Buying A New Computer? Our Definitive Guide On How To Pick The Best Parts

Purchasing a new computer is a big deal. If you're a MakeUseOf reader there's a decent chance that your computer is your most important electronics device. It can be used for work and play and even people who aren't particularly technical often find themselves using a PC for several hours every day.
Buying the right PC with the right parts can mean the difference between years of pleasurable PC use and years of feeling like you were ripped off. But how do you know what to buy? How do you make sense of the components? Let's go through the typical PC piece-by-piece.

The Heart Of Your PC - The Processor

The processor seems like a nice place to start. It has a significant impact on performance and will also dictate the motherboard you buy.
Performance tends to fall into two categories, per-core and multi-core performance. Per-core performance is the amount of grunt a single core can muster. It's important because many applications still are not will optimized for more than one or two threads. Dual-cores are still adequate for basic entertainment PCs, low-end gaming rigs and office computers.
With that said, multi-core performance does become important in applications that can use multiple threads well. An application that's well coded for multiple cores may run nearly twice as quick as it would on a dual-core. Quad-cores are also affordable and becoming more affordable every year, so it's a good idea to buy one if you consider yourself a demanding user.
There are three resources that have charts that judge the latest processors - PassMark, Tom's Hardware and Anandtech. Each site maintains a benchmark database that is constantly updated, making it easy to compare the latest products.

The Bones Of Your PC - The Motherboard

If you buy a computer from a major manufacturer you will not be able to choose your motherboard. Boutiques like Falcon Northwest and Velocity Micro may give you a choice, however. And you can pick whatever you'd like if you build your own.
Motherboards have almost no impact on performance. They are best judged by their features. Different motherboards may have different BIOS, different fan speed controls and different ports selection. High-end motherboards will include features that make them easier to overclock or allow the use of multiple video cards.
Some recent motherboards are starting to use a replacement for BIOS known as the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface. It serves the same function as BIOS but it can handle mouse input and be designed with a more user friendly graphical interface. UFEI is a nice feature to have, but some implementations of it could use some work. Performance and interface issues plague the worst examples of the breed.
If you want the easy route, go to your favorite computer hardware retailer and pick the motherboard with the best customer reviews. If more research doesn't bother you, go to The Tech Report, Anandtech and PC Perspective to read the latest motherboard reviews.

Remembering The Groceries - RAM

RAM, your computer's short-term memory, used to be a big deal. These days it's a basic commodity. Yes, there is a difference between RAM speeds, but not outside some very niche scenarios. And yes, more is better, but the benefit of exceeding what you need is slim. Most people can buy 4GB (for a typical home PC) or 8-16GB (for a gaming rig or workstation) and be done with it.
If you are building your own system be careful to buy the correct RAM. Today's most common standard is DDR3-1333, but that could change in the future. Your motherboard determines RAM compatibility so just read its specification sheet to find out what you need. You can usually find this listed at online retailers or the manufacturer website.
You should also buy two RAM sticks of the same capacity and speed unless your motherboard relies on tri-channel memory (as is the case with a few Intel chipsets) in which case you'll want to buy three identical modules. Again, reference the motherboard's specifications find out what is recommend for your build. Using multiple RAM modules of different size won't crash your computer but it will reduce memory performance.

Remembering Your 12^th Birthday - The Hard Drive

You have some decisions to make when buying long-term memory. Solid state drives are extremely quick, but also expensive. Most people can't afford to use them as their only form of storage. Mechanical drives are the best bet for storing a lot of data.
But why choose? If you have some money to spend, buy both. A 120GB solid state drive isn't outrageously expensive and is large enough to fit your operating system and a few critical programs. You can then add in a 1TB mechanical drive for mass storage.
If your budget is tight, go with the fastest mechanical drive you can reasonably afford. This will usually be a 7,200RPM drive. It can't match the access times of a solid state drive but transfer speeds are adequate.

Gaming Delight - The Discrete Video Card

Intel likes to claim its integrated graphics solution is great for gamers. AMD likes to say the same. Frankly, it's all baloney, and probably will always be baloney. Integrated graphics can be used to play games in the same way a butter knife can be used to cut steak. It can be done, but you won't enjoy doing it.
Discrete video cards are as complex as processors and even more important to gaming performance. There's no particular rule of thumb that applies. Just check the performance benchmarks at Passmark, Tom's Hardware and Anandtech.
You should also pay attention to video card reviews. It's common for a video card manufacturer to use a custom design which changes the cooling solution and overclocks the card. You'll need to read reviews of the card you're considering to see how these changes impact performance.
For further information check out my articles on buying the right video card, new video card features and the impact of multiple video cards (SLI/CrossFireX) on gaming performance.

Keeping It Cool

All processors (besides OEM parts) and computer cases come with fans for cooling. They are usually a bit cheap, however. You can improve cooling and reduce noise by going with a custom solution.
Systems without an overclocked processor can easily have the processor handled by an inexpensive air cooler or low-end water cooler. You will have to read reviews to gain insight into the current best option, or you can just follow the crowd and go with what's most popular online. Expensive options (those over $50) are only necessary if you want to overclock.
Water cooling is now mainstream thanks to products like the Corsair H-Series and Antec Kuhler. But there's no free lunch. Affordable, self-contained water cooling systems aren't necessarily quieter or cooler than the best air coolers. They are smaller than air coolers, however, so they can be a good choice for small systems. Traditional water cooling via an external radiator is still an option but only necessary if you want to overclock your computer to the max.
Case fans are harder to pin down. Reviews can help, but there aren't many fan speed reviews. You'll have to read up on hardware forums to gain user impressions. Also pay attention to manufacturer claims about airflow and decibel rating.

Keeping It Powered

The power supply is another component you'll probably never get to pick if you buy pre-built. If you're going the DIY route, however, it's important to consider.
Power supplies differ in build quality, reliability and power output. Your goal should be to buy an affordable but reliable unit that meets your power needs. Figuring your power needs can be difficult, so I wrote an entire article about choosing a power supply. You'll find a lot of helpful information there.
I recommend power supplies from Corsair, Seasonic, Antec, PC Power And Cooling, OCZ Technology and Cooler Master. Look for reviews on a specific option before buying. That will tell you if the quality of the product is up to expectations.

The 1/3/5 Rule

Now that we've addressed each component let's talk about an important rule that applies to all computer hardware. It's called the 1/3/5 rule.
Whatever you buy today will be beaten by a new product one year from now. It will be entirely mundane three years from now. And it will be obsolete five years from now. This applies to everything, even a fancy $1,000 graphics card or processor.
The implication of this rule is that future proofing is not possible, which in turn implies you should only buy what is adequate for you right now. If you have a 1080p display there's no need to buy a graphics card that is powerful enough to handle 2560×1440. If you don't use up eight gigabytes of RAM there's no need to buy sixteen.
You'll save a lot of money if you keep this in mind while researching the components above. You will need to upgrade more frequently, but you'll be spending a lot less each time you make a leap to your next build. It ultimately works out to a better value.

Conclusion

You should now have the basic information that you need to start looking for components. There's almost no end to the depths you can explore - PC hardware is a complex topic. But going in-detail may not help you find a better deal on the hardware you need. Indeed, you may end up like me. I sometimes break my own rules and buy hardware that's faster than I need because it excites me.
Then again, there's nothing wrong with enjoying your PC. Just keep my advice in mind and don't let excitement take over when you click the "Add to Cart" button.

Abarth 500 Roadster

Abarth 500 Roadster has been designed based on the iconic 500 Fiat. It aims for young generations; that’s why the design boasts sporty and modern style.
The Abarth 500 roadster is a stile exercise of the iconic vehicle 500 Fiat, created by Madeindreams Studio with their team of automotive designers along with some students of the Transportation and Automobile Design Master Course of Politecnico di Milano directed by prof. Fausto Brevi.
Madeindreams Studio created the Alias Automotive Training Centre to fill the gap between University and Design Center of major automotive brands. It is addressed to youth and recent graduates for the professional training in the automotive field.
The goal of the Abarth 500 roadster project was to give a complete experience of the design process to the students making the internship at Madeindreams Studio, in which they learn how to build a virtual model of a car in team with senior designers and under the supervision of our Training Center director, Ginevra Gatto.




To achieve this, we took an iconic and complex Italian vehicle and inspired as well from the summer we decided to make a roadster version of it. The 500 roadster is a two seater sports version, which is suitable for markets with a warm weather and seaside. Keeping the main design cues, to be recognizable but with some of the special features, at the front, two air intakes to cooling the brakes. The front and rear carbon fiber air diffuser provides a high performance aerodynamic. This 500 is projected to mount the 1.4 T-Jet Abarth engine.
Fun to drive is the most important feature of Abarth 500 roadster, it was designed to be a roofless car, the general volume of the car was studied to create a well balance car with rounded shapes, but aggressive and sport key lines.

The Future Is Here – Your Guide To Having A Paperless Life Today

Paperless - a term that is used quite often now days. But what does it mean? And to what extent does it apply? Certainly we all still use paper to some degree despite the advancements in technology, so how can we go completely paperless?
Well, the truth is, there will likely always be some form of paper, but the problem doesn't lie in using paper itself, but instead having awareness for the amount used and methods of which it is being used for.
All in all, despite the methods that are presented to you in this article, ultimately it is up to you to make it happen. So as you read, think to yourself how you might be able to carry this out in your life. If there is something which you feel is likely not for you, instead of shutting the door completely, try pondering what it might take to make it happen. Often, the initial thought is that it won't work, but usually after some serious thought and deeper research, you might discover some neat ways to make it happen.

Alternatives To Printing & Paper Notes

  Printing can be beneficial, there's no doubt about that. Sometimes it's nice just to have the document in hand and sometimes it's necessary to as well. When that's the case, it's important to know how to keep the printing costs as low as possible. However, often we just click print without thinking twice. What are we really going to do with that receipt from the online shopping store that we just printed out? It's nice to have it for the records, but does it really need to be printed? Probably not.

Print To PDF

"Printing" to PDF can be done with a variety of tools - some of which are browser plugins and others are programs. We've shared a couple of ways on MakeUseOf to do it with PDF995 and Print To Pages in Firefox. Personally, I use Nitro PDF and highly recommend it as a PDF reader. It also includes a "print to PDF" application.
    However, you may not even need a program that does this. Google Chrome can save what you are printing right to a PDF.
Other options are to use Google Cloud Print within Google Chrome to save to Google Drive. I might also note that Microsoft OneNote also has a feature which your computer recognizes as a printer and can send the document there.

Save As WWF, Save A Tree

You might be familiar with the World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF). In their "Think before you print" movement, they have addressed a major issue - unneeded printing. Sure you might be go paperless, but how can you ensure others start as well?
They have created a file format called a WWF - a PDF that can't be printed. Once you've installed the software, you'll be able to save files in this format. The format can be opened with any PDF file, but obviously not printed.

Electronically Sign Documents

If signing documents is a big reason why you print out documents, you might want to consider signing them on your computer. There are devices which you can purchase to do this and programs to help you easily do it. Many PDF readers, such as Nitro PDF or Adobe (eSignatures), have the features embedded in them. But there are many other tools which can do this too.
Including, but not limited to: Hellofax, PDFPen, MyLiveSignatures, DocShaker, MiddlePost, Hyplet, DocuSign and SignNow. The choice is up to you what you use, but I encourage you to look into it if it is something you do often. If it's more of "once in a blue moon" sort of thing, the tradeoff may not be as big, but if you are truly wanting to go completely paperless and it would make organizing your documents easier, then I recommend it.

Use Your Smartphone For Notes

Perhaps you don't have a smartphone (I don't either) and if you don't I will say from firsthand experience that going completely paperless is often difficult. However, if you do have a smartphone you can really take advantage of its "paperless features". The first advantage to having a smartphone is simply that you always have it. This means that you don't need to make sticky notes and plaster them all over your work area. Simply create a note in your phone (there are lots of apps that do this) and you don't have to worry about forgetting that piece of paper you left on your desk with your shopping list, so and so's phone number, etc.
Also, there's often the ability to set a reminder for notes in your smartphone - sticky notes can't do that, especially if you lose or forget to bring them with you.
Of course the same can be applied to tablets as well, however despite their portable advantages, they aren't nearly as mobile as a smartphone.

Clip Webpages Instead Of Printing Them

Lastly, the Evernote Web Clipper is a very handy tool for saving information. I will expand on Evernote a little more later on, but this tool is excellent. It's available as a browser extension and bookmarklet, but of course you need an Evernote account to use it - which you should get! Web Clipper can detect and save articles or selected text. This means you can save just what you want to read and nothing else.

Cutting Down On Mail

There are so many things that clutter your mailbox, which lead to cluttering your desk or kitchen table - bank statements, bills, magazines, newspapers, not to mention newsletters and plain junk mail. How do you get rid of it all? Well, there are several ways you can cut down on mail, incoming and outgoing.

Get Your Bank Statements Via Email

The first thing you can do is notify your bank that you would like to receive statements by email. I don't know about yours, but my bank is constantly promoting this - even to people like me who already have enabled it. You likely won't even need to talk to your bank, but you should be able to access the setting within your online banking account.

Fill Out Forms Online

Instead of printing out forms, filling in the information and spending postage to mail it, many services, even government organizations, offer the ability to fill out forms and send them online. Many times they prefer this actually, so before you go into those crowded government buildings, try to see if you can complete the task from the comfort of your home.

Email Invoices (For Businesses)

If you own a business, you likely have a lot more paper to deal with than the average homeowner. One way to cut this down dramatically is to reduce the amount of outgoing mail, e.g. invoices. Of course there are lots of other documents as well, but invoices seem to be one of the major ones. Your customers will likely appreciate your paperless efforts too.

Get Your News & Information Online

Instead of getting the daily newspaper, try getting just the weekly addition. Or better yet, cut it out completely. The beauty of the Web is that we have an endless amount of information at our fingertips. You can check all the big news sites on your own and get the information for free, so why pay for it?
However, if you do still want the newspaper (because it does have it's advantages), a lot of the major publishers allows you to subscribe to an electrical version. This goes for magazines as well.
As a bonus, if you have an eReader, you can likely get them sent right to it! I've actually written an article on MakeUseOf on sending web articles (which might even replace the need for your magazines completely) to your Kindle.

Unsubscribe From Mailing Lists

Believe it or not, you can get rid of a lot of that mail. Sadly, it might take some time, but there is an excellent resource on WikiHow that explains different ways to do it - numbers to call, organizations to write, and techniques to remember to do.

Pay Your Bills Online

Last, but certainly not least is paying your bills. It is probably one of the biggest ways to reduce paper and save time in the process. Often you can get email reminders from companies instead of mailings and you can even automate the process so you don't even have to think about making the payments - just make sure you have the money in your account.

Scan Existing & New Documents

The best way to convert your existing documents to a digital file is to scan them in. I recommend using the PNG format, as the JPEG format is lesser quality. If you have a large scanner, great, however if all you have is a smartphone, don't worry - in fact, you might begin to prefer it over traditional scanners.
There are many apps available to scan documents. Why can't you just snap a photo with your phone's camera? Well you can, however, you might find that many of the apps specifically created for scanning have more features that will result in a better scanned document.

Use A File Organizer, Preferably With OCR

Now that you are scanning both your existing and new documents, you need to manage them. There are definitely some techniques and methods you need to use to do this and I have written an article about this on MakeUseOf as well. It's crucial to your move to being paperless to make sure you start it right from the beginning - even if so far you haven't been very good about organizing.
After you have the fundamentals of organizing down, the software will be much more beneficial. There are a couple of different programs that I recommend. One being the all-famous, Evernote. In my opinion, it's great. It's not just a program for going paperless, it's a program for whatever you want it to be - that's what I love about it - it's universal and it conforms to how you work.
One of the big features of Evernote is its ability to detect text within images - otherwise known as OCR or Optical Character Recognition. This means that if you scan a document in and save it as an image, then later on search for something within the document, Evernote will scan and find the text within the image.
We've recently published an entire guide on using Evernote, so I recommend you check that out as well as become familiar with the other articles about it on MakeUseOf.
The other tool, also covered on MakeUseOf, is Doxo. It is focused on helping you go paperless and is an excellent tool to do so.

Sync Your Documents Across All Devices

You likely have more than one device and one of the benefits of going paperless is not having to take that paper note or document with you. However, having to copy and paste the document from device to device is almost more of a nuisance. Thankfully, there are plenty of cloud services to pick from to help with this issue. From SugarSync to Box to the "big three" - Google Drive, SkyDrive and Dropbox, you have a lot to choose from.

Conclusion: Helpful Methods To Adopt

In addition to these different things you can do, in reality it is all up to you to go paperless. Just like managing your files, if you don't make the effort and have the right things in place, it won't work very well. I would like to refer you to this article on LifeHack which addresses that even more. I feel it's quite important to get that established before any techniques or other methods are tried.
Other things you can do to go paperless are to simply go to the library and borrow a book instead of buying it. Recycling is very important and can be done more than just the traditional way, but also by using both sides of the paper instead of using a new sheet. Reusing it as scratch paper or other purposes is great to do too.
Make sure not to overprint. Remember - "think before you print". Also, before you print a document, see if adjusting the font size and type as well as the page margins reduces the number of pages. Of course, some documents, whether for school or professional purposes, require a certain format and layout. These things can't be avoided, but do remember to refer back to Tina's article, which I referenced to earlier, on how to cut printing costs.
Other ways to cut costs when printing from the Web are to use websites like PrintWhatYouLike and PrintFriendly to remove everything from the page such as ads, additional images or links, etc. so that you only get what you want on the page.
 

How To Make Windows 8 Bootable USB Flash Drive

Now need to install the Window 8 on ur Laptop
Just make a Live USB of Window 8

This post is part of a series of guides we’re doing today related to the recently released Windows 8 Developer Preview. In this guide, you will learn how to install Windows 8 DP from a USB flash drive

For the uninitiated, a Developer Preview version of Windows 8 was released recently for anyone and everyone to try out. It isn’t the complete version of Windows 8, but provides a nice glimpse at the future of Microsoft’s desktop operating system. Windows 8 Developer Preview is meant for developers to try out, in order to come to grips with how things work in Windows 8, but if you’ve got a spare computer lying around (or have a virtualization-ready processor), you can give it a try without risking much.
The process is quite easy to follow and anyone who has medium level of skill with handling computers will breeze through it.

Step 1: Download and install Microsoft’s Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool  from this link

http://images2.store.microsoft.com/prod/clustera/framework/w7udt/1.0/en-us/Windows7-USB-DVD-tool.exe

Step 2: Download Windows 8 Developer Preview from Windows Dev Center. If you don’t know if your processor is 32-bit or 64-bit ready, download the 32-bit .iso file. from this link

64 Bit

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=251532 

32 Bit

http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=251533

Step 3: Insert a USB flash drive having 8GB or greater storage capacity in a USB port on your computer.
Step 4: Launch Windows 7 USB/DVD Download Tool you installed in Step 1.
Step 5: Choose the ISO file you downloaded in Step 2 by clicking on “Browse”.

Step 6: Click on “USB device” when prompted to choose media type. In the next step, choose your inserted USB flash drive.


Step 7: The tool will now create a bootable USB flash drive using the Windows 8 DP .iso. This will take some time, so be patient.

Step 8: Once the tool has done its thing, restart your PC with the USB plugged in. On start up, you will need to enter the BIOS utility of your computer and boot from the USB. Since the procedure for entering BIOS utility is different for different computers, we leave it up to the readers to find out how to do this for their specific computer. (Google might come in handy for this)
Step 9: Once booted from the USB drive; follow on-screen instructions to install Windows 8 DP.
If you followed all the steps correctly, you should be well on your way to installing Windows 8 Developer Preview from USB flash drive. Good luck and have fun using Windows 8!