Under: The Influence

I got it to work without help from the techie; I’m so proud of myself.

Pinnacle Systems http://www.pinnaclesys.com/PublicSite/us/Support/Consumer+Support/?viewDownload=1downl has a download for the PCTV HD Ultimate Stick.

In my office, I prefer the PCTV HD Card, but there’s no denying the appeal of a grab-and-go laptop and small antenna rig for accessing TV stations in the Boonies and Beyond. Some quick research tells me I could check weather reports in China. If I ever got there… if I spoke Chinese…, I just couldn’t recharge the laptop from a hotel electrical outlet; wrong voltage, boom! I don’t think a surge protector would help that one. Well, it might. Once.

Funny stuff aside, the weather’s getting positively weird, so TV programs and warnings could be vital. There won’t always be internet access. Pinnacle Systems’ nifty little stick won’t add much weight to the luggage. Take it along.

by Brian Underdahl

MP3 players, iPods, and fancy Smartphones make it easy to listen to your music on the go. Given the choice almost anyone would rather listen to some “good” music (no matter how you personally define that) than to some bozo who wants everyone within 25 feet to hear about his inane ideas regarding politics, religion, sports, or whatever. And even if you’re in a no-bozo zone, who wants to listen to the constant din of an airplane, train, or whatever background noise there happens to be?

But there’s just one problem with listening to your portable music player. Could headset wires possibly be any more inconvenient? They’re always in the way or catching on something, plus they make you look pretty strange, too.

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by Brian Underdahl

A few months ago I tried out the Jawbone Bluetooth headset and loved it. The unit was sleek, it worked great, and the sound quality was wonderful. It was hard to imagine any way to improve it. Boy, was I wrong!

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by Brian Underdahl

Well, it’s getting close once again to gift giving season so naturally people start looking for goodies like digital cameras. But if you’ve tried this recently you’ve probably discovered that choosing a digital camera can be awfully difficult. There are so many choices and unless you spend all of your time on the subject it almost seems impossible to figure out what to buy. I’m going to try and give you a little help.

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by Brian Underdahl

There are times when we take a bit longer to test some of the products we receive here at Under: The Influence. Sometimes it’s a matter of being swamped with projects, but other times it’s because we have a semi-diabolical plot in mind. That is, some products simply deserve to be tested by our most critical testers. Sure, that sounds a little mean, but if a product survives that level of scrutiny you can be sure that it will work well for the ordinary user. I’m happy to say that the Pinnacle Video Transfer not only survived but it even earned the respect of our toughest tester.

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by Brian Underdahl

Who ever has enough storage? Your PC probably doesn’t. That’s why external hard drives are so popular–they’re an easy way to add some additional storage without digging into your PC. I just added a new external drive using the Zonet ZNS8010 3.5″ USB SATA enclosure and it couldn’t be easier.

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by Brian Underdahl

Some years ago we signed up for a long distance plan with our local phone company and at first we were happy with the plan. But you probably know the drill. Sure, it started out fine at $3 per month and 3 cents per minute, but the phone company wasn’t happy with that level of profit (come on, how much does it REALLY cost the phone company for the minutes?).

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by Brian Underdahl

Our Internet connection comes in one end of the house and through some wired and wireless connections, reaches each of our PCs. But our entertainment center is at the opposite end of the house where it’s not really convenient to run a network cable. Sound familiar? Needless to say, this was going to make it hard to get a good Internet connection for things like downloading movies and using interactive content on the media center. Wireless was good enough for audio-only uses, but video was going to take a whole lot more.

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by Brian Underdahl

Let’s face it–none of us is getting any younger. After writing over 70 books I’ve spent a lot of time at the keyboard and sometimes it can feel like I did all of it by hand. My hands and wrists can certainly tell you that they’ve spent many hours typing. Fortunately, I’ve found a product that’s designed to reduce the damage which can be caused by constant keyboard work.

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by Brian Underdahl

Every now and then something comes along that really changes how people do something. One of those changes is happening right now in the form of Internet radio. Why is this such a big change? It’s simple, really. Internet radio lets you listen to what you want–not what your local radio station manager (or more likely, the program pusher at some big media conglomerate) wants to throw your way.

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