2012年6月6日星期三

The Ultimate Disposable Email Provider List 2012

Back in 2007 I re-published a list of 20 temporary email services which proved to be useful to a lot of people. As time passed by, some of the services mentioned in the list stopped working, either because they have been pulled by their developers, or changed their business model. I was reminded of this by some readers who commented on the recently published article on how to use disposable email services like a professional.

Today, I’m publishing an updated list of disposable email providers and programs that you can use for that purpose. Keep in mind though that availability may change at any point in time after the guide has been posted, and that I have not included any commercial services.

temporary email yopmail

I have created a spreadsheet listing all disposable email provides with their most important characteristics. You can download it from here: disposable email services

These disposable email services can be used right away, without registration or the revealing of one of your legit email addresses.

10 Minute Mail – Create throwaway email addresses on the fly that last for ten minutes before they expire.20 Minute Mail – This provider can create an instant disposable email address for you, or forward email to your own address after registration.Dead Address - Create a random email address and check its mailbox right on the site.Email Sensei -Email The – A free disposable email provider that you can use to get a temporary email address of your choice. Emails expire automatically after 24 hours, and the service allows you in that time to read and reply to emails.Fake Mail Generator – Use a random or custom email address with this service.Guerrillamail – Creates temporary email addresses on the fly that get automatically deleted after a certain amount of time.Incognito Email – Create a random email address on the fly, supports RSS.Koszmail – Create temporary email addresses on the fly.Mailcatch – Select a random email alias that you want to use and check emails on the service’s website. Supports email forwarding.Mailinator – A very popular service that supports features that many other disposable email services do not. It ships with hundreds of alternate domains, of which one is displayed on the main page. Interesting features include the ability to access mails via POP3 from an email client or email provider like Gmail, and to subscribe to RSS feeds for mail inboxes.My Trash Mail – Create instantly available email addresses, or private accounts that only you have access to. Supports RSS feed and email forwarding.NoClickEmail – Creates a temporary email address automatically when you visit the page for the first time.Spam Spot – Displays all email addresses send to random spamspot email addresses on the frontpage which may have severe privacy implications.Spamavert – Create on the fly email addresses, and read them on the Spamavert website or in your RSS reader.Spamfree24 – Create on-the-fly email addresses. Emails are stored until the service runs out of space, at which point the oldest emails get deleted first to free up storage.Temp Email – You first need to create a temp email address, and then switch to the check page to check the inbox.Thrashmail.ws – Seems to use the same script that Email The uses.Yopmail – Free choice in creating a temporary email address. Yopmail makes available alternate domains that you can use to register on sites where yopmail.com email addresses are banned.

These services require you to enter a working email address where all temporary emails are forwarded to.

Easy Trash Mail – Create a temporary email address for a period of 15 minutes to 1 month, and have it redirect all emails to a real email account.Jetable – Create a temporary email address and forward all mail it receives to your original account.Mail Expire – Create an email alias with a lifespan of up to 3 months.Melt Mail – Enter your email address to forward a temporary email address that the provider creates for you for up to 24 hours.Spambox – Enter your email address and the desired life time of the temporary email (up to one year) to have mails forwarded in that time to your real email address.Tempomail – Emails created have a lifespan of up to one month.TrashMail.net – Supports SSL and requires you to enter your real email address.? You can select between multiple domain names, the number of forwards and the life span of the temporary email. Paid plus service available.

It is necessary to create an account before any of the services in this group can be used. This usually involves adding at least one legit email address to the account.

E4ward – Lets you redirect the temporary email address to your real one. Free guest account plan is limited to 50 Megabytes of monthly bandwidth.GishPuppy – Sign up to receive access to proxy email addresses that you can use to register on the Internet. Emails are then forwarded to the real email account.Mail Null -? Once you have set up an account all mails send to the temporary email address will be forwarded to the real email address.Spamgourmet – You need to create an account first, and associate an email address with it that you want to protect.? Spamgourmet will then forward email addresses that it receives to the protected account based on parameters that users can specify on the fly.

Add-ons and extensions improve how you create and access disposable emails. Here is a small selection of extensions that you may find useful.

Bloody Vikings for Firefox. Supports ten email providers that you can switch between easily.Spam Control for Firefox. Supports multiple different providers, including Spam Gourmet and Temporary Inbox, and full control over which addresses are used on the Internet.Many disposable email service providers have created add-ons for Firefox for their individual service.? This includes Mail Catch, Tempomail or Email Sensei. A search on the official Mozilla Add-ons website will reveal additional service-specific add-ons.Chrome users find many service-specific extensions for their browser in the Chrome Web Store. To name a few:? Trashmail, Guerrillamail or YopmailOpera users finally find only a 10 Minutes Mail extension for their browser listed on the Opera Addons website.

Disposable email services are not the only options that you have to hide your email addresses when signing-up for services on the Internet. You can naturally create a second account at Hotmail, Yahoo Mail or other email providers to use that account for all registrations on the Internet. It is usually possible to either forward all messages to another inbox, or create filters so that only select messages are forwarded automatically.

Disposable Email Address Yopmail
How to use disposable email services like a Pro
Less Spam Please, Integrates Disposable Email Services In Firefox
Disposable Email Address Services March 2006
List of 20 Temporary Email Services

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Thursday May 31, 2012 -
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Today’s Web Browser Landscape

Today’s Web Browser Landscape .download-info .download-button {background-image: url(http://cdn.ghacks.net/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/page-addon/downloadbutton.gif);}.download-info .more-button {background-image: url(http://cdn.ghacks.net/wp-content/plugins/download-monitor/page-addon/morebutton.gif);}HomeWindowsLinuxSoftwareInternet ExplorerFirefoxChromeOperaEmailContactAdvertiseToday’s Web Browser Landscape

The web browser landscape has changed considerably in recent years. Especially the introduction of the Google browser has shuffled around the landscape quite a bit. On today’s Internet, there are five major web browsers who all have a market share of more than 1%. Of the five, three got the backing of multi-billion Dollar corporations, while two, Mozilla Firefox and Opera, are maintained by smaller organizations and companies.

Below you will find an overview of today’s web browser landscape, and a list of lesser known alternatives that you may want to take a look at as well.

Microsoft Internet Explorer

Internet Explorer has come a long way, and it appears that Microsoft is finally putting resources behind the web browser. Internet Explorer 9 is a step in the right direction, especially when compared to previous versions of the browser. IE9 is faster, supports a variety of newer technologies (could be better but still), and is a force to be reckoned with thanks to its integration into the Windows operating system.

Internet Explorer 10, which will come out later this year when the Windows 8 operating system gets released, will improve the browser further. If there is one thing to criticize it is the beginning fragmentation of the browser, as Microsoft limits newer versions of the browser to the last two released operating system. For Internet Explorer 9 it means that Windows XP users won’t be able to install or upgrade to the browser, for Internet Explorer 10, it is Vista users who share the same fate.

Opera

Opera has been the underdog in the desktop browser niche for a very long time despite being around for more than 15 years. One reason for not getting enough traction in the browser market is the lack of marketing resources that Google for instance made massive use of to push the Chrome browser into the market.

Opera itself is still seen by many as one of the most innovative browsers around, which can be attributed to technologies like Opera Turbo and other improvements that were introduced into the browser. Not all of them paned out as intended though, especially the widget engine lacked features when compared to Firefox extension engine. Opera has however introduced its own extension engine recently.

Currently a rumor makes the round that Facebook is interested in buying Opera Software which could offer new opportunities for the browser, but also alienate part of the browser’s loyal following.

Mozilla Firefox

The rise of Google Chrome has hurt the Firefox web browser, at least when it comes to market share. Back when Firefox first entered the field it was considered innovative thanks to its extensions engine which allowed third party developers to create add-ons for the browser to change, remove or improve functionality.

The last two years have been particularly troublesome for the Firefox browser, first because of the rise of Google Chrome, but then also because of changes that the developers introduced. Especially the switch from Firefox 3 to 4, and then the decision to follow Chrome’s release often policy need to be mentioned in this regard. It did not help either that the first five or six versions of the rapid release process did not really introduce highly visible features to the browser.

This is however changing right now, with the two digit versions of the browser introducing much needed improvements to the browser’s memory usage, overall performance and underlying technologies.

Alternatives include Pale Moon, an optimized version for Windows.

Google Chrome

The Chrome browser jump-started into popularity thanks to Google’s marketing efforts and the fact that developers concentrated on speed first. It is still one of the fastest, if not the fastest, browsers on today’s Internet, even though not by as much as before.

Google managed to establish the browser in record time, with some analysts seeing it in the top spot browser market share wise. It is a functional browser with some interesting technologies that however lacks some features that browsers like Firefox or Opera offer. In terms of interface customizations for instance, it is worse than Microsoft’s Internet Explorer.

Google appears to have reduced its marketing efforts recently, likely because the browser reached a critical mass, and because of the company using the same strategies to increase the market share of its Google+ service in very much the same way.

If you do not like Google’s browser, try its Open Source alternative Chromium, or more privacy orientated spin-offs like Cool Novo or SRWare Iron.

Safari

Apple seems to be the only company that is not putting lots of efforts behind the Safari browser. That’s not making the browser inferior to others, especially not since it is sharing the WebKit core with the Chrome browser. The lack of support however holds the browser back. While it still managed to gain some traction, this can mostly be attributed to it being the default web browser on Macintosh systems, which in recent time have grown in popularity.

It is not a bad browser by all means but there is also nothing special about it that would make users switch to Safari, especially since much of the technology and feature set is also included in Google Chrome.

Others

A handful of niche browsers are available that the majority of the Internet community probably has never heard of. Here is a small selection of browsers that fit the profile.

Maxthon has a lot going for it. The Windows browser comes with Chrome’s fast rendering engine, and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer engine, so that it is possible to switch between engines whenever needed. The browser recently managed to surpass Chrome in the HTML5 test and packs additional interesting features like an option to download videos from video sites like YouTube.

SeaMonkey is based on the Firefox web browser, but aims to be a full application suite rather than a single-purpose web browser. It is in this regard similar to Opera, which also includes email and newsgroup clients, IRC chat and other features that the majority of browsers do not ship with.

Lunascape includes rendering engines from Chrome, Internet Explorer and Mozilla. Especially the integration of Firefox’s engine is interesting in this regard, as it allows users to run Firefox add-ons in the browser. You can read a recent review of Lunascape here.

Avant Browser, another browser that ships with three rendering engines, which are actually the same that Lunascape ships with.

Related Articles: Which Web Browser Will You Be Using In 2010?
Web Browser Popularity
Change Default Browser, Quickly Switch The Default System Browser
Opera Browser Surpasses 50 Million Desktop Users
Web Browser Backup Software FavBackup Updated

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More Indicators that Opera may be for Sale emerge

As far as I’m concerned, it is all just a rumor at this point in time. I’m taking about Opera Software currently in talks with Facebook, and maybe other potential buyers. Two new indicators that came to light today make it look as if there is more to the rumor than initially thought.

It was first reported by Fav Browser that Opera Software has renewed the agreement with Google which in itself is not that spectacular. The extension however ends on June 30, 2012, which is not really a long time considering that Mozilla recently renewed their agreement with Google for 3 years.

When you look back at Opera’s previous renewals, you will however notice that the previous renewal was also only for two months, from March 31, 2012 to May 31, 2012. Before that though, Opera and Google had a two year long agreement that made Google the default search engine in the Opera web browser.

A renewal by two and then one month could indicate that Opera has been in talks with potential buyers for at least that time. There are however other explanations for this, including talks with other search engine companies.

You find the press releases that announce the agreement here, here and here.

The second indicator has also been posted by FavBrowser. Facebook apparently has removed the Google Chrome browser from a page on the site that is displayed to users who access the website with an unsupported browser. The browser it was replaced with? Opera of course.

opera facebook

This should come as a surprise to many who would expect the page to display the most used web browsers like it did previously. This again can have other reasons, for instance that the relationship between Facebook and Google has been rocky lately. It needs to be noted that this page recommends browsers to users who open the page with an unsupported web browser (which Chrome is not).

I’m personally still not convinced that Opera will be acquired by Facebook or another company in the near future, even though it is possible that it will happen after all. What’s your take?

Rumor: Facebook To Buy Opera Software To Join Browser Wars
Opera Software Readies Opera 11.51 Maintenance Release
Opera Releases Happy New Year Build Of Opera 10.50 Pre-Alpha
Opera add-ons
Opera Downloads Triple After Browser Ballot Screen Goes Live In Europe

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Thursday May 31, 2012 -
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Windows 8 Release Preview Available: Download Links Live

If you are dying to test a new snapshot of Microsoft’s upcoming operating system Windows 8 your chance has come to do just that. Microsoft has just enabled the downloads of the Windows 8 Release Preview, which could be the last public preview version of the operating system before release.

The preview version of the operating system is as usually available in form of the Windows 8 Upgrade Assistant which you can use to upgrade an existing system, for instance the Windows 8 Consumer Preview or Windows 7, to the Windows 8 Release Preview, and as ISO images that you can burn on CD, install in a virtual machine or install from USB Flash Drives.

windows 8 consumer preview

Interested users find the Upgrade Advisor download on this page over at the official Microsoft website, and the download links for all 32-bit and 64-bit ISO versions of the operating system below.The upgrade advisor download seems to be faster than the ISO downloads. While I do not have scientific proof to back that up, I compared downloads several times and the Upgrade Advisor download always finished before the ISO download.

The Windows 8 product key for all versions is always the same:? TK8TP-9JN6P-7X7WW-RFFTV-B7QPF

64-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xD76AD96773615E8C504F63564AF749469CFCCD5732-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x8BED436F0959E7120A44BF7C29FF0AA962BDEFC964-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x0C07A0501840517AE789B4EA82EDE061F4E42CE932-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x95B8948DB8AF1559B03ADA5A85B7987CFD456544

Chinese (Simplified)

64-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.4 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xC21B69413E08FCFB756EEDB2B99D0C0472486D1C32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.6 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xF9FAF5910275832EA03F630CD5803565C03C8F3164-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.4 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x1556802DEA81A7B3E3159E99F911C1C855B20B2432-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.6 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xC617D24A48E5A5A2329CBA5DED2B08EBB7463FD064-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x132ED51FAD11EF626BD330288822D68603C5C56032-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x2F434DDD06ADDD38A972E3E71CA059BD9A4416CD64-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xC0117244B5E018BBF01F6242BF9020D27918A12F32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x019E239D0990B8C04505F5248DDBD067FC3CAF4264-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x6393BA8BC2DD3CBD7B55D00B9D9587843BDB05CD32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xE28666272702351491CCB713DC66E064D88BA99464-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xC4CFD5F2DD54CDC44FCFE5D69122931DEDA57DF632-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0xB605E1428852503C0E7E3490815E96A3101F2C5564-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x90B07E56008FAB64AD9CA47F86CC6D99150FBF8A32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x91AE86FACBBC4D6FAFED0239D15542C28F37827D64-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x10F9F738593BC740561DA8AB247F5CEF3ABA65BB32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x7A473B0D7F5DB3E949915D2A2F361FAE92A5253864-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x6E6C4B9D5788BF2BF72E1AC8F1F1D6FA0241311C32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x533CA552681DFC9F347633F2BA1B5224BEF22EB364-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x632DB171AAD356E52930A745D92328055128CB8D32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x0BBB1EC6F68D4D0DAB0130853B5C6543882ED25664-bit (x64)????????????????????Download (3.3 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x9086CAA101C872DAB529CA8A01F7C7370986837B32-bit (x86)????????????????????Download (2.5 GB)????????????????????Sha 1 hash — 0x509E6D4331F965BCA4102968016E5AD6B05769BF

The system requirements do not seem to have changed, they are:

Processor: 1 gigahertz (GHz) or fasterRAM: 1 gigabyte (GB) (32-bit) or 2 GB (64-bit)Hard disk space: 16 GB (32-bit) or 20 GB (64-bit)Graphics card: Microsoft DirectX?9 graphics device with WDDM driver

Additional requirements to use certain features:<

To use touch, you need a tablet or a monitor that supports multitouch.To access the Windows Store and to download and run apps, you need an active Internet connection and a screen resolution of at least 1024 x 768.To snap apps, you need a screen resolution of at least 1366 x 768.Internet access (ISP fees might apply)

We will see lots of coverage in the coming days, especially about new and changed features in the Windows 8 Release Preview. Are you currently downloading the new release, or skipping it? (via Everything Microsoft)

This may be useful to some of you who want to upgrade from previous versions of Windows to the Windows 8 RP release. Depending on the version of Windows you are upgrading from, you may keep some or none of your files. Here is the list:

Windows XP: User accounts and filesWindows Vista: User accounts and files, and Windows settingsWindows 7: User accounts and files, Windows settings, and ProgramsWindows 8 Consumer Preview or Developer Preview: Nothing at all.

The RP expires one day after the Consumer Preview expires, on January 16, 2013.

Update: The official blog post is now available. Check out Microsoft’s announcement here.

Microsoft: Windows 8 Release Preview In First Week of June
Windows 8 Download, Developer Preview
Windows Vista Release Candidate 2 Download
Windows Live Writer Preview
Leaked Microsoft Roadmap Reveals Windows 8, Windows 9 Release Dates

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Thursday May 31, 2012 -
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Facebook finally releases Admin Roles for Pages

Up until now Facebook Page admins could authorize other users as admins, who then had more or less the same rights as the page creator. This approach was problematic for a number of reasons, for instance when someone in a company or organization should only have rights to post news on the page, but not to create new advertisements or unpublish the whole page.

If you have been to a Facebook Page where you have admin rights today you may have noticed that it is now possible to assign different roles to users.? The easiest way to reach the preferences dialog is to click on the Manage button at the top of the page and then on settings in the context menu that pops up.

Locate Admin Roles in the sidebar and select it. Here you see a list of? all current users with their assigned roles. You can change the role of an existing admin and to add new page administrators to the page.

admin roles

To add a new administrator enter a name or email address. Once you start typing the name you will see a list of Facebook users starting with friends that match the characters that you have entered. The following roles are available for selection:

ManagerContent CreatorModeratorAdvertiserInsights AnalystRespond to and Delete Comments

Managers are the core administrators that can manage admin roles. Especially the content creator and moderator roles should be interesting, while advertiser and insights analysts roles probably are only interesting for larger companies and organizations. According to Facebook, there is no limit to the number of admins a page can have.

Facebook Page admin roles is a long demanded feature that has finally been implemented by Facebook. Especially companies can now assign roles with less rights to employees to protect the page from accidental or intended changes.

Finally! Block Applications on Facebook
Google+ Gets Multi-Admin Pages, Stream Filters And More
Facebook Blocker Extension, Block Facebook Scripts
Facebook Lite Discontinued
How To Change The WordPress Admin Interface Fonts

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Thursday May 31, 2012 -
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Strike Force Heroes [Game Saturday]

Strike Force Heroes at its core is a team deathmatch game that you play against AI controlled opponents. It has a few similarities to games like Unreal Tournament or Quake 3, despite the fact that it is played in 2D and not a 3D environment. You for instance have options to select different weapons that you can play with and switch while playing.

There is more to the game than just the shooting part though and this is where it actually gets interesting. The game ships with four different classes that serve their purpose in the game. The tank class for instance is a heavily armored class that can pack a punch, while the sniper is deadlier but also fragile especially when enemies manage to sneak up on him.

strike force heroes

Each class gets experience while it is being played in the game, with level ups granting access to new equipment unlocks and improved stats. You earn money during matches which you can invest in better weapons, but also one active skill and killstreak. When you look at the weapons, skills and killstreaks available you will notice that popular choices from games like Counter Strike, Battlefield 3 or Modern Warfare have been added to the game. From the riot shield to air strikes, it is all there and helps keep the game interesting after a few matches.

equipment

The matches play in various scenarios, from a village that could have been taken out of the latest Rambo movie to an air scenario and caverns, there is lots of variety in the game in this regard. You control the player character with the WASD keys, where W is mapped to jump, and S to crouch. You switch weapons with Q, reload with R, activate killstreaks with e and use the mouse to aim and shoot.

The game displays the game modes for each stage that you can enter. This includes the number of kills to win the game and the difficulty. You may eventually need to replay stages to earn enough experience to level up your characters. The main issue here is that each character levels up individually, which means that you need to replay much of the game when you switch to a new level 1 character.

Besides playing the campaign, you can also play challenges or join a quick match. Challenges start with a hard difficulty that suggests player levels of at least 21. This basically means that you should not start challenges before you have played through the campaign at least once and have a character ready that is at that minimum level.

Strike Force Heroes is a well designed game that is fun to play, at least for a while. The game lacks variety after a while, and if you are not a die-hard gamer, you probably won’t play the game all the way through the final campaign level. Still, for a game or two, it is fun and enjoyable.

Awesome Tanks [Game Saturday]
MC2 Burning Skies [Game Saturday]
Shining Force, DnD [Game Saturday]
Zombie Last Night 2 [Game Saturday]
Decision [Game Saturday]

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Saturday June 2, 2012 -
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2012年6月5日星期二

Pc Fans with active noise cancellation will soon become reality

Before I buy new computer hardware, and it does not really matter if it is a complete PC, laptop, or single component, I look at all important factors and lots of reviews and tests before I make a buying decision. Many factors play an important role in the decision: price, performance, stability, or storage size need to be mentioned in this regard. While those are all important factors, I tend to look at a device’s or component’s noise generation even more.

I have a sensitive hearing, which means that I often become iirritated by noise when others do not even hear it in first place. That’s why I prefer products that are silent, or near silent over products that may be cheaper or more powerful if they are also louder.

Fans can be particularly noisy. I’m not only talking about the cpu fan or fan of the video card, but also fans that you may have installed in the case to suck air in and out of it. While it is necessary to use fans in many systems, I tend to underclock them and select larger fans over smaller ones as they usually make less noise as they are not rotating that fast.

noctua active noise cancellation Ncotua NF-F12 prototype

Noctua and RotoSub have announced a partnership that could reduce the noise generation of PC fans significantly. How does it work? It seems to work similar to white noise techniques, as the fans emit a “sound signal that cancels out the original sound” that the fan makes while the computer is turned on.While this could be used to make fans quieter, it can also be used to improve the performance of existing fans while keeping the original noise level.

The joint-venture targets an 80% increase in airflow and a 120% increase in static pressure while keeping the noise level at that of the original NF-F12 model that will be the first PC fan model available with the active noise cancellation technology included.

According to the press release, the fan will be exhibited at next week’s Computex in Taipei. (via Mike)

It will be interesting to see how this technology evolves in the coming months. I personally would prefer the same airflow capabilities and a reduced overall noise of the fan over an increase in airflow. Price could also be a issue, as it is likely priced higher than standard PC fans.

The most annoying pc noise makers
Lower the noise of your hard drives
Decrease Noise Of LCD Displays
Hard Drive Noise Reduction
White Noise For Chrome

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Wednesday May 30, 2012 -
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Internet Explorer 10 Tech Improvements

Microsoft is currently working on the next iteration of its Internet Explorer web browser, IE10, which the company aims to ship with the Windows 8 operating system that is said to be released in the fourth quarter of 2012. Internet Explorer 10 at that time will be integrated into the operating system in two different versions, a regular desktop browser and a Metro browser that is limited and minimalistic. The browser furthermore will also be available for the Windows 7 operating system.

With yesterday’s release of the Windows 8 Release Preview came a refresh of the Internet Explorer 10 browser which Microsoft announced on the official Internet Explorer blog.

internet explorer 10

The biggest changes in the release are the following:

Do Not Track enabled by default – Sends a do not track header to websites by default to improve privacyNative Flash integration – This is the first release with a native integration of Adobe’s Flash technologyImproved performanceImproved standards support.

Lets take a look at some of the tech improvements / performance improvements in the web browser.

Internet Explorer 10 scores 100/100 in the Acid 3 test

acid3

The browser scores 319 and 6 bonus points in the HTML5 Test. That’s an increase of almost 200 points in comparison to Internet Explorer 9, but still trailing browsers like Google Chrome or Maxthon by about 100 points. Still, a big leap for users of the browser. The score however is only 5 points higher than that of the Internet Explorer 10 Preview 5 version.

internet explorer 10 html5

SunSpider beating Google Chrome. The result of the SunSpider test was surprising, as IE10 managed to run the test in 123ms, while Google Chrome 19 ran the test in 155ms.

sunspider ie10

These benchmarks and tests can be used as indicators that Microsoft has improved the browser, especially when it is compared to previous versions of Internet Explorer 10. I personally would not really look to hard at the numbers, as they are not everything that counts. Internet Explorer 10 does however feel snappier than previous versions of the browser, which is probably the biggest thing that counts in the end.

Have you tried Internet Explorer 10 yet? If so, what is your impression of the browser?

Leaked Internet Explorer 9 Screenshots Show Progress
Internet Explorer 10 Preview 5 Released
Microsoft Pushes Out Second Internet Explorer 10 Preview
Internet Explorer Download
Another Report Finds Internet Explorer 8 To Be The Most Secure Web Browser

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Friday June 1, 2012 -
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Groupon shares drop as IPO lock-up ends

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Groupon Inc slumped on Friday as an initial public offering lock-up on stock sales by insiders of the world's largest daily deal company ended.

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Analysis: In solar: go big, boutique or bust

FRANKFURT (Reuters) - Solar companies could be well advised to look to chip makers to figure out how to survive a sector shake-out, as the consolidation of the semiconductor industry suggests it is all about either being big and basic or small and selective.

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Analysis: Angst at Zynga over tumbling share price

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - In April, a small circle of top Zynga executives and early investors scored a $500 million-plus payday via a choreographed private share sale.

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QuiteRSS, Open Source RSS Reader for Windows

I switched from the Java-based RSS reader RSSOwl to GreatNews a few months ago and have not looked back. The main reason for the change was the Java dependency of RSSOwl, and not missing functionalities or other issues with the excellent news reader. GreatNews, a basic alternative, had no such dependencies so that I was able to uninstall Java from the system I’m working with.

QuiteRSS is in many regards similar to Great News even though its feature set is limited in comparison. The core features, that is importing and exporting feed lists and single feeds, reading and updating feeds is available though.

quite rss

The interface itself is divided into three panes, which seems typical for many RSS readers. The left sidebar displays a list of subscribed feeds and their unread news count, the upper right pane the articles that were published on the selected RSS feed, and the lower right pane the article that is selected right now in the article listing.

The reader displays a basic version of the article at first. It is then possible to click-through to the website the news were published on, or display a rendered page in the feed reader directly. This needs to be enabled under Tools > Options > Browser > Use the embedded browser. QuiteRSS uses Webkit, the same technology that is powering Chrome and Safari for its embedded browser.

A handy button to load or block images is available right in the main toolbar, which can be useful in situations where images are not needed, or when the PC is connected to a slow Internet connection.

The only remaining options are audio notifications when new articles are available, keyboard shortcuts to handle all major features from the keyboard, the option to star items, and various options to modify the retrieval and display of feeds in the program.

If you are currently working with a different feed reader, you may have noticed that I have not mentioned some features that you may require. This includes options to create filters for words or phrases, the option to organize feeds in groups, options to discover new feeds or statistics. QuiteRSS is basic in this regard, which can be a issue if you need some or even all of the features it is missing.

It shines when it comes to performance and stability, even though its resource usage is a bit on the high side, especially when compared to GreatNews. Still, it has a clean interface that is really easy to use, and seems to be updated fairly often. Even if it lacks some of the features that you may need right now, it is a program to keep an eye on.

Two RSS Reader Alternatives For Windows
Desktop RSS Reader RSS Xpress
FeedDemon RSS News Reader
News Factory, Compact News Reader For Google Chrome
GTweet, Read Twitter RSS Feeds In Google Reader

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Wednesday May 30, 2012 -
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2012年6月4日星期一

SkyDrive Desktop Apps Update, Exclusive Windows 8 Feature

Microsoft is currently rolling out a SkyDrive desktop apps update that supposedly will land on all systems running the application in the next week or so. These apps let you synchronize your local storage with the SkyDrive cloud space, and work pretty much like other desktop synchronizers. Probably the biggest difference in terms of functionality is SkyDrive’s Fetch File feature which makes available all data stored on a PC on the SkyDrive website, provided the PC is online at that time.

The update to SkyDrive 16.4.4111.0525 introduces several smaller changes, like improved updating speeds of contents, a file limit increase from 150000 to 10 million, and the removal of the SkyDrive app icon on OS X Lion systems. Mike Torres, Microsoft’s SkyDrive Apps Group Program Manager notes that there have also been many smaller bug fixes that improve the overall reliability of the service.

microsoft skydrive

More interesting than those improvements is a new exclusive Windows 8 that Mike mentions in the blog post.

SkyDrive for Windows desktop will power a cool new feature in the upcoming Windows 8 Release Preview, available the first week of June. Right from the Photos app in Windows 8, you can fetch photos stored on your other PCs that have SkyDrive installed – no matter where you are or how many terabytes of photos you have stored on the PC you are accessing. We’ll have more to say about this shortly, so stay tuned.

He basically states that Windows 8 users will be able to fetch photos from other PCs that have SkyDrive installed. The details are vague: Does the target system have to be online to fetch the photos from it? If that is the case, it would be similar to the fetch files feature that is already integrated into SkyDrive. The only benefit then would be an automatic integration of the photos into the photo app of Windows 8, hardly a feature to gloat about.

Another possible interpretation is that Windows 8 users do not need to have Skydrive installed to make use of the feature. This would obviously limit the availability to users who log into the system with their Windows Live / Microsoft Account ID.

It could also be that SkyDrive will automatically sync all photos on PCs with the cloud, but that seems highly unlikely, unless it is an optional feature that users need to activate in the application.

I guess we will find out in the coming days when Microsoft will reveal additional information about the new SkyDrive feature. The Windows 8 Release Preview will be available in the first week of June, and it will be interesting to see how the feature is implemented.

If you do not want to wait for the automatic update to update your version of SkyDrive to the latest one, you can simply go to the SkyDrive website and download the latest version for your operating system from there. Simply install the application on the system which will update it to the latest version.

Microsoft SkyDrive Feature Update
SkyDrive Get a link feature Now With Bitly Support
Microsoft SkyDrive Desktop Clients, Additional Storage Spotted
How To Access Files Remotely With Microsoft SkyDrive
Windows Live SkyDrive Explorer

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About the Author:Martin Brinkmann is a journalist from Germany who founded Ghacks Technology News Back in 2005. He is passionate about all things tech and knows the Internet and computers like the back of his hand. You can follow Martin on Facebook or Twitter.Author: , Thursday May 31, 2012 -
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