Aaron Weiss

Q: It seems my AT&T ID-2820 2.4 GHz cordless phone broadcasts a buzzing noise. But my ears don’t actually hear it. All this stops, if I move the phone away from other devices, but that is inconvenient. – John A: Do you remember when we did not have cordless phones everywhere? Handsets tethered to their […]

Years ago, multifunction printer/scanner/copier/fax machines weren’t particularly great at any one task. But technology has improved, and buying an MFP is no longer a compromise. The monochrome Xerox Phaser 3300MFP ($599) offers the usual multifunction features plus flexible connectivity to network and USB storage, and a high-speed print engine suitable for small and medium businesses […]

Most people are generally good and law-abiding citizens who try to do the right thing. We stop at red lights, return money that we’ve found and recycle empty bottles. But let’s be honest—sometimes we drive over the speed limit. We jaywalk. We “forget” to say anything when the grocery store undercharges us for Portobello mushrooms […]

It seems that every year is supposed to be “the year” for Linux, but nobody ever manages to define what “the year” really means. You can find statistics on Linux adoption from a variety of research firms but all seem skewed to represent whatever agenda that firm is pushing-whether that is Linux adoption rising, falling, […]

In the wake of the recent Mike Myers movie, “The Love Guru,” you might naturally wonder whether he is in any way related to the Wi-Fi Guru. Makes sense—after all, we both dress badly while trying to help and educate. But there is one very important difference. Only one of us includes jokes. Q: I […]

Let’s be honest ‑ for many of us, backing up our PC, while very important, often falls somewhere behind eating our vegetables and working out three times a week. Oh sure, we read the stories of calamity that befalls other people who haven’t done their backups ‑ like the architectural firm lost $2.5M worth of […]

Little is the new big. There was the Mac Mini, the iPod Mini and even the Mini Cooper. And small still looms large with the LinkStation Mini, from Buffalo Technology. The LS Mini is a Network Attached Storage (NAS) device – essentially an external hard drive that plugs into your network. The drive’s most remarkable […]

The HP CM1312nfi, which sells for an impressive $499, certainly puts the “multi” in multi-function – including a flatbed scanner enhanced with an automatic document feeder, Ethernet networking, fax line and a built-in memory card reader for photo printing without a PC. And, of course, color laser printing. The good news is that the CM1312nfi’s weakest […]

Not every small business needs a color laser printer, but if yours does, the Samsung CLP-660ND offers the speed and performance you need plus the splash of color that make your print materials — but not your budget — pop. From taking it out of the box to features and output quality, the 660ND delivers […]

OpenOffice.org is not simply a cheap knock-off of Microsoft Office. Some proponents say that Writer, OpenOffice.org’s answer to Word, actually bests Word in a number of areas, including page layout, lists, headers, footers and endnotes. (On the other hand, Word maintains the edge on outlining and templates—for a price.) But for typical word processing needs, […]

Ten years ago, sharing an Internet connection was practically an act of rebellion. I vividly remember a debate with my cable ISP (who shall remain nameless), who refused to allow subscribers to “share” their connection among several machines. But, with the first generation of turnkey routers already in big-box stores, and wireless networking just emerging, […]

In 2007 alone Ubuntu released two successive versions of its desktop Linux, 7.04 a.k.a, “Feisty Fawn” and 7.10 a.k.a., “Gutsy Gibbon.” Although Ubuntu’s penchant for tagging its releases with goofy animal names might lend the product an air of frivolity, in fact Ubuntu is so popular for a reason: it is the easiest distribution for […]