Work has been continuing over at Two Guys Tech. Today we released the third podcast, "Someone’s in the kitchen with Art".

We’ve had some technical difficulties with Show 002 - The Chris Streisand effect, but we’re getting things squared away.

Art is still hard at work on the website, although when I posted a video tutorial this morning, the embed code made drupal have a bit of a seizure and re-arranged the page.

The video goes over how to change folder view options in Windows XP,so it’s pretty basic, but we’re trying to help out all levels of users. We’re going to get some more technical stuff up there pretty soon.

Besides letting you guys (and gals) know what I’ve been up to, I also wanted to point out some of the people that we’ve linked to, since our site isn’t being crawled by anything yet, the linkback notices aren’t going out.

Teckh had a interesting way to get around Vista’s UAC, which inspired me to mention my favorite way to work around UAC, which I covered in the podcast, and I also have the steps in the show notes.

We also talked about Virtual memory, and the difference between Memory (RAM) and Storage (Hard Drive). This was inspired by a question from Kellypea. That part is somewhere around 22 minutes into the podcast.

One thing we are in need of, is feedback. Our goal is to try to help people make use of technology, so questions are welcome, but any feedback would be appreciated. You can send email to feedback at twoguystech.com.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you listen in and visit Two Guys Tech!

Posted in Tech, TwoGuysTech, Vista, How To, Windows, WebSites 4 Comments »

When it comes to being an evil genius, I rank pretty low on that scale. No, I’ve never seen a evil genius scale, but I have to assume that there is one. What else would you use to measure evil geniuses with?

Now, when it comes to being a genius, sorry, but I’m pretty low on that scale too. Once again, I’m assuming that there is a scale for this.

When it comes to ideas, plots and plans to take over the entire world, or at least large plots of it, I seem to have more of those than I know what to do with.

Anyway, about a week ago, we bought a new scale. Also, around that time, I posed a question to Art. I asked if he had any interest in doing a podcast with me.

Turns out that he was.

(Note: The whole scale analogy kind of fell apart, but I already found and used the nice scale photo, so I felt obligated to tray and tie it in.)

I’ve been meaning to post about this new endeavor, because frankly, I’m pretty excited. I can’t wait to start churning the podcasts out.

Of course, being tech guys, it’s going to be a tech podcast. I don’t want to give away too much, but we are doing a brand new website with it, and Art is currently fighting with the Drupal install. We hope to have to site launched, and our first podcast ready, by Wednesday the 26th. Hopefully we’ll make it.

I know that I haven’t been terribly active in the blogging arena lately, but I think that this podcast and new web site will give me some real focus, and help to get me back on track. Don’t fear, I still plan on updating this blog, after all, there is a lot of stuff that just doesn’t fit on a pure Tech blog.

So stay tuned.

Photo by Chance Agrella

Posted in Tech, The Mumbler, Blogging, BlogNewsandUpdates 7 Comments »

I’m so excited! Why you ask? Only because I finally received my invitation to buy Popcorn Hour!

Way back in February, I did a little drive by linking, and mentioned Popcorn Hour. Popcorn Hour is a standalone video player, that can play video files from a number of sources. It can play files that you store on a local hard drive, files shared by other computers in the house, and even videos on youtube.

All in all, this is a sweet little device. You don’t have to have a hard drive to operate it, and without a drive, it sells for $179.

There has been such a demand for the player, that it became an invite only system. I signed up a month or so ago, and Monday I received my invitation to buy it.

When I initially signed up, I wasn’t sure if I was going to want to buy it or not, but recently I’ve ran into some frustrations when trying to get some video files on DVD to watch on my television. That has been such a pain, that even my wife is all for buying it.

So I went ahead and ordered it. (W00t!)

I won’t receive mine until sometime in April, but you can be sure I’ll let you know what I think of it.

Posted in Multimedia, TV, Tech, Movies, Internet TV 2 Comments »

Have you ever looked at your hard disk free space, and wondered where it all went? I mean, when I bought that 250G drive, I thought I would never need more space.

WindirStat is a easy way to graphically see where all of that free space went to. I use it all the time, even on my networks, to see what is using up all of my drive space.

Of course, it doesn’t run instantly, after all, WinDirStat has to crawl through every directory on your hard drive. While directories are being updated, you are entertained with little packmen running back and forth next to the directories it is updating.

The visual representation of the files is neat, but I really look for the top half of the screen, pictured below.

Directories are listed with the largest on top, and you can continue to drill down into the subdirectories to find out what they are made up of.

This really is a great utility, and you can’t beat the price, which is free.

You can download WinDirStat from the Downloads page, also check out the WinDirStat Web Site.

If you like this type of Tech post, you should check out Two Guys Tech. A friend and I are working on it, and we even have a terrific podcast.

We’re always glad to answer questions, help people out, and help relate what we’ve learned. Get a new perspective on the tech topics and news that you’re interested in, come visit Two Guys Tech.com.

Posted in Personal-Computing, Tech, Open Source, Reviews, Applications, free stuff, Utilities 25 Comments »

eSATA is a External Serial ATA interface. Serial ATA is a commonly used interface for internal Hard Drives, and eSATA is an extension of that specification to be used with external devices.

If you’re using a USB or Firewire external drive, what you’re really using is a ATA or Serial ATA hard drive, and an external enclosure. The enclosure has a controller in it which translates the ATA or SATA protocol to USB or Firewire.

This translation causes some delay and there is also some overhead involved in the translations.

eSATA is already in the format that the drive is transmitting. No translation necessary means no lag.

Why Would I want to use eSATA?

Reason #1 - The transfer rate is fast. I mean really fast. Currently there is a 1.5 Gbps and a 3 Gbps Standard. This blows FireWire (IEEE 1394) and USB 2.0 out of the water.

Reason #2 - Less Lag. Since the data is already in a native format, there is no translation involved. This means data gets to the interface faster.

Reason #3 - It isn’t terribly expensive. Maybe this isn’t a reason to use it, but it isn’t much of a road block either. If your motherboard has SATA connectors laying around, you can extend them with a $3 bracket. SATA expansion cards can be found right now for under $30.

Should I replace all of my External Drives?

Sure, and I can give you an address to ship them to. Seriously though, I wouldn’t replace what you already have if it works. When you decide to buy a new drive, eSATA is worth some thought.

There are currently many drives shipping with USB and eSATA interfaces. So even if you don’t currently have eSATA capability, I would take a good long look at the drives with both interfaces, since they would allow you to upgrade later.

Read More:

Serial ATA - Serial ATA International Organization

If you like this type of Tech post, you should check out Two Guys Tech. A friend and I are working on it, and we even have a terrific podcast.

We’re always glad to answer questions, help people out, and help relate what we’ve learned. Get a new perspective on the tech topics and news that you’re interested in, come visit Two Guys Tech.com.

Posted in Tech, SATA, Personal-Computing, Hard-Drives, eSATA 29 Comments »