Tag: DESKTOPS

Whether you're a recent convert, ambivalent veteran or one of those hardened Apple fanboys, let us remind you: a Mac, like any other computer, needs to be maintained. No, you probably don't need anti-virus software (yet), you may never have to fiddle with registry editing, and you'll likely never need to reinstall the operating system. But you may face a kernel panic, a raft of mysterious app ...

After all the TouchPad, Pre 3 and Veer hoopla passed, HP dropped a bit of a bombshell at today's press event: webOS is coming to PCs. Whether that's as a primary OS or as a quick-boot option, we're not sure, but the company is working on bringing the smartphone and tablet OS to full-sized computers later this year. ...

According to market research firms Gartner, Inc. and IDC, 2010 was not a great year for PC sales. Well, perhaps that's an oversimplification. PC sales in the fourth quarter of 2010 rose, but not nearly as much as the research firms had expected. Shipments of PCs have risen steadily over the years, as prices have come down and access to computers has become all but required for everything from ...

Hu Chuang may have passed away, but his geeky legacy will live on. After the 26-year-old Chinese man died in the course of sending e-mails to his friends, his family decided to honor him with a tombstone carved in the shape of a computer monitor, which displays his dates of birth and death. Stonemasons also crafted a keyboard, mouse and camera, which sit alongside a photograph of the deceased ...

It's 35-years old, it can't send e-mail or compose office documents, and, even after you open up the box, you'll still have to add your own case, keyboard, monitor and power supply. Yet the Apple-1 -- the first computer to come out of the shop founded by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak -- is still commanding top dollar from eager buyers. Only 200 of the machines were made, and only 50 of those are ...

Occasionally, vintage tech treasures materialize and propel geeks into a nerdly frenzy. Not too long ago, 'Star Trek' creator Gene Roddenberry's vintage Apple console seemingly represented the pinnacle of dorky computer collectors' items. That ancient relic now appears relatively boring compared to one recently unearthed Apple prize, though. An incredibly rare, original 1976 Apple-1 has appeared, ...

It's been a slow and painful death for Windows XP, and it's not over yet. (If the operating system were a beloved pet, you'd have put it to sleep ages ago.) Microsoft plans to officially start barring manufacturers from selling computers preloaded with the aging OS on October 22nd, and Dell plans to get a head start on the phase-out by eliminating XP as an option from its direct sales site this ...

When it comes to booking your next holiday retreat, there are a number of places in the world you'd probably be unlikely to visit if you value your safety -- places like Iraq, Somalia, or Detroit. Digital locations are apparently no different. Anti-virus and computer security company McAfee has a map for you, and red most certainly means don't go. The company has done a search of worldwide ...

Question: I'm finally ready to move to Mac, especially with Apple's latest iMacs. I really like the design and simplicity. But which one should I get? I was thinking I should get the base model for $1199, but the big 27-incher is pretty tempting, too, even though it's another $500. Or should I spend the extra money and get the upgraded versions of the iMac? So confusing -- I thought Apple was ...

HP Touchsmart 300z (Novice, Under $2,500) HP's all-in-one desktop ($799 – $1,099, depending on the configuration) includes the specs you'd want for day-to-day computing: a 20-inch widescreen LCD, an AMD Athlon multi-core processor, 2-4-gigabytes (GB) of RAM and up to a 750 GB hard drive. But what separates the Touchsmart 300z from the pack is the user-friendly, iPhone-like touchscreen ...

Alienware Area 51 ALX Gaming PC (Gamer, Cost No Object) If you're trying to keep up with the Joneses in PC gaming, Alienware's Area 51 Gaming PC ($3,999 and up) is tough to beat. Housed inside one of the company's trademark love-'em-or-hate-'em "futuristic" cases, this rig is decked out with some of the best components money can buy: Intel Core i7 975 Extreme processors, your choice of ATI ...

One of the most important things everyone -- even Mac users -- needs to do with a computer is to make sure it is as secure from viruses, phishing scams, and other 'net threats as possible. No matter how often you practice safe browsing habits or think twice before clicking on a random link in your e-mail, you'd be surprised how often even the most cautious of folks can be caught off guard, which ...

Okay, this is our last post from that Vintage Computer Festival, we promise, but we thought there was something kind of beautiful about all those retro keyboards we saw, especially after seeing them through the lens of Matthew McMullen Smith's camera. Take a look at the gallery below and let us know if you agree. (We call first dibs on the all-turquoise and PET computer keyboards!) ...

Last week, we showed you the biggest exhibitions we saw at the Vintage Computer Festival East 2009. Still, we also became mildly obsessed with all the logos we saw on those retro PCs. So, we asked our photographer, Matthew McMullen Smith, to shoot some close-ups of as many retro logos (and vintage fonts) as he could find on the various restored computers that were on display. If you're a ...

digg_url ='http://www.switched.com/2009/09/24/vintage-computers-get-the-classic-car-treatment-at-vcf-east-6/'; We trekked down to the New Jersey shore a couple of weeks ago to attend the Vintage Computer Festival East 6.0, an annual gathering of serious computer enthusiasts who prepare and exhibit working, restored computers from '50s, '60s, '70s and very early '80s ("essentially nothing later ...