As far as I know, Latitude works on phones that run Windows Mobile and Symbian platforms, on most BlackBerries that support color, and of course, on Google’s own G1. But the surprising fact is that it is not supported on the iPhone. Well, there are other applications that allow you to track the movements of people using their mobile phones, but there are reasons why Latitude scores above them all:

First, it allows you to protect your privacy by being an opt-in service where you invite the people you want to track your whereabouts.

You can stop sharing information any time you want.

You can share only information that you think is necessary, like the city you’re in or the general area, without getting too specific.

You can also fudge your whereabouts by entering a manual location, depending on your mood or situation.

You can keep sharing your location even when you exit Google Maps and Latitude

If your phone supports GPS, you can find directions from your location to your preferred destination. In fact, the directions are pretty precise and allow you to choose your method of travel, vehicle or on foot.

Yes, there are a few aspects that are not-so favorable as many people have pointed out, but in my book, they’re actually blessings in disguise. For example, I’ve had friends complain that my actual location was not very accurate. This is perfectly fine with me, because I do find it a bit creepy that people know exactly where I am at all times, even though I did volunteer to share the information. A mile or two off is not going to hurt anyone, is it? And if people really need to know where you are, they can always pick up the phone and call! After all, wasn’t that what they used to do before Google Maps and Latitude came into existence?

This post was contributed by Kathleen Baker, who writes about a masters in healthcare online. She welcomes your feedback at KathleenBaker3212 at gmail.com

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Have you got an article regarding anything associated with technology? Would you like it featured here like kathleens (above) ? Then just write it up and send it via our email contact form!

80 applications, games and themes. Download them all! Turn your nokia n93 into n93 edition, download tomtom for your phone, a better web browser if you want…choose as you like.

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD.

Being a gamer myself, I find it critical to own a personal computer which can run fast and play games at the highest/fullest capability. You may play a fast paced game which requires high graphics and where split second decision could decide the outcome, i.e a victory or defeat. However, if your computer isn’t up to par, all is lost. A gamer is only as good as his/her computer, and if the computer is sh*t then you too my friend are the same.

You must note that gaming pcs are built to process huge amounts of information while playing online role–playing games or first–person shooters. These power PCs (gaming pcs) come with high–end graphics cards, lighting fast CPUs and even liquid cooling. Usually such a computer can cost a lot, especially when brought from the already well known manufacturers out there.

Cryo Performance Computing, however, a new small business based in the United Kingdom offer fantastic computers, especially gaming pc’s which are designed to handle games at the highest level. What you must think is price to value -whenever you are buying a computer. This is essential as you do not want to pay too much if you can get it cheaper elsewhere. Cryo seem to have found the right balance between price and value, especially when you check out their custom pc’s available for sale.

Take for example the “Cryo Octane” PC they offer;

The Cryo Octane is THE new number cruncher with eight (’Octa’) cores and Intels new 5400 Skulltrail chipset it supports both nVidia SLI and ATI Crossfire multi GPU card technologies. Realising that anyone after a beast like this wants the best from every component we’ve also included a SAS (Serial Attached SCSI) with 3Gb bandwidth point-to-point bus its the fastest IO you can get and previously was only possible with enterprise level investments in storage arrays. This enables us to use enterprise class 15K rpm drives in the array offering the fastest desktop storage ever made available.

The price ranges from £1000 – £4950 which I think is cheaper than if you where to buy similar specs elsewhere. I know £4950 is not enticing in terms of price but I would doubt you would need that particular specification to make a personal computer that powerful. If you can afford it then why not, if you cant then you can always change things such as the RAM or processor. Infact you could go for another whole option such as the Cryo Quad or the Cryo Extreme.

From Gaming PC Review 2009:

Below are the criteria TopTenREVIEWS used to evaluate gaming PCs.

Processor – A fast CPU, or processor, will prevent lags in large or complex games like first person shooters or MMORPGs (massively multi–player online role–playing games). Some systems have dual core processors for hard–core gaming.

Memory – A large memory allows the computer to quickly access frequently used information or programs. This is critical for gaming. A gaming PC should have between one and two GB of RAM memory and a sufficient hard drive.

Video/Audio – A game is only as good as the graphics card supporting it. Many games have life–like, real–time images that require a high–end graphics card. Most computer manufacturers allow you to upgrade your graphics card. The sound should be a clear as the image.

I/O Device – Some computers come with various peripherals including a mouse, keyboard, speakers and a monitor while others don’t. This may or may not be important depending on the buyer. Additionally, some gaming systems come with uniquely designed towers with sleek cases and neon lights.

Value/Price – In this review, we looked for computers under $2000. The leading companies are value oriented—providing a lot of computer for a good price.

Support/Warranty – The first–class manufacturers provide quality help and support through email, phone and online chat. They also provide practical warranties at no additional cost.

The essential point is that you find the best value for money. Cryo offers you support via phone and email so that you are happy before you purchase. Furthermore, there is after support which I believe to be essential, especially if you are not a “tech wiz” yourself.

Try a custom pc today and you may find cryo to be your best option.

Today – Part 1 – We focus on: File Shredder

As a everyday user of the internet you may find that you tend to download work or store important information such as your assignment or credit card. Yes, you can delete everything by just clicking the delete button but what you dont know if its been deleted successfully, by this I mean a clean deletion of the face of the earth…well the computer

Example: You might have seen people on the TV having their computers seized and files recovered even though they might have tried to conceal information, delete it OR even try to curropt their HDD. This is because there are quite a few software tools today for retrieval of deleted files under Windows OS. Those tools, often referred to as “file recovery” software, are taking advantage of shortcoming of WIndows “delete” command that we all use regularly to delete files. Actually, the “delete” operation in Windows only removes bits of information from files so they appear deleted in OS. It is easy to retrieve those files using aforementioned specialized file recovery software.

To put this short – The delete button just hides most of the file and does not actually delete it.

To get rid of this problem what we can do is download this program where we can actually delete files from our hard drives permanently. File Shredder has been developed as fast, safe and reliable tool to shred company files. The author of this program released it free under GNU licence and you are welcome to download File Shredder and use it without any restrictions.

File Shredder is simple but powerful program that surpasses manu commercial file shredders out there. The Author believes that such a utility should be available to anyone for free and that permanent and safe removal of confidential documents is a matter of basic right to privacy.

This is a must download application especially if you keep sensitive files on your computer which you must remove.

Download File Shredder.

More information here

Stay tuned for part 2.

The Pwn2Own contest this year will pit hackers against a MacBook running Mac OS X with Safari and Firefox installed, as well as a Sony Vaio P running Windows 7 and IE8, Firefox, and Chrome installed. The browsers are intended to be the target vector to launch exploit code that will “pwn” the machines and earn $5,000 for each browser that is exploited.

“Apple’s products are really friendly to users, and Safari is designed to handle anything, including all kinds of file formats,” said Miller. “With a lot of functionality comes the increased chance of bugs. The more complex software is, the less secure it is.”

I always knew firefox rocks…but will he “pwn” that too?

Read More Here.

Theres not much point talking about the phone seeing as there are good videos showing how it runs.

Below is such a video, enjoy:

The N97’s large 1500mAh battery is rated for up to 16 days of 3G standby time or over 5 hours of 3G talk time. GSM times are slightly longer. Nokia also claims that the N97 will be capable of up to 1.5 days worth of continuous music playback from a single charge when the phone is in offline (airplane) mode. The large battery does add to the overall size and weight of the N97, though. At roughly 147g (5.2oz), it’s not exactly light.

It is still pocketable, though, measuring 15.9mm in thickness. Furthermore, I love the touchscreen capability along with the scroll on touch menu. A serious contender to the iPhone 3g people??

Core Player Mobile supports almost all the available formats of video like the MPEG-1, Theora, MKV, MPEG-4 part 2 (ASP), XviD, DivX, WMV, Dirac, MSVIDEO1, H.264 (AVC), MJPEG etc. Furthermore to these many media types, you can also play FLV files, thats youtube videos people!

Technology Overview:

* H.264 Ready with CoreAVC
* Built-In YouTube Support
* Flash/FLV Container Support
* Bluetooth ready!* (A2DP and AVRCP)
* Supports over 22 Languages (20+ more coming soon!)
* Podcast, Enhanced Podcast, CoreCaster Ready
* GPU: Intel 2700g, ATI Imageon, QTv (Limited Support), Marvell Monahan Processors (more coming soon!)
*Operating System: Symbian (all), CE 3+4, CE Embedded 5+6, Windows Mobile/Smartphone (5.x – 6.x), Palm, Windows (NT 4.0 – Vista), OS X, and Linux (OEM only)
* CPU: x86 (32bit and 64bit), Intel, Altivec/PowerPC, ARM9, ARM11, MIPS
*CoreUI ‘Universal skins’ Widget. Allows you to create a unique custom user interface exactly how you want it!
*Best in Class audio and video codecs like CoreAVC our High Definition H.264 video decoder
*CoreTheque media library allows for easy management of your playlists and bookmarks

Audio Formats:
MP3, MP2, AAC, MKA, WMA, Midi, WAV, OGG, Speex, WAVPACK, TTA, FLAC, MPC, AMR, ADPCM, ALaw, MuLaw, G.729, GSM

Video Formats:
H.264 (AVC), AVCHD, MKV, MPEG-1, MPEG-4 part 2 (ASP), DivX, XviD, WMV*, Theora*, Dirac*, MJPEG, MSVIDEO1

Image Formats:
JPEG (420, 422, 440, EXIF Headers)*, BMP, GIF, PNG, TIFF, MJPEG

Container Formats:
Flash/FLV, Matroska, ASF, ASX, AVI, PS, M2TS, TS, 3GPP, MOV, MPEG-4, OGM, NSV*

Streaming Formats:
HTTP, UDP, UDP Multicast, UDP Unicast, RDP, RTP. RTSP, RTCP (keep alive), ASX, ASF, Multicast, HTTP Tunneling

Additional Features:
Google Data, Benchmarking, Integrated Pocket IE/IE Support, SMB Browsing

Click the Image below to start your download, any problems just let me know via the comments section below.

Enjoy!

IE NetRenderer is an awesome online tool where you can test your website specifically in Internet Explorer from version 5.5 til the latest 8.0 (currently beta).

As you can see above our hacks site works perfect and loads as it should. Do not loose out on potential sales/visitors or customers- make sure your website renders correctly and shows up as it should in all major browsers.

With IP Renderer you just choose your respective version of Internet Explorer and click “Render” and within a few seconds you will have your screen shot.

P.S If you need to test in other browsers then try Browser Shots – its also free and has loads of extra browsers to try your website on.

Enjoy!

To make PS3 backups you must download the PS3 Backup Tool 1.1 which can be found here.

The Playstation 3 tool automatically copies your system backup, while also copying and renaming the .pkg file which is required and goes on to copy the files in the correct order to get the Corrupt icon on your ps3. This is a super simplified process.

Instruction on Use:

1. Run the Program…
2. Under step 1, Select the origional ps3 system backup.
3. Under step 2, Select the .pkg file to ‘Install’ on your ps3
4. Under step 3, Select the ps3’s EXPORT folder, (on ur usb drive or external media)
5. Under step 3, Type the name of the backup, Make sure this is UNIQUE or it may crash..
6. Press Automate!
7. WAIT Untill message box say COMPLETE!
8. Done…

Download from PS3 News forums

This Video may also prove helpful:

Now go have fun PS3 fanboys!

Part 1:

Parts required are 8x M5 (10mm) machine screws, 16x size 10 nylon washers (1mm length, 5mm in the middle) and 16x metal washers 1 mm length 5mm centre.

Best of luck peeps!