Technology Guides

Cellphone plans are tricky and half of us don’t even look at our bill. We just pay it, not knowing they are over charging us or that it was possible to get Caller ID for free. This post details some sure fire ways to get a deal on your current plan or a future plan. I myself am trying to wring out a new plan from one of the carriers and I have learned some lessons along the way and I am still learning new information.

Current Plan Owners

• Ask to Cancel – Even though you do not have the slightest inclination to cancel, call in to your respective carrier and just ask how much it will cost to cancel. I did that just to figure out the cost because I was curious, knowing full well that the price tag was going to be outrageous ($350) but as soon as they quote you, they’ll ask if you want to speak to a Customer Service Representative (herein referred to as CSR). Say yes and then just wait till they offer you concessions. Mine was free Caller ID for a year (worth $7) because I was such a loyal customer (almost 3 years).
• Retention Plan – When you are ready for an upgrade or your contract is up for renewal, a lot of carriers are willing to cut you a deal for staying along for the ride. This can be in the form of a price discount or more features. Whatever the case may be, wait until the last week or so for them to call you. If they don’t call, they may not love you enough or they forgot, so give them a shout and try to get an idea of what they’re willing to offer. Usually the first time may not garner you the best offer so try again later. One tip I have heard is to almost play dumb and pray for a woman to pick up (they’re usually more willing to offer you something). When I say play dumb, I mean act like you do not know the features out there but say you call your parents a lot so it would be nice not to worry about cost. From there they’ll offer you a discounted LD plan. This advice is very arbitrary and it all depends on what you’re looking for but hopefully it’s a starting point.

New Activations

• Compare to a Comparable Carrier – That’s a lot of C’s in that phrase but you get the point. In Canada at least, none of the Big 3 will flinch if you mention you’re moving to one of the new carriers because they know they can’t match it. Mention that another one of the Big 3 carriers is offering Caller ID/VM in their plan. Half the time they’ll match it and half the time they won’t. If they don’t, call back and try again. Once you get the plan you’re looking for, take down the CSR’s name, extension and the final plan details because when you go to activate the phone you may not get the same person so it’s nice to have proof. I have heard countless stories of people getting a good deal through a CSR, going in-store and getting burned.
• Wait – Many people jump at the newest phone and just sign a new contract but half the time, a better plan is waiting around the corner. The two best times to get a plan is during the Back-to-School and Christmas season.

Using Websites

• MyCellMyTerms- I’m putting this at the top because it is turning out to be an amazing website. It’s absolutely free to the consumer and you lose nothing. I first heard about this type of business model in regards to car buying but it can be applied anywhere else. Basically how the site works is, a prospective buyer outlines their desired plan with either one of their pre-made plans or a plan you design yourself. This includes the minutes, data, texting and any other features. The website then submits your proposal to its network of dealers and you just wait for offers to come your way. I signed up last night, got an offer within two hours (which I countered) and then a counter offer the next morning. If you decide to close on a deal, the customer doesn’t pay a cent; the dealer who connected the wireless carrier with you, will pay a commission to the website. CANADA ONLY (Select provinces for now)

Update: I have now received four offers as of August 4th, 2011 which is less than 3 days since I posted my ideal cellphone plan. The best offer I’ve gotten is from a dealer associated with Bell. The offer is at the bottom and I have just countered it so we’ll see what comes back. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 5% [?]

I have yet to order my Apple MacBook Pro but I have already ordered all the accessories that I could possibly want. This post is all about my recommended products that you should get for your Apple MacBook.

1. MacBook Skins

If you buy a Mac, it looks exactly the same as anyone else who bought a Mac. On the other hand, if you buy a PC, there’s a much better chance that your PC will not be the same as the PC next to you. That is why I highly recommend getting some sort of skin for your MacBook/Pro. I went to MacStyles for one reason, and one reason only, because it had skins that left the Apple sign alone. They also offer MacTatts which is what I bought (pictured below) that offers more intricate designs than MacStyles. MacStyles are $20 and MacTatts are $30 and can be bought at MacStyles.

2. InvisibleSHIELDS

I usually end up scratching or doing something to ruin my gadgets so I’m glad I found this site earlier rather than later because these clear shields as mentioned above can help preserve your gadget. Zagg offers invisibleSHIELDS that protect the bottom, front and side of your laptop. It has a lifetime warranty so if it does wear or scratch you can get a free replacement. You can also customize the front part of the laptop with one of their designs or one of your own. For a non-customized clear version, it costs $55 but to customize it you’ll have to fork over $65. Luckily at the time of this writing they were offering a 50% off coupon if you entered their contest and considering they’ve sold over 7 million of these for various gadgets like the iPhone 4, it was definitely worth the shot.

3. Cooling Pad/Laptop Stand

I own both and they both do serve slightly different purposes but in the end the main reason you buy it, is so your laptop doesn’t overheat. The extra use for the laptop stand is so you can have your keyboard at an ergonomic angle. I bought  a cooling stand from Targus costing me $25. Unlike most cooling pads that just suck out the hot air, this actually forces cool air into the MacBook.

4. USB Hub

One of the big drawbacks of a MacBook is there are very few USB hubs, 2, and most of my friends find they need more. So I purchased a 4 USB Hub from Targus ($10) so I can now use my cooling pad, mouse, external hard drive and a friends USB key for exchanging files all at once.

5. Keyboard Protector

I know all of you once in your lifetime have eaten or drunk with your laptop or desktop within reach so each and every one of you has taken the risk of ruining your laptop keyboard, me included. That’s why I looked around for a keyboard protector and the best deal I found was at iSkin. They have various designs including the basic clear design. For $25 it’s a huge asset because any muck in your keyboard can ruin it for your life.

Popularity: 40% [?]

While many of you looking here on Technology Guides might be used to the usual and typical posts of how to improve the efficiency and performance of your computer, I thought I’d write a post about what digital DJ sets consist of and what all the different components do.

My name is BMO and I’m doing a guest post from Early Mixologists. I am part of a group of DJ’s who have recently been spending quite a while building up our own DJ sets.  If you’re anything like me, you probably have the stereotypical perception of what a DJ set consists of (i.e. turntables, mixer, amplifier, and speakers).  While this is not really incorrect; today there are a wide variety of options for DJ equipment.  In this post I’m going to be talking about all the DJ setups that revolve around the use of a laptop or desktop.

Before I begin talking about the setups I want to explain that in all of these setups the mixer is used as a medium from which DJs will transition from a song on one deck to the song playing on the opposite deck to create a continuous flow of music.  In almost all cases the mixer is from which the main music output is sent to an amplifier or powered speaker.  You can use an amplifier to send amplified signals of music to non-amplified speakers, or you can send non-amplified music signals directly to powered speakers and altogether skip on using an amplifier, but for information on this it is recommended you do some research on the internet.

The Turntable Setup:

2 turntables

1 Mixer

1 USB soundcard

1 Laptop/ Desktop

*headphones recommended.

Turntables are the original DJ music players.  From Grand Wizard Theodore to Grandmaster Flash, turntables are the preferred choice for hip-hop DJs.  They offer a very nice feel since all the buttons and music tables are very large and easy to control.  Using a laptop has even made turntable Djing portable since now music can all be stored on one, instead of having to bring crates upon crates of vinyl just to dig through them to get at the song you want to play.

The turntables can be connected to a USB soundcard such as the Native Instruments Audio 8 DJ, combined with special time coded vinyl and RCA jacks it is possible to manipulate music on your computer as if it was being played directly on your turntable as a vinyl.  Programs that are recommendable for this are: Serato Scratch Live (this is the one that started it all), and Traktor Scratch Pro (My personal favourite).  Just to note, all the equipment needed for this such as the time coded vinyl, soundcard, and cables come packaged together with both of the programs mentioned above.

Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 33% [?]

Everyone has dealt with this problem sometime or another and I know I have dealt with it more than once. The question is, how do you deal with it? I’ve also been on both sides where a citizen has taken their anger out on me, a helpless servant to the town. There are two general ways you can deal with the situation as a consumer: get really angry which is the natural option or you can try and negotiate a compromise of some sort. I’ve tried both and found that the latter is the best option.

Getting Angry

Many people, including me, like to take this approach because it’s the most natural thing to do. You receive poor customer service and by taking that anger out on someone in the company you feel that you are getting something accomplished. In my experience what happens is the customer service rep shuts down and is taught to try and mediate it by calming you down and if that doesn’t work they’ll hang up. Therefore nothing is accomplished on both sides; you don’t benefit and the company just logs another angry caller.  Occasionally, something will come out of it but it’s too rare to be noticeable.

My experience came back in 2009 when I had problems with my Hewlett-Packard (HP) laptop and so I went to their online help as it is much quicker. They gave me advice, I was supposedly happy and then after rebooting my computer wouldn’t start up. Since I couldn’t log onto the internet I couldn’t receive more help on the issue, I decided to call them up. Turns out they wouldn’t help me because my phone support had expired. I got really angry because they gave me advice and wouldn’t take responsibility for it. I eventually hung up on the representative even after I asked to speak to the manager and nothing got resolved.

Be Calm and Come to a Compromise

This is the approach I highly recommend if you want something out of the poor customer service. The keys to this approach is be calm, explain your side and in the back of your mind realize that sometimes it’s not the fault of the customer service representative. Many good things can come from this and I’ve only had success while using this approach.

My experience came on Canadian Thanksgiving 2009 when I lost my SIM card (don’t ask why ) and so I went and replaced it. I phoned up Fido, registered my new card and cycled down my phone. As soon as I got it up and running I had a different account. Not only that but someone else had my account. Obviously I was ticked off as the representative told me to get a new SIM card on them. When I went to get it at the store they said they weren’t authorized to do it. So I called them back and they changed their story saying I had to get it shipped and wait another week and I couldn’t switch back to my old account but I could use this account all I wanted to. The next day rolls around and I go to make a call, lo and behold, I can’t because my account has been canceled. Now this is where I get really pissed but luckily my brother was there to give me advice. Here I put the second approach into action. I called them up again and they told me to go to the nearest Fido store and register a new SIM card and it would be credited (don’t know why they didn’t suggest this before). Once I was up and running I called them up and followed these steps.

1. Explain your situation and in my case highlight the fact that you’ve lost x number of hours (or days),
2. Be calm and never blame or take your anger out on the representative because it’s not their fault, and;
3. Tell them you deserve better and want something in return for your inconvenience.

In my case I got a $12 add-on for my inconvenience and at the end of the day, just making them realize they screwed up and needed to make things right was all I needed.

Hopefully these tips help you next time you receive poor customer service or get a product that stops working.

Popularity: 21% [?]

Many people know how to make your own ringtone for the Apple iPhone when you have a Mac. You just use GarageBand by adding a song and clicking Share–>Share as Ringtone and voila, your done, but for Windows users it’s a little harder but still very simple. This little tutorial will help you create a free ringtone in less than 2 minutes.

Step 1

Firstly, open iTunes and select the song (preferably mp3) you want to use as your ring tone. Pick your favourite part because the ring tone is only allowed to be a max of 30 seconds. Once you’ve found the part you like, right-click the song and click Get Info. For this tutorial I have used Ghosts N Stuff by Deadmau5 featuring Rob Swire.

Step 2

Now hit the Options tab and check off “Start” and “Finish” and enter the section you want the ringtone to be.

Step 3

Once that’s done, you can go ahead and start converting the file. Right-click the song and select Create AAC Version. If you can’t see this option, go to Edit–>Preferences–>Import Settings and make sure AAC Encoder is chosen.

Step 4

iTunes will now start converting the song, but only the snippet that you selected for your ringtone. Next step is to go to the file location of this new file. It usually will be in My Music–>iTunes–>iTunes Media–>Music. Once there you’ll want to rename your file so iTunes recognizes it as a ringtone. Right-click the file and hit rename, changing the file extension to m4r. If you can’t see the file extension, you’ll want to go to Tools–>Folder Options–>View (tab) and scroll down to Advanced Settings. Uncheck, Hide extensions for known file types.

Step 5

Once it’s renamed, you can import it your iTunes library and then sync it to your iPhone. Just remember when you sync it to check off Ringtones and you’re good to go.

Popularity: 27% [?]

I was sitting in my dorm room watching the latest episode of How I Met Your Mother, which by the way was amazing, when my friend came in and asked if I could help him install a third-party Windows 7 Theme. Now I have never actually done it myself but it seemed easy enough. My friend explained the instructions seemed complicated but here’s a dumb downed version that should be easy for the everyday computer to understand.

Step 1

Download Universal Theme Patcher and run the application that matches up with your operating system, either x86 (32 bit) or  x64 (64 bit). To check this go to Computer–>System Properties. Under the System heading will be your system type.

Once you run the correct version, you’ll see a screen like this. Now manually patch all three files. A backup of each file will be made so don’t worry if something goes wrong, you’ll have the original files.

After you’ve done this you’ll be asked to reboot. Once you have rebooted, you’ll be ready to move on to Step 2.

Step 2

The reason you’ve decided to load a new theme is most likely that you saw a crazy theme that you just loved and wanted to embark on the journey of installing it. If not, there are some great sites that offer like the ones at Addictive Tips (Remember to save it and not open it). Once you’ve got your new theme saved on your computer, extract it to C:\Windows\Resources\Themes.

Step 3

Now make your way to Control Panel–>Personalization and select your newly installed theme. Voila, you’re done.

Update: Some people have made it easy to install Windows 7 Themes and one of those happens to be one of my favourite themes. Smashing Magazine makes a post of desktop wallpapers for the current month. Someone else just took those wallpapers and made a theme. Check it out, Smashing Magazine January 2010 Windows 7 Theme because I am loving it.

Popularity: 22% [?]

Everyone knows that we are in a recession at the moment and spending is coming to a halt. Although we are seeing signs of a climb back to prosperity, we all really need to think long and hard about our spending habits. Maybe you talk a lot on your cell phone when you’re at home, or you never look for good deals when buying stuff. It seems we all have room for improvement and I’m here to give you some tips on how you can put some extra money in your pocket.

First off I’d like to talk about one of our most prized possessions. No, not your significant other, I’m talking about your cell phone. It’s been there through thick and thin and it’s always helped you connect to your friends and loved ones. But how much is it taking from your wallet? Sometimes it seems too much. Well you have two options if this is true. If you are at the end of your contract you can look for a new, more value based contract that suits you better. Or, like me, you have a contract that you signed that isn’t going to end anytime soon and you’d like to get out of it without paying any extra fees. I have solutions to both those problems right here.

Someone Without/Almost Expiring Contract

If you have the luxury of being able to choose a brand new contract you’re in luck because right about now in Canada, more than 3 new companies are going to be offering new cellphone services such as DAVE, Public Mobile and Globalive. This will bring lower prices and different plans so personally I’d wait till they start releasing their plans which would be around the 2nd half of 2009. If you’re an eager beaver and can’t wait then there is a wonderful site dedicated to helping you find the best plan suited for you. Granted this site is for the U.S. only but it is still a good tool. First off it’s not only for cell phones but it’s also for gas and credit cards but we’ll get to that later.
The cellphone aspect of this website deals with you entering in your monthly usage by either estimating or by importing your bill. On top of this it asks for your zip code so it can find local deals. With all this information it gives you a result for the best deal in your area from all of the carriers in the United States. While BillShrink didn’t find me a good deal in the area, it doesn’t mean it won’t for you. I have an Employee Pricing Plan so I have a good deal to start with but you might not be as lucky so it’s worth a shot.

Someone Still in a Contract

This section is applicable to Canadians, Americans, Australians and the good old English. If you are someone in the unlucky position of still having a contract for a good chunk of time like me (I have 2 years left on my plan) then you have a savior. CellSwapper is a site dedicated to helping people like you and I find people who want to take over our contract in exchange for theirs. You just list your plan details and any incentives you’d like to give so people will more likely exchange plans with you and then you post. All you do is wait until a good offer comes up and you can message people and discuss ways you can work out a deal. I got an offer but turned it down because it wasn’t what I was looking for but it was a great experience and I highly recommend it.

Coupons

When shopping online it’s always good to try and get a deal when you can. That’s why I always search on Google to find any coupons that might be offered. One of the popular ones is RetailMeNot. They even have a Canadian version of RetailMeNot. There are numerous other ones including:

Current Codes
Coupon Cabin
Coupon Mom
Fat Wallet
Coupons
Coupon Code
Coupon Chief
Deal Catcher

Save on Gas

Gas is not as expensive as it was during the Summer of 2008 but it’s still up there and it’s important to be able to save every dollar that you can. That’s where GasBuddy comes in. It is a network of numerous local sites that you can go to, to look up gas prices in your area. Users update gas prices constantly so you usually get the most up to date price. If you live in Ontario, we are even more lucky because we have someone who will tell us the price of gas for the coming week at Tomorrow’s Gas Prices, Today. If you know of any other state or province that does this, please let me know.

Popularity: 6% [?]

My friend told me of a problem she had with her Apple iPod. It froze and she couldn’t reset it via her computer. Now this usually works for most iPod users but there are times when the basics don’t seem to fix anything. I researched and researched and the simplest thing came up. Recharge your iPod because that might be the reason it won’t hook up to your computer. You may have to leave it in the wall outlet for some time before you can start using it again. When you plug it in to your computer again, make sure you have the latest version of iTunes to speed up the process.

There are other methods which include actually opening up your Apple iPod but I won’t go there as I’m not fully aware of what you should do so I recommend reading this CrunchGear Article to learn more and let me say; if you have to resort to this, I am praying for you.

My suggestion though is if you the two options above don’t work (i.e. reseting your iPod on iTunes or charging it for a while) then you should really consider sending it to Apple or wherever you bought it so they can take care of it. Hopefully it won’t too long to get your baby back.

Popularity: 5% [?]