Category Archives: Ask J.D.

uTorrent vs Transmission on Mac OSX Lion

Well, I bought a Mac. Specifically a MacBook Air 11.6″ notebook. It is the best ultralight travel computer I could find. I had known the MacBook Airs were good little computers for quite some time, but after they did away with the backlit keyboard a while back I scratched them off of my “short list” of top notebook. Well, they re-added the backlit keyboard and they also put in some spicy new CPUs and nice big SSD options. So I

Cheap tech gear for telecommuting jobs in Colorado

Mountains and wildflowers diagonal

Colorado is a wonderful state to visit for business or pleasure. This summer my wife and I will be spending almost a month there. We have a housesitter for home and will be staying at a cabin at 10,500 ft. For the portion of the stay where I’ll be working (telecommuting) I have tried out a variety of hardware and software for the job. If you are thinking about telecommuting from Colorao, this post illustrates a surprisingly capable telecommuting setup

Auto fill username & password in Opera? [solved]

Q. I use Opera as my new web browser. But when I tell Opera to save my username and password for a site it does not seem to do. Like now when I go to the site it does NOT autofill the stored info. It does not even prompt me to save anymore login info for that site anymore. Can you help?! A. Yes! In all likelihood Opera did save your login info, however, to autofill that info you need

What is the latest Kindle firmware version? [answer] for all generations

Q. Hiya. I see on my Kindle “Settings->Device Info” screen that my Kindle has “Software Version” Kindle 2.5.5 Is there a later firmware version for my Kindle?! Thx in advance. A. Yes! There are later firmware versions available.  The LATEST version depends on which Kindle you have. Judging from the info you provided, you have either a 2nd gen Kindle or a Kindle DX so version 2.5.8 is the latest version for your devices. Also here is the latest firmware

Info on the dreaded “not charging” iPad and iPad 2 screen + solutions

Simple tips for charging the iPad via USB | Digiupdateshttp://digiupdates.com/2011/simple-tips-for-charging-the-ipad-via-usb/What we found in all of our test is that although the iPad might say “not charging€ on the display, in reality, juice is still trickling to it and the iPad is in actuality still charging; albeit at a slower rate. No wonder: The iPad is designed to charge from the 10-watt wall adapter it comes bundled with, but many USB ports supply only 2.5 watts (5 volts at 500ma). As

Bought & Sold: Olympus E-P1 – 12.3 MP Digital Camera & 14-42mm lens

Introducing: Bought & Sold This entry marks a new feature on jdhodges.com: Bought & Sold Here I will list items that I purchased and then sold at a later date. Simple enough huh? Here we go… First item: Olympus E-P1 12.3 MP & 14-42mm kit lens This was my second Micro Four Thirds based camera and it was quite a lovely little camera. 🙂 Purchase date: 2009.06.16 Purchase price: $799.99 (from Amazon.com) Sale date: May 27th, 2011 Sale price: $320.00 Owned for:

The best dynamic-range cameras, updated for 2013

P1010169-dynamic-range

NOTE: this is a rough-draft and as such it is meant to be updated, please view these findings as preliminary and in progress. Thanks! As photography enthusiasts are well aware,  there are a number of image-quality criteria that are important when choosing a camera: +lens/optical quality +color fidelity and color vibrance +dynamic range I will save the first two for later, but today I did want to briefly discuss dynamic-range and start compiling a list of the best d-range cameras:

Does amount of RAM (size) affect hibernation time? [yes]

Today some laptops, such as the Dell M6500, can have up to 32GB of RAM! (4 sticks of 8GB DDR3) Drawbacks of more RAM However, before you load up your laptop with as much RAM as it can hold, there are some potential drawbacks to more RAM that you may want to consider: #1 Slower hibernation times – if you use the “hibernate” feature of Windows, be aware that the more RAM you have, the longer hibernation will take. Related: