Blackerry Apps:
Top Free Apps from the Blackberry Store
Top Blackberry Apps from BB Geeks.
The top 10 Blackberry Apps of 2010 rated by PC Mag
Best Blackberry Apps separated by categories by Digital Trends
Great reference page of Best Free Blackberry Apps by Squidoo
Blackberry Apps for mobile picture editing
Top 40 free blackberry apps of 2010 broken down into categories
And some top blackberry apps for remote workers

iphone Apps:
Mashable’s in depth list by category of 700+ iphone apps of 2010 – This article has it all!
The Top iphone & ipad apps of the year
The Top 40 free iphone apps of 2010 by PC Mag

Android Apps:
Top 30 free Android Apps of 2010 by PC Mag
The Best of the Best 25 Android Apps
Top 10 Android Apps with video reviews
60+ awesome Android Apps

SSD drives are for performance. Gamers, Database crunchers, people who have a LOT of programmers running at one time. They are extremely fast, but there is a price. SIZE and COST. They are much smaller than regular drives and they cost a LOT more. Now, you can combine the best of both worlds to fit your budget. You could use a SSD drive for you Operating System and core programs and use a standard drive to store pictures, music, and data. This is much more cost-effective and still allows you to get the speed increase you have been wanting. I have seen systems with SSD drives load up from power on to windows 7 ready to go in 15 seconds. Yes, and that is just the start: Faster boot times and MUCH faster load times on software on the SSD. But, since they are still fairly new I recommend you have an Online Backup Solution before you make this switch. When you factor in that a year of Internet storage for your data is around $60.00 you NEED to make that investment. Time will tell if these drives are as long-lasting as they claim. Do not find out that hard way.

If you’d like a tech opinion on technology or a product feel free to contact us.

Now on to some reasons to finally dump Windows XP. One of the main reasons is Direct X. What is Direct X you say? Check out the Direct X wiki link if you want to know the full details. DirectX
Direct X is basically what handles the Video and Multimedia experience in Windows. Why does this matter to you? Grab a chair and I’ll be happy to enlighten you my young grasshopper. The current release of Direct X is 11. Windows XP will only run Direct X 9. Ahh, I can see the expression of enlightenment on your face. Yes, Windows XP is BEHIND. Two versions behind as a matter of fact. Now, a caveat: If you only use your Windows XP computer to view websites, check email and do your online banking, then you are not missing anything graphically. But, what you are missing is something security wise. Windows XP support will be terminated at some point. Microsoft dropped support for Windows XP w/ Service Pack 2 on July 13th 2010. This means that if you are not running service pack 3 you have no support from Microsoft. I’m just mentioning this because service pack 3 was the LAST XP service pack. So we are getting to the end of service life for XP. It’s time to donate those old shoes to Goodwill.

Ahh, I can see you in the back young grasshopper. You with your hand raised. You are about to tell me Vista runs Direct X 11. That Vista still has a long life left. Then why would I recommend dumping Vista. Windows 7 was done right. In all of my trips to various customers who have Windows 7, I have not heard ONE who does not like it. Microsoft finally got it right. Windows 7 merges the best of XP with the best of Vista. It’s easy to install, it’s easy to learn and it’s got a lot more features.

This brings me on to the next question I hear a lot, do I buy a new computer or do I upgrade the one I have? My normal answer to that is what type of processor does your current computer have? How much ram does it have? And how old is it? But, I’m going to tell you none of that matters. What? How can none of this matter? List up my eager computer apprentice, this holiday season will be one FULL of computer deals. There will be deals on top of deals for computers. This is the time to BUY a new computer. I am hearing rumors that prices are going to come down so much that it will be cheaper to BUY a new computer then to upgrade your current one. Take this example, you own a computer a year or so old. So you decide to upgrade, so you buy Windows 7 Home, then you realize you need more ram. And low and behold your computer only has so many ram slots so your old ram is useless and you need to buy new ram. Now you need to have a tech install it and upgrade your system. You are looking at 2-3 hours of tech work. And shame on you, you went to the local computer store. They charged you $199.00 to do the computer work. Did I mention it took 4 days? I’d say you should have called us, but today that is not the case. What? Yes, you heard me. With the price of Windows 7, the ram and the tech work you are in the $500.00 range already. DO NOT DO IT. BUY NEW. One thing we pride ourselves on here at Redline: We will not sell you something you don’t need. So yes, it’s time to wipe clean your old computers and hand them down to the kids or grandma. You will be amazed at the deals this season offers.

My friends, it is time for a new pair of shoes!

That night I got a new fan, a new follower and a connection request. A few days later, I got a phone call. It was my buddy the frustrated social media business owner. He asked me how does everything gets posted to the same place? How many hours I spent posting and what other social media platforms were there for him to maximize on? I told him that it really is quite simple how the social media platforms can be integrated through widgets. Social media is made to be simple, not overly complicated. The point of social media is to attract new potential customers, wherever they may be. You want to give people a reason to come back and find out more, and you want to give them a central location to go back to every time. If they have to hunt you down, it’s not going to happen.

There are a lot of great tools out there to help. Facebook has profile badges that you can create to put on your website. Twitter has “tweet buttons“, badges and button icons you place on your website. LinkedIn has apps that will connect your blog into your LinkedIn account. No need to multi-post. 1 post and everything is updated! There are tons of integration widgets out there. Did you know that you can even schedule your updates? Hootsuite helps you schedule your tweets in advance.

And of course, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are not the only source of social media out there. Depending on your business, business directories are a great source to find new clients. There are tons of business directories out there that you can tell your clients your on and clients can read and post reviews which helps your business build credibility: Google Local, Yelp, BizVotes, and Thumbtack to name a few.

If you’re a business that needs to drive people to you (local restaurant, shop…), get into the location based social media side. Sites like Gowalla, Foursquare and Facebook Places are very beneficial and becoming increasingly popular.

Save yourself and your business some time and take advantage of our countless hours of research and testing. Redline can help with your social media needs. Give us a call today 904-281-0009!

Where are you getting your Halloween costumes? Here are some places we’ve found on the web. Some offer discounts, free shipping over a certain amount, live chat, and the ability to search by themes.
Costume Cauldron offers live chat support, props and worldwide shipping.

SpiritHalloween offers a bit scarier costume selection. There are also locations in Jacksonville.

Costume City has a wide selection of kids’ themed costumes such as Iron Man, Avatar, Toy Story and many more. Free shipping with orders over $50.00 offered.

Costume Craze offers some family themed costumes, live chat and has a mobile site.

We’ll keep searching, in the mean time, feel free to post yours to share…

Don’t forget to visit us to find out more Redline Happenings and check out our “Featured Products”.

The whole system is based on “checking-in”. You check-in from restaurants, stores and basically any public place, you can also add a little message about where you are and what you’re doing – all very brief – and the system will then register what you’re up to. People who are your friends will then get a message to let them know where you are and your activities, and the idea is that they can then join you or visit that place later for themselves.

The fun part is that you get points for checking-in. It’s all still new, even for the developers, and much of the system is still evolving but, at the moment, you get a point for checking in, you get five points if it happens to be from a place you’ve never checked-in from before; a further point if it’s the second, third, fourth etc. and another still for checking-in multiple times in a row. Currently the points aren’t good for anything other than bragging rights but that’s plenty. There is a leader board on the site with the top users. Also, if you check-in from the same place more times and more regularly than anyone else, you become crowned Mayor of that venue- an honour that many may try for and that’s part of the fun. You can also earn badges as you check-in. There are badges for the number of times you’ve checked-in to new venue from Newbie up to Superstar, plus all sorts of random titles to earn. Developers are working with vendors and taking suggestions for all sorts of new badges.

That’s the fun side of foursquare and what users appreciate, but while all this is going on, imagine you own a restaurant, hotel, store or coffee shop and people literally compete to see who can spend the most time in your venue. They are recommending your best menu items to friends, and telling the world via Twitter and Facebook every time they walk through your door. And, you can track where they are coming from, where else they’ve been and what time of day they like to visit and gathering other very valuable feedback. Vendors should really look into getting themselves listed. How to get listed? When a foursquare user goes to a new location they go to “check-in” and the app pulls up vendors within the area, if your not on there, the foursquare user can add your establishment for others to view next time. Redline has been adding our vendors and customers whom visit throughout our weekly service calls. Foursquare has also just announced that they will be adding a dashboard with analytics for vendors. It’s currently being beta tested by about 30 vendors. Other benefits to businesses – 1. Word-of-mouth marketing: Foursquare works with Twitter and Facebook, one check-in at your restaurant or venue could be potentially viewable by thousands via users’ social networks. 2. Customer loyalty building/reward: Businesses can track customers’ visits, and can easily reward their most frequent customers. Foursquare promotes business’ “Mayor Specials,” specials for those who visit an establishment the most. 3. Recommendations from your best customers: Foursquare users can add “tips” about places, such as what to try on the menu or the best day to visit. These tips are available to anyone who checks in to your business, or even if they are close to your business.

What do we think of it? It’s definitely interesting and fun, especially if you’ve got a group of friends to play with. It’s also compatible with other social networking platforms such as Facebook, Twiiter and Osnapz. Here at Redline, our techs have been using foursquare to promote our clients that want the exposure. There have been rivalries over mayorship It’s a great exposure tool for restaurants, coffee shops, stores and other venues. We’re really looking forward to foursquare rolling out their vendor dashboard.

How do you get started? Like all social networks, just head to the foursquare site and sign up. Add a photo and find your friends. There are of course apps for the iPhone, Droid & Blackberry. Look us up on foursquare: redlineitinjax. For help getting started and more information on vendor dashboard & analytics, contact us at Redline.

references: Pocket-lint, Brainwoo, YouTube

It’s free! Just sign up for an account and you can get started. Great app for simple tutorials and a quick easy way to post by simply linking. User friendly.

There is an option to upload your video directly to YouTube, but it’s a bit flaky. It crashed on me several times and when it did work, it took forevers. If you want to upload to YouTube with ScreenToaster, the best way would be to save the screen recorder as a .mov and then go to YouTube and upload directly from there. The ScreenToaster option works just fine. I’d like to see the ability to instead of having 1 chance to pick an option (youtube, screentoaster, save as .mov or .swf) you can go back and convert or upload.

It works great for creating short little “how to” demos to post on your web site, blog, facebook, linkedin…

All in all I thought it was a neat little application that has lots of posibilities and we’re planning on using it for little online demos of “how to”. Below is a little recording we made of a request from one of our fans – facebook chat emoticons. We made the recording, saved it as a .mov and uploaded from our YouTube account.

Feel free to drop us a line if you have any more questions about ScreenToaster, have something you want us to demo, or have an app you want us to test out.

1. Avoid opening e-mail attachments from people you don’t know. This should go without saying, but there are definitely people that still do this. E-mails can contain self-running executable files which can have a field day with your computer if you actually run them. Fortunately most e-mail providers do not allow the .exe file extention to be sent, but there are exceptions and alternate self-installing file types.

2. Avoid installing Active X controls from untrusted sources. This is the one that I feel most people fall victim to, simply because a lot of times these can be legitimate. You have probably seen the bar below your address bar pop up on occasion, telling you that you need to install something to view this page properly. These are extensions for your internet browser that normally allow you to do just that; however in cases of illegitamate Active X controls you can be installing a peice of malware strait to your computer.

3. Avoid running/saving executable files from the internet. This should also go without saying, but I have found several people literally install these programs themselves or run them just to close the window when it pops up. If you are not actively searching for a specific file to be downloaded, chances are any window popping up asking to be run or saved to your computer is not something you want to be doing. Get in the habit of pressing the ‘x’ in the top right hand side of these windows to close them, rather then pressing the run/save/ok/cancel buttons.

4. Avoid unnecesary Facebook applications. If you have used Facebook, you have probably heard of these. They are installed much like Active X controls to your browser, so follow the same steps here as you would with Active X controls. While it may seem nice to have an app that posts smiley faces on your freinds wall, is it really necesary and worth the risk?

5. Avoid questionable websites. Yeah, the seedier the website you are going to, the more likely it is that is have little to no restrictions on what content can be placed on it. These sites are not picky with advertisers, simply because they need more cash to run, so they do not put limitations on what can be displayed in banner advertisements, or scripts that can be run on their site. Yes, that does mean you should probably not be browsing porn sites on your work computer.

If you have any questions, feel free to comment here, or if you managed to fall victim to a piece of malware despite my advice, give us a call at the office to get it cleaned up for you (281-0009)!