Computer, Electronic, and Freeware » Freeware Games

How to Set Up a Beginners Home Studio For $5 and Still Record Good Quality Audio

admin — Thu, 09 Dec 2010 10:11:28 +0000

I see guides all the time that purport to instruct new home recording hopefuls on the best equipment and software needed to start their home recording studio. There is one thing these “how-to” articles seem to have in common, which is that they explain very well how to set up an intermediate home studio, not a starter one.

I remember how overwhelmed I felt when I first started recording my own stuff, mostly music, but then audio books, voice-overs, podcasts, audio-for video, etc. That was about 20 years ago, and to be honest, there are STILL topics in the realm of audio recording that confuse me! And I’m an engineer and producer! So I’ve developed a rule-of-thumb for what constitutes “audio recording guidance for beginners” that goes something like this: If that guidance contains the acronym, “MIDI” (or any acronym for that matter), it isn’t for beginners.” Why?

First, let’s look at why someone might want to start recording audio from home. Guess what? Not everyone is a musician! In this multi-media, internet-dependent, YouTube-watching age, audio is everywhere; well, at least crappy-to-mediocre audio is everywhere;). From podcasts to audio books, advertisement voice-overs to e-learning, and video narration to, yes, music, we consume audio just about every minute of every day. So it is a mistake to assume that all, or even most, of the folks out there who really want good beginner advice on setting up and operation their own home recording studio are musicians. There is little need to tell those folks anything about the musical the instrument digital interface (MIDI) protocol.

Second, let’s talk about musicians who have little-to-no experience recording. A LOT of these folks are singers and guitar-players, garage rock bands or folk singer-songwriters. In other words, they just want to get their music “out there” in the world in the form of recordings. Musicians tend to be artists…yeah, I know, that’s a shocker, eh? Well artists are not always fabulous with the hard sciences, like electrical engineering or computer science. So even among the recording newbies out there, MIDI is not something they need immediately, if ever.

So now that I have described what advice for recording beginners does NOT look like, I suppose you’d like to know what it DOES look like. Okay, here goes. Download free audio recording software. There are a few good ones out there that are open-source “freeware,” like Audacity for example. Total cost so far: $0.00. Next, get yourself some headphones or ear buds. If anyone in your house has an mp3 player, you already have at least one set lying around. Total cost so far: $0.00. Now all you need is a microphone. Your beginner home studio only needs a PC mic. Thanks to on-line role-playing games and internet communication, most folks will already have one of these as well. Total cost so far: $0.00. If you don’t already have a PC microphone, you can get one almost anywhere for about $5.00. So the most expensive beginner home recording studio so far is $5.00. Once you have those things, you have your home studio!

Now I did promise in the title of this article to explain how to record good quality audio from a $5.00 studio. So what do I have to say for myself on that score? Only this: when it comes to audio quality, knowledge trumps gear. If you understand just a few key principles of audio recording, you can produce better quality audio from your $5.00 studio than someone with a $500 studio who doesn’t know what they are doing! I’ve seen/heard this all too often.

Oh now I suppose you want me to reveal those few key principles, huh? Well, if you insist. First, and most importantly, record as little noise as possible. Second, be able to reduce and/or eliminate the noise you couldn’t prevent. There will always be some, especially with the $5.00 studio. Said a different way, record as much of what you WANT people to hear as possible, and minimize stuff you don’t want them to hear.

You can learn more about those key principles from the tutorials on the Home Brew Audio website. The video tutorials there start out assuming you’re a beginner…a REAL beginner, and will show you how to set up the $5.00 studio and make your first recording in the first 5 lessons (should take less than an hour), which are FREE by the way;). Come check it out. I promise that “MIDI” isn’t even mentioned in the first several videos.

Must Have Software For Your iPad

admin — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 20:27:23 +0000

The ipad is the revolutionary new touch screen tablet computer from Apple that also doubles as an e-reader, a music player, a media console – and basically, whatever else its owner wants it to do if it has the right software. Shouldn’t it be illegal to have this much fun with a piece of hardware? Fortunately for us, it’s not.

Three million units were sold in the first two and a half months after the iPad’s launch. Analysts are predicting the iPad will be the big Christmas toy for grown-ups this year, with sales of 11 million by the time 2010 is through.

Part of what makes using the iPad so exhilarating is the huge number of software applications – colloquially known as “apps” – available to help you customize your user experience. Here are our four favorites:

Evernote: Evernote is an note-taking and archiving software suite that interprets the word “note” liberally. A note can be a piece of formattable text, a web page, part of a web page, a photograph, a voice recording or even a handwritten scribble. Once captured, “notes” can be edited, tagged, archived, commented upon, and sorted into folders. Evernote supports both Windows and Mac OS X operating systems, and that means the notes you take on your iPad can be easily ported to other devices. It’s freeware, so the price is right too – although if you really like it, there’s a premium version of Evernote, which gives you even more versatility.

Kindle: These days Amazon is selling more e-books than print books, and the Kindle is the reason why. The iPad Kindle app is actually more versatile than Amazon’s proprietary hardware: It displays full color photographs (unlike its Amazon counterpart) as well any font in your library on an interface that’s easy on your eyes, and grants you access to the same 450,000 Web titles that owners of the Amazon hardware platform enjoy.

Netflix: For $8.99 a month, the Netflix app allows you to stream videos and TV shows to watch on your iPad. Be warned: this app is still in the early days of its development. The relationship between the ipad’s browser interface and the Netflix movie player is not the smoothest, and occasionally the aspect ratios seem off in what you’re watching. Still, these are small annoyances that will doubtless be ironed out in the next upgrade, and in the meantime nothing beats getting to watch “Casablanca” any time you really get the craving.

Pandora Radio: Pandora, which revolutionized Internet radio with its ultra-smart music selection algorithms that utilize over 400 tonal attributes, brings that same level of innovation to the iPad. Just enter the title of a song or the name of a musician whom you particularly enjoy, and voila! Pandora responds with a playlist of tunes that are acoustically akin. It’s a great way to learn about new artists and musical genres while expanding your listening horizons. If you really like what you’re listening to, Pandora can make purchasing it a cinch by hook you up with an online music retailer

How Spyware Gets to Your Hardrive

admin — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 13:04:39 +0000

The average internet user’s computer is very likely to have some sort of hidden spyware infection that is slyly monitoring their internet activities.

Thousands of spyware applications exist making it difficult for users to avoid the threats when using the internet for numerous purposes. While online you could become infected with spyware by downloading games, music,
screensavers, pop ups, pictures, emails, freeware and shareware.

A spyware or adware infection can slow down your computer, sometimes causing it to crash because advertisers bombarding you with pop ups and monitoring your activity are using all the system resources. Spyware programs latch onto computers to track your uses and acquire personal information to be sent out to intruders, all done without your permission or knowledge.

Legislators are now looking into making laws that would protect internet users from the privacy invasive software. Consumers must beware of spyware because it can uncover and take advantage of your personal information including credit card numbers, passwords, social security numbers and more. Malicious operators can hack into your computer and take control which could cause more permanent, serious damage to you and the computer.

If you are wondering what spyware may be latching onto your computer try downloading spyware scanning tools that can detect and eliminate malicious codes such as spyware. Spybot, Pest Patrol and ZoneAlarm Pro and popularly used removal tools.

How to Tell If Your Video Card is Overheating by Checking the Temperature

admin — Wed, 08 Dec 2010 02:25:29 +0000

Aside from perhaps the performance of graphic-intensive applications (such as games and video editing suites) there are few visual indicators for an overheating video card. That means that unless you’re using those high stress applications it can be almost impossible to be really sure if there is a problem with your card, and whether or not it’s actually overheating. Luckily, the solution isn’t too difficult.

Start by download the application known as Everest. There are only commercial editions officially available these days, but if you type Everest Free Edition 2.20 in to Google then you should be able to find somewhere to download the original freeware version.

Once downloaded and installed find the tab that relates to the temperature of your hardware components (there’s not too many menu items so it should be fairly easy to find). Then you’ll simply need to find the specific component that is your video card, and the associated temperature.

But there’s a problem

How do you actually tell if you video card is overheating? There is no “average” graphics card temperature, because they vary so wildly and can handle varying different levels of heat. The answer is actually quite simple:

Go to an online computer forum (hardforum.com is a good choice) and simply post about your graphics card and ask what temperature it should be. The answers will still vary somewhat, but if you notice that your card’s temperature is oddly high compared to the responses, then you’ve probably got an overheating problem.

Protect Your USB Drives

admin — Mon, 06 Dec 2010 01:15:19 +0000

USB drives are getting very popular because of their small size and ease of use. They are not only used for transferring data from one PC to another, but are also being used for different other purposes like for PC troubleshooting, booting your computer and many more… If you use USB drive or any other external data storage device to hold important data or personal information, you cannot just be done without protecting it with a password.

It is very much important to password protect USB flash drives and other portable storage devices because you may misplace or lose them due to their small size. Some people even leave their devices on their computer table at internet cafe and when they came back to find it, it was gone. In these circumstances, question arises how to lock your information away from snoopers even if you lose or misplace your flash drive. The answer is protecting your USB drive or other portable devices with a password so that no can misuse your confidential data.

You may use variety of software available in the market to password protect your USB or other external devices, some are free and some are shareware programs that you can download for free from the net, but the question is which type of software should be used to password protect your flash drives? Well, I would recommend using USB Secure particularly if you use more than one type of storage devices like USB drive, thumb drive and memory stick and need a software that can password protect all your external devices that you connect through USB port.

I never recommend using freeware to protect your data because software that are free to use sound great but more often they are not safe to be used as they can be riddled with spy-ware, ad-ware or other type of malware that can access your data that you are trying to protect. Do you want to trust these things? Obviously, NO.

Using a reliable data locking software would be the best approach when you want ultimate security of your data. USB Secure is especially designed to lock USB drives, thumb drives, pen drives, jump drives, memory cards, memory sticks and even external hard drives. Furthermore its Auto-play feature automatically detects all the devices currently plugged in to your computer and lets you protect and / or not protect your data by simply entering the password.

Although USB Secure costs you few dollars, but you will realize when it comes to USB security and protecting data in it USB Secure worth it! Investing in a reliable security program is a wise option!

What’s Cooking? – Wii Homebrew Games

admin — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 15:26:05 +0000

Wii homebrew games are custom video games created through the reuse of Nintendo’s Wii game console hardware, its accessories and software that were not intended by the manufacturer. This began when people attempted to use the Wii Remote for running Web-based games in the computer’s built-in Web browser or for use as a pointing device on other operating systems.

From this, other developments emerged such as the Twilight Hack and the Homebrew Channel, which are made native code execution enabled. Recently, it was announced that a fully integrated Wii homebrew games are in the horizon. But as early as now developers are already homebrewing games for the Wii on the Interent Channel. In this channel you may already play Flash and Javascript games and of course create your own games.

Certainly you’ve heard that fully integrated Wii homebrew are in the near future, but did you know that developers are already homebrewing with the Wii? Through the Internet Channel, you can play Flash and Javascript games, and yes, even make your own. So if you find yourself cash strapped for games, there are hundreds of Wii homebrew games resources online.

For example there is the Homebrew Channel, a freeware Wii homebrew games application loader. This was developed to provide users a way of running software on the Wii console unofficially. Since the architecture of the Wii is based on the Nintendo GameCube hardware, most of the homebrew development tools used for the Nintendo GameCube can also be used for Wii development. The Wii has a GameCube compatibility mode, so that most Gamecube homebrew games run unmodified though at a slower pace than native Wii applications. On the other hand code running in GameCube mode cannot access hardware that is unique to the Wii, like the Wii Remote.

Wii homebrew games codes running in native Wii mode was first demonstrated at the 24th Annual Chaos Communication Congress in December 2007. The demonstration showed homebrew code running and responding to the Wii remote. Then came the release of the Twilight Hack software, the first non-modchip homebrew-enabling exploit on the Wii. The software released by Team Twiizers made it possible to run native Wii homebrew code without even modifying any hardware. Nintendo’s Firmware 3.3 disables the alpha version of this hack. Nintendo declared that unauthorized modifications to save files may impair game play and the entire console and that updating to the Wii Menu 3.3 will check for and automatically remove such files. In response, Team Twiizers released an updated beta version compatible with both 3.3 and 3.4 Wii updates to support Wii homebrew games.

Free Card Games

admin — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 04:01:42 +0000

Free card games are those card games which can be played on the Internet without having to pay a fee. These are contrasted with pay card games, in which you pay to play but run a chance of winning cash prizes, either large or small, depending on the game and site you choose to access. There are many card game freeware sites on the Internet where players can download and play free card games.

Sites like [http://geocities.com/thanoscardgames] and http://www.cardgames4free.com offer enhanced versions of the standard Klondike Solitaire, FreeCell Solitaire and Spider Solitaire games that come with extra features, such as the ability to save games during play as well as better graphics and sound. These sites also contain comprehensive information on many other popular card games such as Tripeaks Solitaire, Addition Solitaire,Texas Hold’em and Video Poker.

Free Games (www.free-games.au), a directory of free games on the Internet, also reviews and ranks free card games. Per their lists, here are the three most popular free card games in their directory. AS-Solitaire, a collection of 40 card games that uses more than 1000 different card sets in Photo Quality, is the top-ranked card game. Top 10 Solitaire is a combination game of the world’s 10 most popular solitaire card games, with a world wide online ranking system. Speed is a card game that uses a single deck of cards for the player to compete against the computer. The action is intense and needs split second timing. In Animated Rummy 2.0 the user plays rummy against animated computer characters.

Google Provides a Huge Selection of Web Based Gadgets

admin — Thu, 02 Dec 2010 20:59:21 +0000

There have always been small computer programs that perform very specialized and tasks that can be integrated into various computer operating systems. These have largely been available for download over the Internet as freeware or shareware. Programs like these are still available, but now they’re called “gadgets.” The term gadget applies well to these small programs. After all, a physical gadget that you can hold in your hand is often something uncomplicated but extremely useful- just like these software gadgets. Now programs that are called gadgets are available for integration into tool bars in Microsoft’s new Windows Vista operating system. There are also similar programs (though they’re not called gadgets) that can be added to tool bars in the Gnome desktop for Linux.

The idea of software gadgets has also expanded to the Internet with a variety of gadget type applications that can be embedded in web pages. These gadgets are primarily offered by Microsoft and Google free of charge and have a huge variety of applications.

Google’s selection of web page gadgets in particular are really impressive. For example, you can get gadgets that provide a word of the day- in several different languages including Japanese- for the visitors to your web site. You can also get things like pictures of the day, and quotes of the day. You can also give your visitors the option playing videos from Google’s enormous library of online videos.

If you’re into music, Google has plenty of applications that can help you communicate your passion. Things like cord finders for guitars and other instruments will go a long way to provide your visitors with instructions on how to play your music. You can also integrate gadgets that play audio files into your page.

If you expect to have visitors who speed different languages visiting your site, you can build a Babelfish gadget into your page to help make it more accessible to more people. You can also get an international presence with access to web cams from around the world.

There are plenty of other conveniences that you can provide for your visitors. For example, you can embed a calculator from Google into your web page. You could also choose to put various calendars and clocks on your website in order to help your visitors keep track of things. This could be particularly useful for visitors who want to buy something from you or schedule an appointment with you. You can also embed chat programs that will let people text you or each other through your website. These programs include Yahoo! Messenger, MSN Messenger, and of course Google Chat.

Google also provides plenty of gadgets that are just plain fun. There are games like Mahjong, Asteroids, Chess, a simple version of Sonic the Hedgehog, Pac Man, Connect Four, and many others. You can also get random quotes from the President, access to your Horoscope, a slang translator, daily pictures of things like cars, satellite tracking, and the ability to search for YouTube videos, and a lot more.

Web gadgets from Google run the gambit in terms of function and amount of fun that’s built into them.

Be Careful When Using Flight Simulator Freeware

admin — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 05:07:39 +0000

With the increasing popularity of the flight simulator games, the developers of the game have been forced to bring on the new versions of the game continuously with more and more new and attractive features for its users. Besides this, people wish to look for flight simulator freeware more than the sites that charge for the services.

Because of the demand for the flight sim freeware, there are many sites on the internet that are providing free versions of the game to its users. They are trying to give the best services as possible by regularly updating the game with more modernised features. These sites are very helpful for the aviation enthusiasts as they give all the services for free.

If you are looking for a flight sim freeware, keep in mind that you go on a site that is genuine and provides the original game software and not the pirated version. If you will use the pirated version, your computer might get infected and you will not be able to enjoy playing the flight simulator. Also remember, when choosing the right site, read the reviews carefully so that you do not get cheated.

As the flight simulator games and its accessories are very expensive, it cannot be easily afforded by all. Therefore, to make it available for all, there is the freeware version which can be used by all those who are not willing to pay money for it. It is possible that when you are using a freeware version, you may not get all the features of the flight simulator and also there would not be a wide range of aircrafts to choose from. But it is sure that you can also enjoy flying the aircraft available to you. So, enjoy flying your own plane using the flight sim freeware.

Which Are the Best iPad Games to Get?

admin — Wed, 01 Dec 2010 00:05:06 +0000

Using your iPad at your job is great. Even surfing the internet just for your fun or simply reading an eBook you want to read is great. But what if you could also play games on your iPad? Would that not be great? Sometimes a little relaxation can just make your whole day great. iPad games can provide this in many situations especially since you can find just about any type of game for your iPad. Having the option to play your favorite game in your coffee break is definitely a plus.

You can start looking for the best iPad games on the internet just now. You will find many reviews on the internet that will help you choose the right game for you. What you should know before starting to look for iPad games is that there is no single best iPad game. Different people enjoy different games so just think about what type of game you would like the most.

If you like simple games such as the classical solitaire or minesweeper you should not worry too much. You will find many simple games for your iPad as well. You will even find some games for iPad that are freeware.

The fact that you can find freeware games for your iPad is not the only great thing. The games that are shareware are pretty cheap and generally do not exceed the price of 10 dollars. iPad games are much cheaper than games for the PC or other consoles and also bring the innovation of touch control into games so they are really worth a try.

You will also find more complex apps for iPad. If you love games with astonishing graphics you should not worry about not being able to find any such complex graphics apps for your iPad. Of course, the graphics will not be as complex as they are on your gaming computer, but they will still be pretty interesting.

You will find anything from role playing games to first person shooters for your iPad. You can even find a Need for Speed ipad game if you love driving simulators. All you have to do is choose the title you think you will like the most, buy it, and have fun.

Start searching the net for your favorite iPad games now and have fun playing them and relaxing with their help.