Danie van der Merwe

How-To Geek Tested: Should You Unplug Chargers When You’re Not Using Them?

Thu, 09 Mar 2023 19:57:04 +0100

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

Well, this is interesting as we often have more than one fast-charger plugged in around the house. I had noticed mine are all 'cool' without anything plugged in. So this was a fascinating report to read. They dig down into the approximate costs per year, too. Of course, old chargers maybe a different situation altogether.

Smartphone and laptop chargers use a negligible amount of idle power when left plugged in. Other kinds of chargers vary significantly, however, and it's worth checking their power consumption or just unplugging them to play it safe.

"Measuring such low wattage consumption with consumer devices is tricky, but it’s safe to estimate a power charger with no attached load (no device plugged in and charging) draws between 0.05W to 0.1W or less of power in standby mode. This series of tests conducted by an electrical engineer with more advanced equipment than ours supports our estimate, as he found chargers had a similar range, as does this extensive Department of Energy analysis."

"To put that low level of power consumption in perspective, most LED light bulbs use between 5-7 watts of power. So to even approach the power draw of leaving a single energy-efficient LED light bulb on, you’d need to plug in around 100 cellphone chargers."

See Tested: Should You Unplug Chargers When You’re Not Using Them?

#technology #chargers #power

How much energy do your smartphone, laptop, and tablet chargers really use? What about laptop and tool chargers? Should you unplug them when you aren’t using them to save power and money? We measured exactly how much power a variety of common chargers use—and how much keeping them plugged in will cost you each year.

technology chargers power

How to Electronically Sign PDF Documents Across Various OSs, Without Printing and Scanning Them

Thu, 09 Mar 2023 12:47:13 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

You’ve been emailed a document, and you have to sign it and send it back. You could print out the document, sign it, and then scan it back in and email it. But there’s a better, faster way.

This article shows you how to quickly add your signature to any PDF document, saving it as a standard PDF file that can be read anywhere. You can do this on Windows, Mac, iPad, iPhone, Android, Chrome OS, Linux — whatever platform you prefer.

I've been using Master PDF Editor on Linux for a while, mainly because I often have to paste signatures in (and Okular does not do that at all - yes really odd) but I now tried Xournal and yes it does all I need as well as much more. Maybe now, too, Google's GDrive will also allow the form filling and signing (it's not mentioned in this article as it's quite a new feature).

See How to Electronically Sign PDF Documents Without Printing and Scanning Them

#technology #PDF #signature

You’ve been emailed a document, and you have to sign it and send it back. You could print out the document, sign it, and then scan it back in and email it. But there’s a better, faster way.

technology PDF signature

Stranded motorist effects own rescue by attaching his phone to a drone and sending it up to higher altitude

Wed, 08 Mar 2023 18:51:18 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

Rather than wandering off on foot in search of help, he stayed with his vehicle, which provided shelter from the elements. Conveniently, he also happened to have a drone along with him, which provided him with an opportunity to get some help. After typing a detailed text message to a friend describing his situation and exact location, he attached the phone to his drone and sent it straight up a couple of hundred feet — enough to get a line-of-sight connection to a cell tower.

When he brought the drone back down a few minutes later, he found that the queued text had been sent, and the cavalry was on the way. The Search and Rescue unit was able to locate him, and as a bonus, also found someone else nearby who had been stranded for days.

See Stranded Motorist Effects Own Rescue Using A Drone And A Cell Phone

#technology #drone #SOS

If you’re looking for a good excuse to finally buy a drone, you probably can’t do better than claiming it can save your life. Granted, you may never find yourself in the position of bei…

technology SOS drone

If you're really BRAVE you can upgrade the RAM on your Raspberry Pi 4 to 8 GB

Wed, 08 Mar 2023 12:16:37 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

Whether the reason is Pi's are really difficult to get hold of, or you just needed more RAM on an existing Pi, it is technically quite possible to upgrade it yourself. The video in the linked article below demonstrates it being done.

You get a compatible RAM chip somewhere like Aliexpress – lucky for us, those come equipped with a set of balls from the factory. The default balls are made of lead-free solder, and MadEDoctor reballed the RAM chip with leaded solder balls to lower the melting point, but it’s by no means a requirement that you do the same.

In fact, you only need a hot air gun, flux, a soldering iron and some solder wick to perform the replacement – no reballing equipment.

The "brave" part is whether you feel comfortable heating the board up in this way and getting all those pins loosened, and the board cleaned. That said, I've heated my TV's motherboard in the oven to solve a dry solder joint issue, and it is 100% many years later still.

See Upgrade RAM On Your Pi 4, The Fun Way

#technology #raspberrypi

The Raspberry Pi shortage has been a meme in hacker circles for what feels like an eternity now, and the Pi 4 seems to be most affected – though, maybe it’s just its popularity. Neverth…

technology RaspberryPi

Satellite Internet packages in South Africa — Speeds and prices compared

Tue, 07 Mar 2023 21:48:00 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

South Africans living in rural areas without mobile or fixed network coverage can get Internet access through a satellite broadband provider.

Starlink may have less latency and higher speeds, but it is not yet available in South Africa, and many of these existing services start from around only R710 per month. But note the fair use policies and any contract lock in periods.

See Satellite Internet packages in South Africa — Speeds and prices compared

#technology #southafrica #satellite #rural

Starlink seems to be struggling to clear South Africa’s regulatory hurdles but there are already several satellite Internet providers available in the country.

technology southafrica rural satellite

Analytico investigation: Data worth thousands disappearing from South Africa's Cell C SIMs even when mobile data is disabled

Tue, 07 Mar 2023 16:13:28 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

An investigation by Analytico has revealed that data disappears from Cell C SIMs connected to a 4G network even when mobile data is disabled.

Analytico performed separate tests for disappearing airtime and data with SIMs from all four major network operators in South Africa.

The SIMs were inserted into identical Nokia 5 devices.

These devices run a near-stock version of Android and provide easy access to settings to disable mobile data use for all apps.

Mobile data use is also disabled for individual apps, and the devices are also connected to a stable Wi-Fi connection to provide alternative Internet access for any necessary services.

This latest test by Analytico shows that Vodacom may have made changes that prevent end users from being billed for internal signalling, as the Vodacom balance also remained constant for the whole period. Only the Cell C SIM lost data over ten days, while the rest of the SIMs kept their original balance.

Very interesting, as obviously Vodacom had a similar issue, but they seemed to have zero-rated their portion of the data. This is especially painful for the poorer subscribers, who can anyway only afford a little data.

See Data worth thousands disappearing from Cell C

#technology #southafrica #CellC #mobiledata

Vodacom appears to have finally fixed its disappearing data problem for devices on its 4G network. Cell C has not.

technology SouthAfrica CellC

Beloved iOS app GoodNotes finally comes to Android, now in beta

Tue, 07 Mar 2023 16:11:23 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

Goodnotes was/is my go to notes app on my iPad. It was excellent bang for the buck with a once off payment. I used it for any handwritten meeting notes, and also if I needed to sketch diagrams for anything.

Now it's getting stated with testing on Android in a limited-seat beta. Participants get full access to the app for free during the test period (the iOS version has some features behind a paywall), but there are still a couple big limitations here.

Maybe the biggest right now is that the GoodNotes beta only works on Samsung Galaxy tablets with an 8-inch display or larger, and at least 3GB of RAM. Enthusiastic redditors point out that this is a Progressive Web App (PWA), which could be detrimental to the overall user experience (while also needing constant internet access).

GoodNotes plans to add support for more Android tablets in the future, but makes it clear the Android app is separate from the iOS version. Unfortunately, that means that notes made on the former won't sync with the latter, taking a lot of the air out of this new release.

So yes, far from perfect right now on Android. On Android, I've actually already been using Sketchbook and been pretty happy with it. So for me, it will come down to a comparison between those two.

See Beloved iOS app GoodNotes finally comes to Android, now in beta

#technology #goodnotes #notes #android

Award-winning App Store app, GoodNotes, makes its Android debut

technology notes goodnotes Android

Moon "mode" photo taken on my Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra

Mon, 06 Mar 2023 21:03:33 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

The phone uses AI to recognise it as a moon photo, and opens an aiming square (top left of the screenshot) which helps find the moon at full 100x digital zoom.

It uses AI to slightly enhance the photo as normally at 100x digital zoom this would be pretty blurry, actually. So not going to replace a DSLR quite yet, but a nice and easy shot (just mounted on a tripod).

#moon #fullmoon #samsunggalaxys23ultra #capetown

technology fullmoon SamsungGalaxyS23Ultra

OBS Studio Movable Pointer Overlay For Superimposed Images Or Videos

Sun, 05 Mar 2023 22:35:54 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

Having a mouse pointer captured as part of a desktop being streamed, is quite easy. But I wanted to have various images and videos superimposed over that desktop view in OBS Studio, and the mouse pointer then disappears behind those images or videos. I've noticed this happening with some videos I've done, and although I'm seeing the mouse pointer on the screen I'm capturing, it is hidden from viewers by the superimposed images I added via OBS Studio. Searching for solutions kept bringing back to how to capture the mouse pointer with a basic desktop streaming capture.

So I thought of this really simple solution by just creating a new source from a suitable image, and manipulating it on the OBS Studio monitor screen. The effect is seamless for viewers, who then see the "pointer" moving and pointing to whatever I'm discussing. It hardly warranted having this video done, but may save some others a few minutes of head scratching.

Watch

OBS Studio Movable Pointer Overlay For Superimposed Images Or Videos

#technology #OBSStudio #OBS #pointer #cursor

Having a mouse pointer captured as part of a desktop being streamed, is quite easy. But I wanted to have various images and videos superimposed over that des...

technology OBS OBSStudio cursor pointer

Audible and Beyond: A Guide to the Best Audiobook Services

Sun, 05 Mar 2023 17:09:19 +0100

Danie van der Merwe

gadgeteer@hub.netzgemeinde.eu

There’s more than one way to enjoy a good book. You can read it in the form of an eBook on a Kindle, or take it in the good old-fashioned way as a physical book. However, these options don’t always work. The good news is that audiobooks exist, and there is no storage of amazing audiobook services to help you enjoy them.

To help you select the best service to help you get your book fix, Review Geek highlights the best audiobook services. They cover the better-known options like Audible and Scribd as well as services you might not have heard of like GraphicAudio. Also, keep in mind that Apple Books and Books on Google Play both have an excellent selection of audiobooks.

See Audible and Beyond: A Guide to the Best Audiobook Services

#technology #audiobooks #reading #books

There’s more than one way to enjoy a good book. You can read it in the form of an eBook on a Kindle or take it in the good old fashioned way as a physical book. However, these options don’t always work. The good news is that audiobooks exist, and there is no storage of amazing audiobook services to help you enjoy them.

technology reading audiobooks books