the direction toward which Windows seems to be heading.  The march toward the Metro interface on the Consumer Preview of Windows 8, means the departure of old signposts like the “Start button.”  Looks like mobile devices are having a profound affect on desktops as well as laptops.

Here is a review by noted car site Edmunds.com of four iPhone applications to help keep track of your fuel economy in the face of soaring costs.

Here is a listing of a wide range of Android apps to help you keep track of your fuel economy.

Maybe  you haven’t noticed but the announcement of Mountain Lion for Mac OS, is taking computers one step closer to looking and working like the smartphones in many of our pockets.  Pete Cashmore of Mashable has an interesting commentary on the subject.

The first time around the PlayBook promised a lot and delivered a very little.  But PlayBook 2.0, now running on an Android platform, is delivering pleasant surprises in performance even to skeptics.

Sometimes the price of security seems to be slow performance because the firewall/anti-virus/anti-malware software is hogging the system resources hostage. Fred Langa of Windows Secrets Newsletter tackled this issue with some interesting results.  Full Article

Microsoft has entered the touch mouse market with its newest device.  Following in Apple’s footsteps, MS presents a mouse whose surface allows for gestures to control movements on the screen.

Windows 7 is arguably Microsoft’s best operating system to date but there still can be unforeseen disasters.  Fred Lange of the Windows Secrets newsletter posted a whole recipe for recovering from a Windows 7 disaster. This article is worth printing off and keeping on hand if not for yourself then for a friend whose PC has been taken over by a nasty virus.  This way you also get to keep your files on the computer without having to remove and protect them all.  You did that with backup already…Right?…Right?

Cisco E4200 v2

Cut corners anywhere else but buy the best router you can.  That’s the advice of CNet’s expert who describes the 5 top wireless routers on the market at the end of 2011.  A chain is only as strong as its weakest link; make sure that your router is the weakest link in your chain.

The Crunchies Award

The ballot boxes stuffed emptied and votes are counted; the winners of the 2012 Crunchies for best…well, just about anything that you could categorize on the Net are….  Some winners were gimme’s like DropBox but some left us scratching our heads in disbelief, e.g. Nest beat iPad2 for Best Devices.  Really?!  Really?!