PC Magazine July 2010

Storage Evolution Sony’s decision to end 3.5-inch disk production is just another signal that local storage media and platforms cannot be trusted with your precious data. It’s worth noting the demise of any popular format, because it has a ripple effect on the technology world. In 2003, when Dell decided to stop putting 3.5-inch floppy drives in its computers, we were already seeing the proliferation of USB drives. Back then, they had capacities that, while many times greater than the best floppy disk, were still miles away from where they are now. Personally, I don’t know anyone who still uses 3.5-inch floppies, but I’ll bet if I asked you or anyone else, you’d admit to still having a box or two stashed somewhere. Most are probably filled with data that you always…

First, they climbed to the top of the corporate ladder in the tech industry. Now they’re hoping to capture the same success—and votes—in California politics. Former Hewlett-Packard chief Carly Fiorina (above, right) and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman (above, left) are hitting the campaign trail. Whitman is taking on former governor and current state Attorney General Jerry Brown for the office of governor this November, while Fiorina will challenge incumbent Senator Barbara Boxer for her Senate seat in 2010. Both candidates won their primary battles to represent the GOP in their respective races. ‘Buy It Now’ Politics? Whitman spent an estimated $71 million of her own fortune on the campaign, prompting some wags to make comparisons to the “Buy It Now” option that eBay offers to supersede a public auction. Whitman combated that…

PRIVACYDEFENDER This free Facebook app not only examines your current privacy settings, but also adjusts them based on your preferences. It can even warn you when you’re making something personal open to the public.—Alan Henry THUMBA This free Web-based image editor has some high-end features to tweak your photos from any computer. Along with basic image editing, you can also automatically adjust color levels, brightness, and so on.—AH UNHUB Part personal landing page, part quick-access to your presence on the Web, unhub is a Web service that allows you to create a “landing strip” that points to your social networking profiles, blogs, and other data.—AH…

GEARLOG NetDock Has What Your Netbook Lacks There are a few trade-offs in getting a netbook or ultraportable note-book, but the Apricorn Aegis NetDock has it all covered. This compact $189 package includes 500GB of storage, a dual-layer DVD burner, and a four-port USB hub. All that with a footprint no bigger than a stapler. If you want the portability of a netbook but are tired of the limited storage or lack of an optical drive, this is for you. The NetDock comes in candy-red for visual flair. It also ships with synchronization software so you can keep all your data backed up. It turns on automatically when connected to your netbook and shuts down by itself when not in use. If you ever need to add more storage, the easy open enclosure…

The film Alien and its sequel, Aliens, still stand out today for their devotion to dimly lit creepiness, giving you the impression in almost every frame that certain doom lay within every shadow. And though we never found Predator quite as unsettling, it also was a solid alien-action flick. Fans have known for about 20 years that the two franchises go great together, especially on the video-game front. But it’s only been recently that the technology has caught up to the visions of the original films—with the help of DirectX 11. The Aliens vs. Predator benchmark—based on the popular game—is a good-looking, easyto-run app. It’s a fairly hefty download (just over 300MB), and it won’t run unless you’re using DX11 video hardware, but it’s smoothly configurable, and it’s easy to document…

By now, iPad owners probably know about most of the entertaining apps offered on the platform, such as Netflix, Rhapsody, Marvel Comics, and more. But there are also a slew of programs that can keep you productive on the road. Such apps can make the iPad the perfect tech travel companion—slim, light, powerful, and easy to use. Here are a few of our favorites for iPad road warriors. First of all, no worker’s iPad is complete without iWork for iPad ($9.99 direct per app, 4.0/5.0), Apple’s tablet answer to Office. Here you can get the Pages word processor, Numbers spreadsheet app, and Keynote for creating presentations. While Pages is for basic documents, Numbers and Keynote have powerful, advanced features that rival their PC counterparts. Google Docs users can’t be without Light Room’s…