Things to know before buying a new laptop or desktop computer

I purchased my laptop on 09^th Aug 2007. Those days, I was not that much technically sound in hardware. But, I compared a lot models, explored technology forums and after in depth comparative study, I made a decision on a model (HP Pavillion dv 6516tx). Most of people blindly purchase laptop or desktop computer without understanding the technical details of the configuration. In the article, Laptop or Desktop Computer - what should I purchase? I discussed about the best computer match for you. Here, I am going to discuss about importance of each key part of computer system. In this article, some parts of computer will not be applicable for laptop computer like monitor, keyboard but other parts will be same for both.

1.  Processor: This is one of the most important parts of computer system. As the name suggest, it processes/controls all activities of computer system with the help of operating system. I recommend Intel processor because they have a very good research in the development of desktop processors. It is always better to buy higher bit processor i.e. 64 bits processor is better than 32 bits processor, provided that, operating system and all other software will be of 64 bits.

2.    Cache memory: This is one of the ignored parts of computer system but cache memory is very important in terms of speed of computer system. Processor uses the cache memory to store frequently required data.

3.   RAM: This is the second most important part of computer system after processor. RAM is working space of computer system i.e. all the computer operations are carried out in RAM. If computer has a large RAM, then big number of applications can be run simultaneously.

4.   Operating System: This is another most important part of computer system. Processor controls all computer activities through operating system. Unless and until, there is no good software to run the hardware, that hardware will not make sense, so operating system plays a big role in operating computer system. Though, the system has a fast processor and large RAM and not compatible operating system then the PC will not give a better performance. For example, if processor is 64 bits and the operating system is 32 bits then that hardware utilise its half working capacity and half will be idle. So, 64 bits operating system and software should be installed on the system.

5.      Hard disk: This is used to store the data like documents, music files, photos, and videos. Usually people give more important to the hard disk size, but I don’t. I suggest do not buy a large capacity hard disk, rather you should buy additional external hard disk (preferably, solid state drive) to safely save the data. Don’t think about storing about videos and music files just think about your personal data, because you can transfer the music files and videos from someone but once your personal data gets loss then it cannot be recovered.

Hard disk is used to store the data like text documents, audio file or video files. Usually people think to have big size storage medium. But in my view, you should purchase maximum 500 GB hard disk because our personal data (not music files and movies) does not exceed 500 GB. I would recommend extra 500 GB external hard disk to store your personal data as a back safely.

6.    Graphics Card: This is the part of computer system that helps the processor to process the graphics stuff i.e. picture, video or animation. So, this is an additional processor to handle graphics. Usually, people buy this part without knowing its use. Actually, this should be purchased by those who professionally work in graphics and multimedia field like animators, graphics editors etc or CAD design field or HD game lovers. The users who don’t play HD games, those should not buy graphics card, it will unnecessarily increase the cost of computer system. The graphics card produces heat and if computer system has not proper air ventilation then system will be heated and this may cause IC burning problem. I have experienced the same incident. I talked with technician; he told me that most of such problems happened in summer.

7.   Battery: This part is not applicable for desktop computer but for laptop this is an important part. Average battery life of laptop computer is 2-3 years provided that you have used it properly. If you want to extend the battery life period then follow the rule that - “Plug charger to laptop when battery goes below 10% and completely charge it until it reaches to 100%. Do not plug in charger until it reaches to 10%”. Replacing battery with new one is the recurring expense for the laptop.

8.     Monitor: This is most known part of computer system. The monitor is used to display the output through screen. Technically, screen is the display device not monitor. The screen is fitted in monitor so in general speaking monitor is called display device. LED monitor/ screen should be purchased because of low consumption of electricity. In my opinion, touch screen should not be purchased because it is impractical to use touch screen for a big display devices. It is ok with mobile devices like cell phone or phablet or tablet.

9.   Fan: Fan is used to drain out heat which is generated by electronic components of computer. There should be sufficient heat sink for the computer.

10. USB Port: USB port facilitates faster communication between computer and external devices. There should be at least 3 USB ports to the system. In which at least one port should be USB 3.0 or eSATA or Thunderbolt because these are the next generation port for faster data transfer.

11.  Keyboard: Keyboard is used to give inputs to computer system. The inputs are in the forms of text or commands. I would recommend using HCL keyboard.

12. Mouse: Mouse is used to handle various computer activities like clicking, dragging etc. You can use USB wired or wireless mouse, but wireless mouse are expensive. For laptop users, I would recommend use mouse rather than touchpad. It’s easy to handle the computer through mouse. 

     In my view, while purchasing a computer, you need to select good & high speed processor and large RAM by considering a long term view.

Laptop or Desktop Computer - what should I purchase?

Since 14 years, many people asked me this question. In my view, answer of the question varies according to individual's requirement. I experienced that, while buying a computer most of the people get confused due to misguided suggestions from seller or non-technical person. Here, I tried to consider different scenarios to answer the question. Consider the following scenarios,

§  If you are a general user who surf web and use computer for personal use (like letter typing, home budgeting) then you should buy desktop computer only. Desktop computer is robust and cheap for maintenance.

§  If you are a businessman or marketing person who is frequently traveller then surely netbook, laptop or notebook (preferably Netbook) should be the best choice. Netbook is a light weight laptop which has basic computing facilities. Notebook is light weight, thin, advanced but expensive laptop.

§  If you are a small scale businessman (like medical, shop owner) who need to enter the data and take a print outs then buy a low-middle range desktop computer.

§  If you are a student, you need computer for education purpose and you stay at one place only then I suggest you to buy a low-middle range desktop computer. A desktop computer is easily upgradable and low maintenance as compare to laptop. If you are reallocating student then laptop may be the choice.

§  If you are an mechanical or civil engineering, geospatial technology or multimedia  student/user who use software like AutoCAD, ProE, ArcGIS, Erdas, 3DMax then you can purchase big screen high range laptop or workstations with ATI or nVIDIA graphics card  as per the budget.

§  If you are a game lover then buy a big screen desktop computer with ATI or nVIDIA graphics card. Laptop’s keyboard maintenance is not affordable because if any key fails, you need to replace whole keypad. Also, game playing experience is enjoyable at big screen only.

One more question arises while buying desktop computer, should I purchase branded (Like HP, Dell) or assembled computer? Today, desktop computer prices are very low, so if you have good budget then you can buy branded computer. I suggest HP or Dell as brands to purchase for laptop as well as desktop computer. If you know an authentic seller for assembled computer then you can purchase assembled computer. I give emphasis on authentic seller because duplicate parts are available in the market with the same brand name.

Note: Technology is changing extremely fast, so what you buy today, it will be outdated after 5 years.

How to make your strong and easily recallable password?

Nowadays, people are becoming more and more social, not in living life but in digital life. When you register for some social networking web site or some emailing service or some web service, you need to decide your password to login and use that service. So password plays crucial role in digital life. One survey regarding password says that “password”, “12345” and “qwerty” are the most common passwords of new users. There is a fear of stealing your digital identity by hacking or cracking your password this is why you need a strong password. I am sharing some tips to make strong password and in the latter part of this article, I am sharing how to remember long and strong password easily.

• The thumb rule for strong password is making it as long as you can, minimum 8 characters are recommended.
• Go for combinations of letters (uPPer and LOweR case), numbers and special symbols.
• Have a fun with characters and symbols e.g. bOMb@y2g0A (in simple bombay2goa…….I used @ instead of ‘a’ in Bombay and zero (0) instead of O in goa)
• Avoid easily guessable words like your first name, last name, cell number, birth place, company name from your password.
• Avoid dictionary words in the password because these are easily crackable.
• Use local language word in the password. E.g. “Mera Bharat Mahan” can be “meRabhARatmaHAn”
• Use initial letters of each word from some proverb or sentence.  e.g.  “Olive oil contains high amounts of monounsaturated fat” the password may be “oochaomf”
• Do not use same password for all usernames.
• Revive your password in 2-3 months.

Some examples of strong passwords,

physics experiment – phY$icsXperiment

unsolved mystery – Un$0lved_mYstry

traumatic time – traUmat!c#t!me

Wealth and power – We@LthNpOwR

Life is about being aware of things around – liAbaoTa

My Daughter, Akshaya, Born On 2^nd May 2014 – mdAbo2M14

We have many usernames and many passwords, so how can we remember all passwords? Now, I am going to share the tricks to remember the password. First you have to make one strong password on the basis of above guidelines. Then append shortcut word of the web site at end or in middle of that strong password.

e.g. The password “hUw!fstd” which is derived from “Here yoU Will Find SomeThing Different”

The password of Gmail may be - hUw!fstd _gml

The password of Facebook may be - hUw!fstd _FbK

The password of Yahoo may be - hUw!fstd _Y00

The password of Flipkart may be - hUw!fstd _fLkP

MS Word bugs and solutions

After Microsoft’s XP, I am a big fan of MS Office 2007. I frequently use MS word and while working with MS Word, I found two bugs that I am sharing today. One bug is regarding sub-numbering system and other regarding changing case of the line.

Sub-numbering system:

Suppose I want to give sub-numbering (like 2.1, 2.2, 2.3) to the text. As per my best knowledge, MS Office does not directly provide such facility to number. The default numbering system is shown in the first figure.

 

Default Numbering System

I need to change the numbering format to give such numbering. If you notice the first figure then you can see 1 (highlighted) in the ‘Number format’ section. If you put 2 after 1 i.e. (1.2) then the numbering will be like 1.2, 2.2, 3.2, but you need a different series. For this, you need to change ‘Number format’ as shown in second figure. You need to put 2. before the highlighted 1, then your numbering series is like 2.1, 2.2, 2.3

There is another manual method to give such numbering. Just type 1.1 then type the text you want then press “Enter” 1.2 will be automatically appeared. But this will not work with 2.1, 2.2….

If you need a series like 3.a, 3.b, 3.c then you needs to select a, b, c from ‘Number style’ as shown in the third figure. Then add 3. before the a in the ‘Number format’ as shown in the fourth figure.

Changing case of the line:

With the change case tool, you can change the case of text to other types.  When I was changing the case of line to ‘Sentence case”, then there is no effect on the line. I have to convert it to ‘UPPERCASE’ or ‘lowercase’ then to ‘Sentence case”.

Note: If you find better solution, please share with me.

Interesting solutions for Fibonacci series (0,1,1,2,3,5,8,13,…) in C++ Language

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=0,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                cout<<a<<"\n";

                                x=a+b;

                                a=b;

                                b=x;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                cout<<a<<"\n";

                                b=a+b;

                                a=b-a;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=0,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                cout<<x<<"\n";

                                a=b;

                                b=x;

                                x=a+b;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=0,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                x=a+b;

                                cout<<a<<"\n";

                                a=b;

                                b=x;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=0,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                cout<<a<<"\n";

                                a=b;

                                b=a+x;

                                x=a;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=0,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                cout<<x<<"\n";

                                a=b;

                                b=a+x;

                                x=a;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=1,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                n=n-2;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                cout<<0<<"\n";

                cout<<1<<"\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                a=b;

                                b=a+x;

                                x=a;

                                cout<<a<<"\n";

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

#include<iostream.h>

#include<conio.h>

void main()

{

                int x=0,a=0,b=1,n;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Enter how many no to print in fib series\n";

                cin>>n;

                n=n-2;

                clrscr();

                cout<<"Fibonacci Series is: \n\n";

                cout<<0<<"\n";

                cout<<1<<"\n";

                while(n>0)

                {

                                x=a+b;

                                cout<<x<<"\n";

                                a=b;

                                b=x;

                                n--;

                }

                getch();

}

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Output:

Enter how many no to print in fib series

10

Fibonacci Series is:

0

1

1

2

3

5

8

13

21

34

Future of Computing

Can you imagine your desktop or laptop without Hard disk? In current situation, absolutely not! But in near future, we will to say bye-bye to our hard disk. 

No doubt, hard disk plays crucial role as a secondary storage medium but technology is growing very fast. When I started my computer science study in 2000, I started with 10 GB hard disk. Now-a-days, it is in TBs. By technology advancement, not only storage capacity increased but also dimensions are decreased. 2X1 cm data (memory) card can store no of GB data.

In 21^st century, human’s life is very fast, we need instant things like instant coffee, instant food, instant money, etc. Human’s life become very easy with the use of ICT, but for that we need instance access to personal data and applications. If you don’t have access to your data, i.e. you don’t have your desktop PC or notebook with you then you are wedged to this situation. To thrash such situation, you have to keep your all data and applications in your pocket which is not good and feasible solution or you can keep your data and applications at some remote location and which can be accessed through internet. Currently, similar concept is implemented as thin client in our client/server model. In thin client, there is no hard disk attached to PC, all data will be stored in and accessed from central hard disk, i.e. server’s hard disk. This architecture saves not only the cost but also electrical energy.

World is shifting towards cloud computing. The cloud computing is a technology which allows you to store your data and applications over internet in a protected form. You can store everything like Softwares, Movies, Music, and Documents in the cloud (storage center). Now-a-days, cloud computing is not a regular practice, large organizations are using it, but in near future it will be a common practice. Currently, companies like Google, Microsoft, Amazon are providing the cloud computing on commercial as well as free basis (Google Drive, Microsoft SkyDrive)

In June 2011, Google has launched its next generation laptop named as Chromebook. The Chromebook will not have its own Hard Disk (only minimal space for secondary storage); all data will be stored in the Google’s cloud. This is the step towards using the cloud computing at personal level. Recently, IITs have launched world’s cheapest Tablet PC named as Aakash II. Tablet PC has very less internal and external storage so they will also alternatively use cloud computing technology. Cloud computing requires a Web connection to access the contents of cloud. In the country like India where we are struggling for a getting Web connection, that’s why it will take time to widespread use of cloud computing.

Nanotechnology will play crucial role in storage technology of computing. Currently magnetic technology will be replaced by nano-chips to store a large amount of data. In nano-chips, we can store ample amount of data with a very low cost.

DNA computing is a form of computing which uses DNA, biochemistry and molecular biology, instead of the traditional silicon-based computer technologies. DNA computing, or, more generally, biomolecular computing, is a fast developing interdisciplinary area. DNA has capabilities to transfer the data faster than electrons to have effective communication in computer system. These computers will be eco-friendly computers. The research and development in this area concerns theory, experiments and applications of DNA computing.

In future, we may have chemical based computer. Chemical computer also called reaction-diffusion computer, BZ computer (stands for Belousov–Zhabotinsky computer) or gooware computer. These computers will be based on a semi-solid chemical "soup" where data is represented by varying concentrations of chemicals. The computations are performed by naturally occurring chemical reactions. So far it is still in a very early experimental stage, but may have great potential for the computer industry.

Ultrabook is the slimmest version of laptop. These laptops are the very expensive in cost but they are very versatile, you can easily make them move. This kind of laptop will be popular in business but I think this will not good buy for common people.

Tablet PC (or simply tablet) is a small (not smallest) size handheld PC. By dimension, it lies between smart phone and Netbook. Tablet PC comes in 7” or 10” sizes. Tablet PC’s touch screen, GPS and motion sensor are the very attractive features to users. People loves touch experience (which is lacking in laptop and desktops). No doubt, tablet PC will be popular because of their low cost, but doubt about the usability of tablet PC. For miniature work or entertainment, it’s fine to use Tablet PC but if you want to work hard (say for 5 hours) then surely tablet PC will not good deal. Second thing that I experienced that you are getting that working feel like laptop because apps are in compact version. You have to rely on laptop or Netbook.

Netbook is a small size laptop which is low configured small screen laptop. Netbook is internet ready machine to easily access the Web. It has very less internal storage memory so we can keep our documents in cloud.

This is a snapshot of future computing but science also experienced magic which is called Eureka, so you can also expect some Eureka in computing also.