3 Reasons Why a Solid State Drive Greatly Improves Your Computer’s Performance

The standard hard disk drive (HDD) has been the data storage workhorse for computers since the beginning of the personal computer. This is because HDD’s are reasonably fast, reliable, and very affordable. But soon, solid state drives (SSD’s) may rapidly take their place.

What is an SSD and how does it differ from an HDD?

Like hard drives, SSD’s store data on a computer. They look almost the same as hard drives, and in fact it takes only a few minutes to switch from an HDD to an SSD. While an HDD has a spinning disk and other moving parts that run the hard disk’s storage, SSD’s use microchips to store data, a technology similar to that used in digital camera memory cards and USB memory sticks.

3 Reasons to switch to SSD

§  SSD’s have faster speeds. Hard drives have to ‘spin up’ before they can read or write your data, and they have to locate that data on its magnetic disk. In contrast, SSD’s have no moving parts and can find and transfer data much more quickly.

§  SSD’s are more robust. When dropped or subjected to sudden shock, they are less likely than hard drives to have a drop in performance or fail altogether.

§  SSD’s use less power. Solid state drives contain no power-hungry motors, so this means that when used in laptops, they can make a noticeable difference to overall battery life, or consumes less current power on desktops.

When a 500GB SSD is matched in performance to a standard 750GB, 5400-rpm HDD on a laptop, there is a considerable performance improvement of around 56 percent when an SSD is used. Even when the comparison uses a tower desktop PC, comparing a standard 1TB, 7200-rpm hard drive and a 250GB SSD, the SSD boosts up PC performance by up to 60 percent. Boot time for computers are also reduced when using an SSD, from 63 seconds down to 23 seconds.

But aside from the obvious performance advantages of SSD’s over HDD’s, solid state drives are far more expensive than SSD’s. For instance, a 500GB SSD may cost around $200, while an equivalent HDD will cost only around $50. Because of this, SSD’s tend to be used only on high-end computers, on servers, or for big businesses or corporations.

Consider switching to SSD for your business or company.

Remember that SSD’s can read and write data faster, so you’ll see particular advantages in situations where you need to manipulate a lot of data such as when using large databases with your customer relationship management system or saving or processing big files such as videos or complex images.

A typical problem faced by growing businesses is a slowdown of their customer database as its size increases. Exchanging the hard drive for an SSD can improve things considerably.

Count Your Steps Easier With These Free Android Pedometer Apps

More people are getting into fitness activities recently, and they do it alongside with their mobile devices. Step counting or pedometry is one of the most commonly used forms of exercise people get into with the help of their mobile phones.

As GPS tracking and phone movement sensors have improved over time, so, too, have the apps that help you keep track of your daily steppage stats. So if you're planning to be one of those fitness junkies, check out these free pedometer apps to help you easily monitor or literally count your steps from your Android device.

Fitbit

Fitbit has probably the prettiest interface of all the apps for a start, offering a huge amount of features to incentivize your walking. You can, for example, take part in the various weekly challenges curated by the developers, log workouts and food, as well as go on “Adventures” where you attempt to walk the same amount of steps it takes to tackle famous hikes such as those around Yosemite Park. It’s obviously not quite as good as the real thing, but close, right?

Pedometer

Pedometer is a free, ad-supported app that doesn’t foist any in-app purchases on you. What you see is what you get. It has the usual assortment of step counters, calories burned, walking times and speed tracking, and displays your long-term walking information in a convenient graph. It also uses your gender and weight to give you a better idea of the number of calories you burned and the amount you should burn.

Pedometer is very easy on the battery, too, and has a small selection of different themes for some personalization, and you can also adjust the sensitivity, so you’re not cheating by counting steps when you’re cycling or driving.

ViewRanger

ViewRanger is filled with hundreds of thousands of trails and walks around the world, all rated by the app’s millions of users. It serves as a great navigation guide, too, using Augmented Reality to let you point your phone at the scenery and get pointers about what’s what and where to go next.

This app works with Android Wear and uses your phone’s GPS to track your walking stats, letting you see how much distance you’ve covered and maybe even share it with your friends. It’s a great option for those who aren’t quite as obsessed with counting every single step and want to focus more on enjoying the great outdoors.

Moves

Moves is an app that distinguishes itself by being easy to use, distraction-free, and useful. It has a clean interface that uses circles of different sizes to represent how many steps you’ve taken, how many minutes you’ve biked, or how many miles you’ve run. It tracks your activity each day and has a map where you can view where you’ve been. There isn’t much in the way of settings here, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.

Accupedo Pedometer

Like the other apps on this list, Accupedo Pedometer is one of the best pedometer apps around. This particular offering is known for its widget that sits on your home screen giving you a constant view of the steps you’ve taken. It’s configurable, so you can see steps, distance, minutes, calories, and more in a manner that suits you best. It only starts tracking after you take ten steps, so there’s a chance your trips to the bathroom or kitchen from your desk won’t count. You’ve been warned.

Noom Walk

Noom Walk has an interface that’s sparse and clean. The app claims to use less than 2% of your battery, consuming as much juice over twenty-two hours as keeping your screen on for twenty minutes or just three minutes of GPS usage. But much more exciting is the fact that you can virtually high five your friends when they hit their goals. (I’m still hoping you can send them boos and hisses if they fail.) It’s entirely free to use, which is also a plus.

Tech Guide: What Cables and Cords Are Needed for a Desktop PC?

Planning to assemble your own desktop personal computer? Do take note of the numerous types of cables and cords you might encounter from different sources of information. So, before overall confusion over these cables and cords sets in, here’s an overview of the most common computer cable and cord types you’ll encounter for desktop PCs.

VGA (Video Graphics Array)

Though still in common use, VGAs are slowly fading out of popularity due to the gradual shift to digital connections over analog. Still, if you look on any PC video card apparatus, there is a good chance you’ll see a VGA port. VGA connections can be identified by 15 pins arranged in 3 rows with 5 on each row. Each row corresponds to the 3 different color channels used.

DVI (Digital Visual Interface)

The DVI connection is now becoming the successor to VGA. Digital displays like LCD have proven to be of higher quality and is now the market standard for home pictures. DVI connectors come in 3 varieties, DVI-A, DVI-D, and DVI-I. With some desktop PCs, you may need a VGA-to-DVI or DVI-to-VGA converter cable.

HDMI (High Definition Multimedia Interface)

High-definition broadcast has become the new standard of high quality. Unlike VGA and DVI, HDMI sends both video and audio signals together. The signals are digital only; HDMI is only compatible with newer devices. HDMI connectors come in 4 types:

§  Type A is the most popular and identified by its 19 pins on the male head. Type A is compatible with single-link DVI-D connections.

§  Type B is larger than Type A, coming in at 29 pins on the male head, and is compatible with dual-link DVI-D connections.

§  Type C is a 19-pin connector that’s most often used with portable devices, like camcorders and digital cameras.

§  Type D looks similar to a micro-USB cord. It also has 19 pins.

USB (Universal Serial Bus)

The USB connection is now the most pervasive connection type today. Nearly every form of computer peripheral device from keyboards, mouse, headsets, flash drives, wireless adapters, and the like can be connected to your computer through a USB port. The design has evolved over the years, which means there are multiple versions of USB still available such as the USB 1.0/1.1, USB 2.0 (the most common type found in the market), and USB 3.0. The mini and micro USB variants are most often used with smaller, portable devices like PDAs, phones, and digital cameras.

IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics)

IDE cables were used to connect storage devices to a motherboard. It’s the wide cable that looks like a ribbon with more than 2 plugs. The connectors on an IDE cable have 40 pins.

SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment)

Newer hard drives will likely use SATA ports over IDE ports. In fact, SATA was designed to slowly succeed IDE. Compared to IDE, SATA provides higher data transfer speeds. Your motherboard needs to be compatible with SATA. A standard SATA cable can be identified by two connectors, each having 7 pins and an empty notch. It looks like a subtle L-shape. A sub-type, the eSATA (external SATA), is an extension and improvement on the SATA cable. It makes SATA technology available in an external form. In reality, eSATA is not much different from SATA, but it allows connections to devices like external hard drives and optical drives. This is useful because eSATA offers speeds much faster than USB alternatives.

Ethernet

Ethernet cables are used to set up local area networks. They’re mostly used to connect routers to modems and computers. Nowadays, they come in three varieties: Cat 5 cables are the most basic type, Cat 5e (Cat 5 Enhanced) allows for faster data transmission, and Cat 6 offers the best performance of the three.