Microsoft released their original version of this hardware back in 2014. The reviews were pretty mixed, with complaints about latency and connectivity. They released a new version of the Wireless Display Adapter earlier this year, and recently I put a couple of them to the test.

I decided to do some hardware upgrades this weekend, and as prices on SSD continue to drop, I found a pretty good deal at my local MicroCenter. The Crucial M4 256GB SSD normally retails for $239, but you save $50 instantly, and an additional $20 on a rebate, so you can take it home for $169 all said and done. I installed it into my Dell desktop this afternoon, and thought at the same time I would start with a fresh build from the OS on up. I timed some of these operations just to have an idea of the performance increase you can see when switching from spinning disk to SSD. Of course, this isn’t a full comparison, since I don’t have existing data on these operations, but nonetheless, we all know how long we sit and wait for a new install of Windows or Office. I’m pretty impressed…

Introduction For some time I have had a few ideas for Internet Explorer add-ons that I’d like to create.  One of the biggest challenges was with creating the wrapper that is required to encapsulate the executing code.  You could create context menu actions pretty easily through the registry, but you were limited to what you could do via JavaScript. That being said, I was doing some research to see how I could accomplish this.  Almost immediately I came across Add-In Express which makes a product called Add-In Express for Internet Explorer.  They have a number of products available that help build add-ons around Microsoft Office and Microsoft Internet Explorer. I thought I’d give it a try, so I sent them an email to see about getting an evaluation copy.  Within a couple of days they provided me with an evaluation key good for 45 days.  This would be enough time…

I’ve been very loyal to NetNewsWire for a long time. Whether it be NewsGator (a RSS plugin for Outlook), FeedDamon (an RSS feedreader app for Windows, NetNewsWire on the iPhone, or NetNewsWire on the Mac. In the fall, NetNewsWire was switched to synchronize with Google Reader accounts. I just can’t take the inconsistencies in synchronization that occur when using NetNewsWire on my Mac. I spend an hour or two going through a couple hundred or more news items all for them to reappear as unread items next sync period – sometimes, other times they stay unread. NetNewsWire is a desktop RSS application for the Mac. You can use it for free with embedded advertising, or you can buy it for $20. I’m all about supporting developers who write apps – but I can’t do that for NetNewsWire. The best alternative that I could find for now is an app called…

I was at Costco this last weekend and saw the Sony BDP-N460 Network Blu-ray Disc Player on sale for $199.  It usually sells for $249, but most places have it on sale right now.  As a side note, I wasn’t able to locate it on their website, but it was on an end-cap in one of their stores. A while back, right after Blu-ray was initially introduced, I purchased the Best Buy “Insignia” brand Blu-ray player.  I think I paid $250 for it.  Back then, if you wanted network capabilities, you had to pay a premium, now this type of functionality is pretty standard.  The Insignia model that I owned was slow to start up.  It took 30-45 seconds for it to power up before I could even insert a disc.  You can’t upgrade the firmware on it, and there are no network capabilities. That’s why the Sony was appealing. …