How-To - Tested

How To Rip All Your Photos and Documents Off the Cloud by Matthew Braga on June 4, 2010 9 Comments

The cloud is this magical place where files never die. We put our photos, our videos, our entire lives into this digital land in the hopes that they'll live on forever, untouched by fire or folly or other catastrophic acts. It's convenient, and it gives us the peace of mind that our data is safe. But have you ever actually tried to pull your files back down from the cloud? It isn't fun, and in some cases, it's downright impossible.

The cloud, you see, isn't a two way street. It's great for saving, and great for sharing, but sucks at returning what's yours. This doesn't sit well with everyone of course; Flickr, Twitter and even Google Docs are, in essence, keeping your data in digital limbo, and getting it back is no easy feat. Luckily, some enterprising developers know your pain. If you spend as much time as we do uploading your life online, there should be a way to recover that data too. And now there is.

How To Keep Your Data Up-to-Date with Elegant Sync Solutions by Matthew Braga on June 3, 2010 5 Comments

These days, you can start reading an article on your iPad, add a comment from your phone, and then re-tweet the whole thing from your laptop. Everything is connected — and that's damn scary. But it's also kind of cool, and brings a new level of connectivity to all your digital devices. Where syncing was once a two-way operation — between a device and a computer — it's now grown to encompass almost anything with a connection online, pushing data in any number of directions, to any device we choose.

5 Practical Steps to Instantly Better Mac OS X Performance by Matthew Braga on May 31, 2010 22 Comments

Mac's just work, or so we're told. People repeat that phrase like it's a mantra, or a chant, as if their unflinching belief is the only thing keeping their computer alive. But OS X is not infallible, and like the worst Windows PC, it comes with its own share of quirks and problems. Poorly written applications, hidden files, and performance degradation are problems not inherent to the PC world, but totally possible on Macs as well.

But if there's one failing of OS X, it's that when there's a problem, it's hidden well. You're never told that your disk permissions are hopelessly broken, or that maintenance has never been preformed. Your Mac keeps you in the dark, until that fateful day upon which you simply can't boot. But let's peel back the curtain, shall we? We have a bit of advice that you can use to make OS X run faster, smoother, and problem-free.

How To Take Old School Photographs with Pinhole Cameras by Matthew Braga on May 27, 2010 12 Comments

At first glance, a pinhole camera seems to defy logic. The concept of a minuscule hole on a piece of black cardboard capturing images similar to our digital cameras or SLRs sounds impossible. But there's no magic involved here — pinhole photography is the most basic of all camera designs, and once you understand how light and apertures work, it actually starts to make sense.

one of your own.

How To Take Apart a Nintendo DSi XL

by on May 25, 2010 33 Comments

Will guts a Nintendo DSi and masterfully reassembles it. But does it still work?

How To Tweak Your Movies with Awesome Video Effects by Matthew Braga on May 25, 2010 11 Comments

If you're not using VLC by now, you're seriously missing out. The versatile media player can handle nearly anything you throw at it, from the most popular codecs to obscure of standards. Not only is it fast, and cross-platform, but VLC also has some of the coolest real-time video effects of any player out there. Some are useless, and some are just plain cool, but we swear you'll never look at your videos the same again.

How To Enable Motion Interpolation on Your Movie Files by Matthew Braga on May 24, 2010 55 Comments

We here at Tested know that motion smoothing televisions aren't for everyone. In last week's article on frame interpolation, a number of you made it very clear that the technology just didn't look good on the HDTVs you viewed, and often left source material looking fake and unrealistic (the "soap opera" effect). Ouch. But for all the hate, there's bound to be a few fans amongst the Tested community. As it turns out, you don't need a fancy 120Hz television to smooth out your films — any old computer monitor will do.

5 Fast and Easy BlackBerry Speed Tips to Do Right Now by Matthew Braga on May 21, 2010 12 Comments

Now is not a good time to be a BlackBerry owner. The OS is dated, the devices unimpressive, and a barrage of iPhone, Android and Windows 7 phones are ready to trounce past RIM within the next few months. But perhaps you're stuck with your BlackBerry; even worse, you could be a Canadian with a three-year contract, so here's to making the best of a bad situation. Your phone might be slow and aging, but we have a few quick tips to jumpstart your BlackBerry's performance, maximizing speed and stability until your next handset upgrade.

6 Pieces of Everyday Tech that Put Your Privacy at Risk by Matthew Braga on May 20, 2010 13 Comments

The common photocopier is a docile creature, stationed faithfully in offices across the world. It scans, it copies and exists to do our bidding — but like all machines, it has something far more sinister planned for us. Hidden deep within its inky bowels are more than just springs and sprockets, but a complete archival history of every document that's ever passed through it's feed. It knows our secrets, and with a little bit of work, everyone else can too.

CBS News report, photocopiers produced in the past few years have started to rely on hard drives for copying and scanning tasks. Medical records, social security numbers and that Dial-a-Joke bill you racked up aren't just reproduced, but stored indefinitely in the copier's bowels. It's a trivial task to remove that hard drive and extract all the potentially damning info within. It almost makes you wonder, what other sinister technology is storing more information than we care to share?

3 Important Things You Should Know about Steam for Mac by Matthew Braga on May 20, 2010 22 Comments

It's always fun to tell die hard console gamers that Halo was almost exclusively released for the Mac. Bungie, the game's developer, had even demoed the game to excited journalists at Macworld 1999, before being bought by Microsoft the following year. Development was shifted to the Xbox, the Mac engine killed, and the rest is history. Considering Halo's popularity, it's always curious to think what would have happened if the original plan stayed intact. After all, Mac gaming is an oxymoron for many, a reoccurring joke in a long-running sitcom. For a very short time, things could have been different. These days, however, Apple is estimated to hold just 10 per cent of the personal computing market share — a demographic hardly large enough to entice most big name developers.

The keyword, however, is most, because now we have Valve. Developer of the wildly successful digital distribution platform Steam, Valve has sworn to do what few others would — treat the Mac as a first-tier gaming platform. With a growing library of first and third party games, Steam might just be the answer to the Mac gaming conundrum.

Tested: Easy Tweaks to Expand Your Wi-Fi Coverage

by on May 19, 2010 11 Comments

There's only one room in Will's house that his router's Wi-Fi can't reach. Let's fix that.

Make Sense of Your Router and Local Network Settings by Paul Lilly on May 18, 2010 13 Comments

Quick, define the following: Default gateway, MAC address, and subnet mask. Didn't get all three right? That's OK. Even for seasoned vets who can build a PC blindfolded, networking often ends up being their Achilles Heel, the one area that manages to perplex and frustrate computer users of all skill levels. Blame it on the quirky terminology (Hint: a MAC address has nothing to do with Apple) or a fear of the unknown, but whatever the reason, today is the day you take that first step towards becoming a networking guru. In the following days and weeks, we'll be posting several networking related guides, but you have to walk before you can run, Johnny.

How To Use an Old Router to Expand Your Wi-Fi Network by Will Smith on May 18, 2010 32 Comments

So, you just upgraded your old Wi-Fi router to a shiny new model and you're reveling in speedier wireless transfers. But what should you do with the old router? While you could install a third-party firmware on it, then upgrade it for use as a bridge, that's a big pain in the ass and the performance will only be as good as your old router is capable of. If you're upgrading your router from 802.11g to 802.11n, the bridge will be limited to 802.11g speeds.

So, what to do with the old router? I've converted it to an access point, and am using it to fill a dead spot, in the furthest corner of my house. By flipping a few settings, you can turn pretty much any router into an AP, you don't even need to install any fancy third-party firmware. All you need to get started is an old router and a connection to your new router--it can be old-school wired Ethernet or you can use powerline networks to bridge the wireless divide. (We'll have more on powerline networks later this week.)

How To Find Your Nearest Cell Phone Tower for Fun and Profit by Paul Lilly on May 17, 2010 7 Comments

Every major wireless carrier now offers nationwide coverage, but that doesn't mean all telcos are created equal. When you start breaking down coverage maps to different geographic locations, the difference can be night and day, especially the further away you get from major cities like Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco, to name just a few. It all depends on where the cell phone towers are located, and if your carrier isn't invested in your particular area, you're going to find yourself bitching and moaning throughout the course of your two-year service agreement.

How To Make Awesome Wallpapers Using Free Vector Tools by Matthew Braga on May 14, 2010 61 Comments

Face it, you've been using the same desktop wallpaper for years. The one with the grass and the hills and deep blue sky. Maybe you've become so accustomed to XP's default screen that you've moved the image to your OS X and Linux installs as well. But no more! Sure, there's a wealth of awesome wallpaper scattered across the internet, but we're going to do you one better. In less than five minutes you can turn any image into awesome wallpaper of your own, all thanks to the magic of vectors.

bitmapped. In other words, these are images of fixed size, made up of a specific number of pixels. Each pixel is assigned a color value, which is what gives your pictures and photographs such a great level of detail — to an extent. There's only so much you can zoom in on a bitmapped image before pixelation occurs. Vector images, however, are not fixed in size. They're simply geometric shapes, or math equations, that define how a given image should look, and thus, can be scaled to dimensions of infinite size. This is great for making wallpapers, because it means we can adapt our images to any resolution we wish, even for multi-monitor setups.

How To Automatically Tag Your Movies with Useful Metadata by Will Greenwald on May 14, 2010 12 Comments

We’re all familiar with meta-data in music. MP3s have information coded into them that lets your media player of choice organize them by album, artist, genre, and several other characteristics. Movie files can have meta-data, too; MP4 movie files can hold information that media players can use to organize them easier as well. Videos purchased over online stores like iTunes automatically include metadata, but if you want to rip your own DVDs and organize them nice and neat on your hard drive, you have to do it yourself. Tagging movies may seem unnecessary, but it's actually extremely useful if you want to move those movies onto a mobile media player like the iPad. Metadata not only helps you sort your videos, but includes relevant information like a plot synopsis, film credits, and even a poster thumbnail.

Metadata includes movie posters that show up in the iPad.

Windows and Mac OS. We'll walk you through the tagging steps for the Windows version of the software, but the process is similar for both versions.

The Best Places on the Web to Host Your Photos and Blogs by Matthew Braga on May 13, 2010 9 Comments

When the internet is described as a virtual wild west, it's not far from the truth. The online world is a lawless domain, where everything from Commander Riker to human Tetris have a home. Creating your own niche online is as easy as its ever been, and these days, you don't even need to know how to code. Photos, videos and writing can all be hosted on any number of services, and when combined, can make a conventional website obsolete.

Curiously Hackable: 8 Awesome Altoids Tin Hacks by Paul Lilly on May 11, 2010 17 Comments

MacGyver could fashion all kinds of contraptions out of bubble gum wrappers, tree bark, and other nearby objects, which he did through seven seasons of crime solving, but one thing he never made was a custom USB key out of an Altoids tin. Come to think if it, he didn't do much of anything with Altoids, but the same can't be said for creative modders in more recent times. In fact, the Altoids tin has become an icon for D-I-Y culture. Its low cost, malleable yet sturdy frame, and pocket-able size makes it the ideal housing for small electronics.

How To Best Utilize Your External USB Hard Drives by Matthew Braga on May 11, 2010 13 Comments

When it comes to storage, laptops have historically been second-rate citizens. Minuscule hard drives and slow transfer technology often plagued road warriors of old in comparison to their faster desktop counterparts. With the rise of desktop replacements, that's begun to change, but many users are still left counting their gigabytes. The solution for most lies with the purchase of an external drive, or even a spacious flash stick; the question is, how do you use all that extra space effectively?

External drives are more than just a file dump, or an extension to your current space needs. Used right, they can actually give your laptop a bit of a speed boost, and change the way you use your computer for the better — without going low on storage.

10 Essential Tricks for Clutter-free Cable Management by Matthew Braga on May 10, 2010 11 Comments

There's nothing worse than having a cable-sized Cthulu living beneath your desk. Keyboard, mice and speaker cords all have a tendency to tangle, and there will come a time when you need to sort things out. So why not stop the madness before it begins? No one likes a messy desk, and if there's one thing we've taught you, your cables might not either. A tangled mess of cables on your desk is a ticking time bomb. The heat around your electronics draws dust close, which tends to get caught around cables. Over time, as you add more power and data cables for your new peripherals, phones, and external hard drives, your desk transforms into something that looks like a filthy snake pit. Visualize that for a second. Worse yet, when it's time to swap out your devices, unraveling this intertwined mess is an absolute nightmare.