THE NUMBERS REPORT

Seventy percent of small businesses that have a major data loss go out of business within a year, according to a report by the accounting firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers.

Read more

Share

CONVERTING VINYL RECORDS

A couple years ago we bought a Simon and Garfunkel record on eBay and it arrived as a vinyl record. Well that was a surprise! Because we thought we would be getting a CD and had no way to play a record.

Read more

Share

OFFICE ON THE IPAD

We’re still waiting for the official Microsoft version of Office for iPad and Android tablets. Meanwhile, there’s a free app that lets you use Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint. It’s called “OnLive Desktop” from desktop.onlive.com.

Read more

Share

WIN SOME, LOSE SOME

The Google Chromebook comes in four versions, one by Samsung, another by Acer, one by HP and the new “Chromebook Pixel.” Acer, by the way, is one of world’s largest computer makers, and just reported that it sells more Chromebooks than Windows 8 computers.
Acer said laptops based on the Chrome operating system accounted

Read more

Share

MUSIC IN THE CLOUD

Several years ago, Bob was browsing Amazon’s online music store and ended up putting two dozen classical CDs in the shopping cart. He planned to look the list over again before going to check-out. But Joy surprised him and just bought the whole batch. Yesterday, all of those CDs popped up online, ready to play from any computer, tablet or phone. Amazon’s new “AutoRip,” is a free service that automatically uploads any CD you bought from them, going all the way back to 1998. It puts the contents into your personal “Cloud Player” ready to stream online. We are more than slightly awed by this; just consider the amount of storage they must have. A playlist online is much easier [...]

Read more

Share

SHARING LARGE FILES

Dropbox is a free program from dropbox.com, and probably the most popular way to store and/or share large files; they let you store up to two gigabytes for free. But Gmail now lets you insert an attachment up to 10 gigabytes. That’s 400 times larger than Gmail’s previous limit for attachments. It will prompt you to store it in Google Drive. To see all you’ve stored, from the Gmail window, click “Drive.”

Read more

Share

A PEN FOR THE CLOUD

Here’s something for the person who hates typing. It’s the LiveScribe “Sky WiFi Smartpen,” and it digitizes your handwriting, records the lecture you’re listening to and stores it all in the cloud.

Read more

Share

A FASTER CHROME BOX

Samsung’s new $329 “Chromebox” is the first desktop computer to run the new Google Chrome operating system (Chrome OS). We think it and the “Chromebook” laptop could be the wave of the future – which in this business means the next year or so.

Read more

Share

GOOGLE DRIVE

Just after we wrote about Microsoft’s Skydrive’s free 25 gigabytes of online storage, they started charging for it. They’re still king of the freebie hill with seven free gigabytes, but the competing new Google Drive is worth a spin. Google Drive (Drive.Google.com) gives you five gigabytes free, and unlike other storage sites, lets you edit the documents you store. That’s because it connects seamlessly to Google Docs, which has it’s own word processor. And — as they might say on late night TV — any documents you create with the Google Docs word processor don’t count toward using up the five gigabytes of storage. If you need 25 gigabytes, it costs $2.49 a month.

Read more

Share

THE NO-HASSLE LAPTOP

There’s a new kid on the block, and she’s easy. If you’ve had it with Windows maintenance and aren’t a Mac fan, the new Google Chrome operating system, “Chrome OS,” is something to consider. We just bought one of these new-fangled “Chrome” laptops.

Read more

Share