TechTalk on WRLR 98.3 FM

 

 lance ulanoff pcmag.com talks win 7 [61:03m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (42)

TOPIC:  Dave’s back in the saddle with us today as we have the priveledge of Lance Ulanoff, Editor-In-Chief for PCMag.com coming back on air with us!  This time out, Lance gives us the skinny on Windows 7, what’s hot and what’s not about it and answers the burning question “should I dump XP and jump over Vista?”

Another great week of awesomeness comes your way as Jay “Geek Trivia” Garmon gives us what for and answers last week’s question.

This time around we don’t skimp on the cool sites of the week either!  There’s still a bit of a MS theme, but some real gems you may not know about:

• Microsoft Technet: Server Quest II – Remember King’s Quest or Leisure Suit Larry?  Well, this may not be quite as fun as those, but it’s pretty close, feels the same, is free, and focuses on your hapless tech support technician and how he learns to save the IT Department (and get the girl).  By Microsoft, so naturally many of the answers to the puzzles start with ‘MS’…
• Microsoft’s Deploying Windows 7 Essential Guide – Pretty much exactly what it says, in PDF format you can load on your Kindle or simply view on-screen for some great tips!
• VistaSwitcher – No, it won’t help you switch from Vista to something else … but it does speed up the Vista Alt-Tab graphical wingding and make it much slicker!  Since it’s free, if you’re stuck with Vista for a while longer you might want to check it out!
• Lake County Passage – If you live in Lake County, IL, where WRLR broadcasts out of, this will help you see the traffic before you get there!  Even works on some of your smarter smart phones like the iPhone and Storm!

Got to tune it down with a little Iron and Wine and their single “Belated Promise Ring” – but I promise next week we’ll get a little more up-tempo!

 

 the return of sparky [58:13m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (63)

TOPIC:  Dave comes back!  Thanks to all the emails, calls, and letters (OK, OK make that “thanks to all the email – singular – and a call”) Dave hops back into the saddle for at least a week to hang with Mike and Jay as we swap stories, talk tech, get geeky about trivia, and just generally have a great time!

Plus, Mike shows off his shiny new TechTalk Google Voice number: 847-984-0847.  Call us, leave a message, get heard on air!  If we do use your voice on air and you’ve given us enough info to figure out who you are (say, an email address or something) you may get some TechTalk tchotchke’s too … or even a book!

With all the excitement going on, Dave being back on the show, and Jay Garmon’s awesome new geek trivia and personal website (http://jaygarmon.net natch), it would have been no shame to miss the cool sites of the week.  But instead, we bring you two fantastic coolsites this week – check ‘em out:

• TextHog – Looking for an easy, quick way to track your cash expenses?  TextHog may be the (free) answer for you!  You don’t have to load in a bunch of personal data, just an email address and then start texting every expense – tagged however you like – off to texthog and you’ll get all the charts, graphs, and trends you could want.   And you wont’ be taking money out of your pocket to do it!
• GroovyPost – No, this isn’t about where to score the most rad concert info on the Dead man.  It’s all about some groovy tech tips and tricks, how-to’s and makes for a ton of stuff!  Wondering how to get Google Voice on your iPhone?  Add some internet calendars to Outlook?  Click on over to GroovyPost!

And a jumping old-school podcast only song of the week “Is This New” by The Fall!

 

 Mike and Dave [61:19m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (68)

TOPIC:  We make good on our hype this week by providing you a solid hour of straight up news and views (we’ll leave the reviews and interviews for another week)!  Jay also treats us to a new and intriguing Geek Trivia that gets everyone thinking, whether your name is Customer Jones or just sounds like it …   You’ll have to tune in to hear what it is!

And what would a show with Dave and Mike be without some truly awesome cool sites of the week? Wait, you don’t have to answer that, because we include some really good ones for you right here:

• TED: Ideas Worth Sharing – Suggested by our longtime listener and good friend Greg, this site is like a YouTube for awesome tech, businessm and entertainment industry talks and conferences!  If you’re like me you’ll easily blow an hour or two thumbing through some of the more interesting ones …
• Rainmeter – Want to customize your desktop way beyond what Vista or Google sidebars will let you do?  Not much of a programmer?  You’ve heard us talk about Rainmeter and Samurize in the past, but with Rainmeter 1.0 you no longer have to have a degree in programming and hours of time to flip through config files!  If you haven’t seen it before, check it out now and you’ll be amazed at how much information you can add to that boring desktop – and how cool it will look when you’re done!

Finally, the podcast only song of the week is He’s Frank (Slight Return) by The BPA feat. Iggy Pop. Truly a podcast only bonus; remember if you’re not listening to us on the web, you are missing out!

Next week we’re looking forward to having URLEsque back on to celebrate a “Day Without (Web) Cats”!

 

 Mike and Dave [60:44m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (19)

TOPIC:  Although we promised you Plextor, you got something even better – a full hour of Dave and Mike!  OK, so maybe not so much.  How about if I told you we spent extra time with Jay Garmon discussing the missing three weeks of Geek Trivia?  And we got our tech on yakking about news like our upcoming trip to Oracle Open World 2009, Microsoft’s possible injunction against selling Word, and then we delve into the “grey” area of technology, hacking and video games!

Don’t worry though, we’re looking to get Plextor back in the near future.  Of course, no show would be complete without some of the coolest of the cool sites on the web:

• How to Crack a WEP key – Our good friends at Lifehacker.com give us the full breakdown on how to use the free software Backtrack to crack WEP keys for fun and profit!
• Password Checker – Not sure how secure that password is?  Microsoft provides a free and easy way to check it.

And the podcast only song of the week is the rather melancholy “Disney’s Ice Parade” by Ballboy.  Note that this has some adult themed lyrics.

 

 google and yahoo! [61:47m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (63)

TOPIC:  November 8, 2008 (A CLASSIC FROM OUR ARCHIVES) – This week we discuss Yahoo’s continuing implosion as well as getting some incredible presidential Geek Trivia from Jay Garmon, and follow up with our usual brand of inanity as well as some truly great coolsites of the week – and the podcast only tune this week is “The Numbers Game” by Thievery Corporation!

 

 bing pre is done [61:54m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (67)

TOPIC:  Gosh, we have fun today!  After working over Microsoft’s new search engine Bing, we talk about the Microsoft Office Live ice age that is coming and then break down the newest Palm release (the Pre), and talk about what Apple could possibly do at WWDC to keep our interest (other than announcing he’s back to take the helm, that is).

Of course we’ve got our coolsites of the week, such as:

• Gminder – Desktop reminder for Google Calendar, by reflective code, this will make SURE you never forget those  important calendar items; even if your browser is down and email turned off!
• GReader Gadget – Pops your google reader RSS subscriptions right onto the google desktop bar!  You can view by category, starred, shared – most of the options you have on the regular greader site.

As the podcast only song of the week (which winds up being a radio play too) is “What Else is There?” by Röyksopp.

 

 sci-fi breakdown [63:19m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (76)

TOPIC:  Well, that title may not be completely accurate, but we do spend an inordinate amount of time focused on Harlan Ellison, Terminator, the new Star Trek movie, and other sci-fi related geekness.  We’re kept in the pink with a helpful heaping teaspoon of Jay “Geek Trivia” Garmon of course – and if you haven’t already you really need to check out his writings on The Written Weird.  His newest addition is a weekly Nerd Word of the Day, just perfect for all you geek linguaphiles out there!

We of course burn your ears with some news and other great stuff, including referencing links to http://wolframalpha.com and others, plus our very cool cool sites of the week include:

• RunPee – Pretty much exactly what it sounds like, this site will let you check in advance or on your smartphone when the best time to take a little break during the current batch of movies.  Want to find out what you missed?  It includes a short synopsis of the estimated 3 minutes you took, and explains why that was a good time to leave too!
• Free Faxing (send)- Looking for an easy way to send a fax, but don’t have a fax machine or want to go to Kinkos?  Here’s your free answer – sends an ad-driven cover page too, but nothing too obnoxious and will save you in a pinch!
• Free EFax (receive) – You won’t find this listed anywhere public, but popular fax service EFax offers a free signup and account to get you a real fax number that you can receive faxes to your email address!  You’ll need to download some viewer software and put up with the occasional email trying to get you to upgrade, but this is a great service if you don’t want to invest in a fax line for your home!

Then the podcast only song of the week this week is Whachadoin? by NASA which, by the way, you can download 100% FREE and legal from Amazon!  So does that qualify it as a hidden, secret and unknown ‘cool site of the week’ for our valued newsletter subscribers?  You be the judge!

NOTE that the audio indicates we’re playing something different, but that is due to the restrictions of on-air broadcast and the FCC.  Since this is a podcast, we’ll play what we want, not what we have to!

 

 Fun fun fun and getting things done [61:44m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (82)

TOPIC:  This week it’s just Dave and Mike hanging out and trying to figure out ways that Mike’s cold won’t interfere with the show.  Riiiiiicolaaaaa!  Mike does spend some time opining about the beauty of using Evernote to completely digitize your life – and breaks out three questions you need to really make it work for you:  Will a digital version of your sentimental items be acceptable long-term? Do you have the assurance of permanence with your digitized items that is equivalent or greater than the physical? Can you find (and use) the item easier digitally than physically?

Plus you’ll want to go read this article by Mike Elgan of Computerworld, it’s got some great tips too!

Jay “Geek Trivia” Garmon adds to the fun, giving us another installment of his fantastic info – this week with a very apropos Star Trek theme!  After  all that, we also manage to have time to get you the cool sites of the week:

• Recipe Puppy – Got a couple of cool things in the pantry, but not sure what to do with them?  Recipe Puppy to the rescue!  With this site you’ll never have to wonder what you should be making again!
• 50 Totally Free Lessons in Design Theory – Even if you don’t have ‘designs’ on being a professional graphic artist, these tutorials and instructional bits will get your creative juices flowing!

The podcast only song of the week this week is Dino Lenny’s “Call Me (in a club)”.

 

 Valentine Tech Day [61:12m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (63)

TOPIC: February 14th – Happy Valentine’s!  This week we actually got a copy of the show for a podcast (unlike last week – apologies extended on-air), have a rousing discussion about the origins of Valentine’s day, some incredible Geek Trivia from Jay combined with a TOKBOX webcam giveaway!  You got that right; listen in this week for sure and find out how to win a webcam!  Next week we’ll discuss even more thoroughly TokBox and webcasting – so keep listening!  A great coolsite of the week and our podcast only song “Fame” remixed by Dan Chase closes out the show!

 

 Mad New Years [62:16m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (1)

TOPIC: December 27 – Happy new years, and this week we’re just MAD (just Mike and Dave, that is) … and we have a blast! Some news and views, awesome Geek Trivia from Jay Garmon, and of course great cool sites of the week and the podcast only “The Cigarette Girl From the Future” song of the week!

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