Add RAM to a Laptop

So my dad was griping that his Acer Aspire 9300 laptop takes forever to boot. I inspected it for spyware, excessive startup programs, and the other usual suspects, but everything checked out.

Then I remembered that the machine is about three years old and wasn't a powerhouse to begin with. So I checked the RAM. Bingo: it has only 1GB. Windows Vista needs at least 2GB to run smoothly. (So does Windows 7, but I've seen it run reasonably well on less.)

Upgrading a laptop's RAM may sound like a big deal, but it's actually the single easiest upgrade there is. The only challenge lies in determining how many RAM modules your system currently has and what kind they are.

To find out, turn off your system, unplug it, remove the battery, and flip it over. You should see at least one panel that can be removed with a small screwdriver. Consult your manual if you can't find the one covering the RAM sockets--or just open them all. Here's what you're looking for:

Most laptops have two sockets. If only one is occupied, just buy a module that exactly matches the existing one and drop it in. That'll effectively double your RAM.

If both sockets are filled, you'll have to replace both modules. In the case of Dad's Aspire, for example, it had a pair of 512MB modules for a total of 1GB of RAM. We elected to replace them with a pair of 1GB modules for 2GB total. (What to do with the displaced RAM? Ebay, of course!)

Not sure what kind of memory your laptop takes? Head to a site like Crucial, which can identify nearly every make and model. (Of course, once you know what you need, you can shop around to find the best price.)

There are countless how-to guides online that can help you further. I just wanted to let you know that if your laptop seems sluggish, it may be because it needs more RAM. Thankfully, it's a cheap and easy upgrade.

PalTalkScene Adds Video to Its Chat

PaltalkScene is a full-featured messaging/chat program that includes video, audio, and a host of other bells and whistles, as well as the ability to send and receive messages from several other chat programs or protocols, including Facebook and Yahoo IM. It is fairly easy to install and use, though the free version has ongoing banner ads which make the interface seem cluttered and busy, distracting your eye from the ongoing stream of text or the video of your friends trying to shoo their cat away from their Webcam.

PalTalkScene has video, sound, fonts, and graphics...but basic chatting hasn't changed much since Compuserve CB Simulator in 1988.

The Paltalk service has a tiered pricing plan. Paltalk Free is the level reviewed here. Paltalk Plus costs 40.00/year and includes unlimited, but low framerate, video (6 video windows at a time), and Paltalk Extreme increases the framerate and removes the window limit, for 60.00/year. All paid programs remove the banner ads..

PaltalkScene combines a person-to-person (or small group of up to 10 in Paltalk Free) messenger with a community site featuring literally thousands of rooms... most of which are empty. As is typical of any site where you can trivially create a room, club, or other such organization, thousands of people log on once, make a room, then never return, and rooms which have not seen a person log in for two years continue to clutter up search results. Also, as a side note, apparently there are apparently an awful lot of people for whom "roleplaying" does not involve Monster Manuals and twenty-sided dice. At least, I sure hope not.

I was able to find some decently populated rooms in only a few minutes of browsing. Fortunately, you can see room population and even sort by it before entering, so you don't waste time entering empty rooms. The text chat in PaltalkScene has all of the expected features--you can change your font, color, add bold or italic, and insert all kinds of graphic emoticons from a wide selection. Audio chat is clear and adds a nice dimension to the experience. Video chat is also enabled; you will see who in the room has a camera and you can see it if you wish, but the free version allows only 10 seconds of video in chat rooms. For private one-on-one chat, video is unlimited.

Other functions of PaltalkScene include the creation of groups for your pals, so you can easily send one message to coworkers ("Learning a lot at this conference, will tell you all when I get back.") and one to friends ("It's a good thing this is all on my expense account"). Just don't mix them up. You can easily create rooms, or store sets of your favorite rooms, and so on.

Bottom line? I liked the overall ease of use and setup of rooms and video. It was a trivial matter to do so simply by following the interface. Finding an existing room to join was somewhat hampered by the many dead rooms that cluttered the search results. The advertising and 10-second limit on video in chat rooms were irksome, but the point of most "Free" or "Lite" versions of software is to annoy you into paying for the full thing. The cross-protocol chat feature was my favorite; I really like having one program to use for multiple groups of friends. The free version is definitely worth trying out; if you find a good community you like, upgrading to a paid version may well be justified.

Firefox Home Syncs Your Faves to Your iPhone

Mozilla’s new Firefox Home app for Apple mobiles is now available for download. You can get Firefox Home for the iPhone and iPod Touch in iTunes. It’s a free download.

As we mentioned when we first told you about it, the Firefox Home app is not Firefox on your iPhone. It’s a companion to Firefox.

It securely syncs your bookmarks, browsing history, user preferences and open tabs from the last time you used Firefox, and it brings them down to your iPhone or iPod Touch so you can access that stuff on your mobile. It works in tandem with Firefox Sync, Mozilla’s hosted, cloud-based service that keeps all of your installations of Firefox synced up with one another.

It’s especially welcome now, as most of us use multiple screens every day — one or two computers, and at least one smartphone with a web browser. Firefox Sync tied our work machine and our home machine together by syncing all of our browser data in the cloud, and Firefox Home completes the circuit for iOS users, making all the hard-to-remember stuff — your myriad “starred” favorites and bookmarked URLs — available in your pocket.

Needless to say, this app is only going to be useful to you if you’re a Firefox user with an iPhone or iPod Touch. Android users have had Mozilla’s mobile version of Firefox available on their phones since April.

You also need to have Firefox Sync set up to use it. If you don’t have an account, you can sign up when you install the app on your phone. You will also need the Sync add-on for Firefox (newer versions of Firefox will ship with Sync pre-installed). As Charlie Sorrel notes in his Gadget Lab post, this is a bit more work than syncing your desktop Safari data to your iPhone, which just involves checking a box in iTunes (and you can keep Safari and Firefox in sync — and by extension, the iPhone — using Xmarks, but only on the Mac). Opera’s mobile browsers have easy syncing as well. But unlike those choices, this isn’t a new browser or a half-way-there solution, it’s a direct line to the same browser data that’s on your desktops and laptops.

Once the app is set up, you can search your history, access your Firefox bookmarks and see the tabs you most recently had open when you walked away from your computer. All of this info is accessible from within Firefox Home’s search bar, which is sort of a miniature version of the “Awesome Bar” in Firefox. It will search both page titles and URL strings, and it will auto-suggest results as you type.

Just like using the Awesome Bar in Firefox, everything shows up in a single list as you type, and a little icon shows up next to each item to tell you what sort of result it is — a bookmark, a piece of history, an open tab.

Click on an item and the page opens inside an in-app browser. It’s your standard iOS WebKit browser in a pretty blue wrapper, and it performs about the same as the built-in browser inside other popular apps like Twitter.

So Firefox Home is not Firefox on your iPhone, which is something we’re not ever likely to see. Mozilla’s brass has made it clear that Apple’s app policies are too restrictive for Firefox, and the company doesn’t want to dumb the browser down for the iPhone. For people who use Firefox as their primary browser everywhere else, this app is the next best thing.

You can read Mozilla’s announcement for more links, troubleshooting tips, and feedback channels.

Hands on With the Samsung Galaxy S

Samsung’s making a splash with their new, high-end line of Android ”Galaxy S” handsets. And while they’ve already launched overseas, the US variants with custom enclosures and functionality, started rolling out yesterday:

• Sprint Samsung EPIC 4G
• AT&T Samsung Captivate
• Verizon Samsung Fascinate
• T-Mobile Samsung Vibrant

As part of the launch festivities, I was provided a stock Galaxy S to evaluate. Media outreach and spec sheet highlights have led with Samsung’s 4″ 800 x 480 Super AMOLED screen. And while I initially found it oversaturated, even garish (combined with Samsung’s Touchwiz skinning), I’ve landed somewhere else entirely. In fact, I’ve concluded that the Galaxy S utilizes the most pleasing mobile display I’ve encountered — striking an excellent balance of resolution, size, and vibrancy. The Galaxy S obviously isn’t as high res as Apple’s iPhone 4 pixel-dense “retina display” … but with uncorrected sub-20/20 vision, it’s not like I’ve been bothered by aliasing at 18″. So, ultimately, I find myself in the same camp as Harry:

if all other phone features were equal, I’d take more square inches over more pixels

A common Galaxy S knock has been a plasticy appearance and/or feel. And while the enclosure is indeed plastic, it contributes (positively) to a lightweight feeling device, despite sporting that 4″ display. (And how quickly folks have forgotten iPhone 3GS and 3G’s slippery plastic backside?) There’s no debating that the Samsung’s handset doesn’t pack the same level of materials or symmetry found on the iPhone 4 but, in my week of usage, the Galaxy S has been both comfortable and functional.

Regarding the Galaxy S’s photographic capabilities, I can tell you the handset captures 5 megapixel stills and 720p video. I haven’t shot enough sample content to pass judgement, other than saying quality’s in about the same ballpark as most of the competition. Two other camera notes… The Galaxy S doesn’t incorporate a LED, or other, flash. Which isn’t a problem for me, as a flash-free photographer, but it’s something you may want to consider. Also, my particular unit houses a front-facing camera. But, sadly, I’m unaware of any Market apps which support the feature (yet) and believe only the Sprint model in the US will contain similar.

Like other Android smartphone manufacturers, Samsung aims to enhance the stock ‘droid experience by providing their own skin, other UI customizations, and apps. The latest incarnation of Touchwiz (3.0) is an improvement over its predecessors and it’s definitely grown on me during my period of testing. Yet, there’s still much I prefer from HTC’s SenseUI – specifically in regards to home screen and icon presentation. However, I do quite like Samsung’s dialer and the non-standard (for Android), but more consistant, horizontal app tray cycling.

The Galaxy S also comes preloaded with some Samsung social-esque apps that I’ve mostly ignored, but the wireless hotspot functionality and Swype software certainly got my attention. It’s a safe assumption that the US Galaxy S handsets won’t ship with the infinitely useful wireless access point app (without associated tethering charges), but we know Swype’s being bundled. And it makes for an amazing keyboard replacement app. In addition to tapping out characters, Swype lets you virtually connect the alphabet dots for text entry – and the accuracy is uncanny. Not perfect, but damn good. Check out the demo video at jkOnTheRun to see Swype in action.

Of course, phones are still used for voice communication and I did make a few calls. Audio quality has been fine on both ends and earpiece volume seems louder than my 3GS. While I didn’t get around to testing the speakerphone, the external speaker found on the rear/bottom actually did a decent job streaming Slacker without a headset.

Overall, I’ve quite enjoyed my Samsung Galaxy S review hardware and any of the US models should make for a fine smartphone. But there have been some instances of UI lag which you should be aware of. And I’m not alone in this observation, as the experience has been corroborated by my pals at Slashgear. Given the higher-end hardware specs, including 1 Ghz processor, I imagine it’ll merely be a matter of pushing some software optimizations out – perhaps accompanying the promised Android 2.2 Froyo update later this year.

Atari May Plunder Its Classics for Remakes

Atari’s not the company it used to be — literally, it’s been swallowed up by a succession of larger companies since the 1980s — but it can still milk name recognition and classic video games.

The company, now a wholly-owned subsidiary of Infogrames, is remaking the Atari 2600 classic Haunted House, and a couple of listings on Gamefly suggest that Centipede and Star Raiders remakes could be next.

Given the timing, this wouldn’t surprise me. E3 was crowded with remakes of well-known or in some cases forgotten video game franchises. Fondly remembered games like Goldeneye and NBA Jam are being brought back to life, while franchises that never really went away, such as Sonic the Hedgehog and Mortal Kombat, are going back to their 2D roots. These are safe bets in the midst of a games industry slump. If Atari wants to jump on the nostalgia train, now’s the time.

The difference between Atari’s remakes and the examples I saw at E3 is that Atari’s games are so old, there’s very little to build from. Haunted House could be a great game, but it’s impossible to say whether the remake is faithful to the original, because the original is so primitive. If Star Raiders gets remade, it’ll probably resemble Wing Commander more than anything else.

Basically, I feel the same way about Atari’s games as I do about the upcoming surge of movies based on very old video games. They won’t necessarily be bad, but they’re just blank slates with recognizable names.

Will There Ever Be a Nexus Two?

Google has announced that it’s received its last batch of Nexus One phones. When they’re gone, they’re gone–and since Google announced back in May that it had decided to shutter its online phone store, the company will be ending its experiment in direct sales to the masses when the last N1 goes out the door.

One question which I think remains unanswered: Does the imminent death of the Nexus One signal the end of the concept of the Googlephone–if “Googlephone” is defined as an Android handset for which Google is the maker of record and the sole company responsible for the software experience? When Google decided to wind down direct sales of the phone, it said it would work to sell it through retailers. But I don’t think it ever addressed directly what it intended to do once the Nexus One was discontinued. Will it be content to let phone makers do with Android as they will from now on? Or does it still want the opportunity to make a phone that fits its vision of what an Android handset should be as closely as possible?

What Happens When You Hack the Droid X?

If the Droid X's U.S. launch had just one pockmark, it was the hoopla that transpired when one Android enthusiast declared the phone would become a brick when hacked.

It all started when My Droid World forum admin p3droid declared that a chip called eFuse was triggered to blow when the Droid X's digitally-signed bootloader is tampered with, rendering the phone unusable. Attempts to run custom ROMs on the phone, such as Cyanogen, would likely produce a Motorola-branded doorstop that only the company could fix. MobileCrunch's Devin Coldewey ran with the story, as did other sites, and a debate ensued on whether the phone does, in fact, have a hardware-killing security feature.

So Engadget cleared the air with Motorola, who said the phone is not rigged to blow, but it does go into "Recovery Mode" when booted with unauthorized software. This is for security reasons, and for meeting carrier, partner and legal requirements, Motorola said. Re-installing Motorola-approved software restores the Droid X to normal.

Okay, great. But I think the debate yesterday was misdirected. The problem is not that the Droid X becomes a brick when hacked, but that it cannot be hacked. While the lack of a phone-killing security feature means hackers are at a greater liberty to tinker, they won't get anywhere. Motorola Milestone, the original Droid's overseas sibling, has the same digitally-signed bootloader, and its security measures haven't been broken yet. There are workarounds for loading custom ROMs on the Milestone, but they are difficult to perform, and there are other drawbacks, as explained by TheUnlockr.

Any tech topic with the word "brick" in it makes for a better headline, but I'd rather see the discussion focus on why Motorola doesn't want its users hacking the Droid X, rather than what nasty things will happen to the phone if they do.