Mom Central » Tech Dad’s Blog

Logitech Product Reviews for “Work from Home Week”

Ron Remy — Fri, 13 Oct 2017 18:58:27 +0000

Work from home week may seem like a nice change of pace for some office warriors, but for my colleagues and I, it Read more...

Can Your Bluetooth Earbuds Survive My Golf Swing?

Ron Remy — Wed, 13 Apr 2016 18:03:00 +0000

Disclosure: We received a set of HA-EBT5 Bluetooth Sport Earphones in order to facilitate this review. All opinions are our own.

A few weeks Read more...

Travel Bags that Withstand Even the Philly Airport

Ron Remy — Wed, 23 Mar 2016 18:24:32 +0000

Disclosure: We received samples of these bags in order to facilitate our review. All opinions are our own.

With 9 business trips already Read more...

FAST & FUEL

Ron Remy — Sat, 25 Jan 2014 22:13:08 +0000

Cloud computing is like the Borg – “Resistance is Futile”. So it was refreshing to visit a storage manufacturer during CES 2014 that gets it. I spent time with Seagate / LaCie learning about their new product lines and came away impressed. Instead of trying to fight cloud storage, their new offerings adhere to some very well though out axioms:

- Products should complement the cloud by integrating with existing cloud services

- The physical design should be simple and attractive

- The user interface, specifically for smartphones and tablets, should be consistent and easy-to-use across devices

Battle of the Nest – Part 1

Ron Remy — Mon, 16 Dec 2013 03:50:26 +0000

Never has a product been more divisive in our house than the Nest automated thermostats – I love them and they are the bane of my spouse's existence.

The Evolution of the Flat Screen TV

Ron Remy — Sun, 15 Dec 2013 16:53:11 +0000

A colleague of mine recently commented, “There’s not much going on with TVs. They’re all the same.“ I was about to start an argument on the benefits of having new models featuring six HMDI ports versus only four but I realized that on the surface, my colleague was correct. The flat screen revolution is behind us – however TVs (or rather video viewing) is now evolving and changes may come from different areas than we expect.

First a quick story on the flat screen revolution and why it's over. Earlier this year, I decided to replace an old picture tube-based TV with a flat screen. The old 35” screen worked fine, but with no HD capability it was time for an upgrade. Getting rid of the old TV proved to be really problematic:

The Future of Wireless Routing

Ron Remy — Sun, 24 Mar 2013 14:29:41 +0000

In the wireless world, faster is always better. But there are a few key concepts to keep in mind – bands, standards, bandwidth and range.

Bands: You will be seeing a lot of “dual band” devices. This means that the wireless signal operates in two different bands – 2.4 GHz and 5 GHz. You can segment your wireless traffic on the two bands. For instance, you can put your video streaming devices on one band and your web browsing on a different band to maximize performance.

2.4 GHz – this is the traditional WiFi band. It offers decent range and excellent interoperability between devices. One issue, however, is that 2.4 GHz radio waves are absorbed by water–containing vessels such as the human body.

My iPad Smells Like a New Car

Ron Remy — Sun, 24 Feb 2013 16:17:16 +0000

So I’m wandering around the CES show between meetings and suddenly realize that it smells awesome. Where is that new car smell coming from? I keep looking and stumble upon a booth specializing in leather cases for all of your iOS, Android and Blackberry devices. I’m talking perfectly fitted cases crafted from real leather that smell like the inside of a new car. The booth is run by Mapi Cases and they are showing off their entire line; wall-to-wall leather cases for every device imaginable.

Airline Madness – Why you should ALWAYS use advanced check-in

Ron Remy — Sun, 26 Aug 2012 13:45:02 +0000

A few months ago, on a return trip through the Cincinnati Airport, I learned the hard way why you should always check-in to a flight online in advance. I was coming home from a business trip the night before my son's high school graduation. With over two hours before departure, my colleague and I decided to get some dinner and then head to the airport. We finished dinner with plenty of time to spare, returned the rental car and walked up to the Departures area leisurely. I stepped up to one kiosk to check-in while my colleague went to another.

I punched in my frequent flyer number, brought up my reservation and the dreaded message, "Please see an agent" appeared on the screen. My colleague, boarding pass in hand, turned and said. "Did you check-in in advance? I checked in on my smartphone while you were presenting to our client. I just needed to print out my boarding pass."

So at 43 minutes prior to the scheduled departure time, I flagged down a gate agent in the otherwise empty terminal. The dialogue that followed was eye-opening:

"Hi, can you help me check-in please. I had trouble with the kiosk"

Traveling Without a Laptop – Day 3

Ron Remy — Sat, 28 Jul 2012 21:52:04 +0000

It's now time to display a presentation on the road without my laptop. First I have to get my slide deck ready to go on my iPad. I am a hardcore PowerPoint user so step one is converting the file over to Keynote so that I can display it on the tablet.

Before I left home, I imported the file by opening it using Keynote on my Mac. The import worked well with only a few minor positioning tweaks needed to some of the graphic images. I then copied the file over to my iPad using iTunes and was ready to go.