I must have been 12 or 13 when my father suggested I go downtown with him to get some money from the bank. It was a Saturday afternoon, and, although he was a senior executive at the “Multibanco” in Chihuahua, I doubted he was going to be admitted on the weekend to help himself to some pesos. So I kept watching soccer on TV. My team, Atlético Español, was finding a new way to lose; that’s what they did.

But no, Dad was clearly up to something. “C’mon, I have a card that will get me cash,” he said, grinning. He did have a sense of humor and an adventurous streak, so I figured I should play along.

“OK,” I said. “Vamos.”

We got into our un-air-conditioned orange VW Caribe and headed downtown. The Multibanco was right across the street from the zócalo, in the shadows of Chihuahua’s 18th-century cathedral, the first and last baroque structure built in our otherwise unpretentious city.

Outside the bank, by the parking lot, was a small kiosk I had never noticed before, like a walk-in phone booth. We walked over to it, and my dad fumbled for a card that he reverentially slid out from a little envelope and into an opening that caused a buzz and click, and in we went to the booth, where he proceeded, before his wide-eyed, jaw-dragging son, to retrieve a few hundred pesos from a machine. I don’t think I could have been more astonished had he beamed us into the 23rd century.

Three decades later, I type down this memory on a plane as I listen to one of a few hundred albums on my iPad before settling in to read one of the dozens of books on the same nimble tablet with the interactive screen.

We live in an age when we can have nearly anything all the time, and my first inkling of that coming age came that languid Saturday afternoon in Chihuahua, when Dad pulled his act of magic at the city’s first ATM.

There were other milestones along the way, of course. The Walkman seemed like a huge leap forward, providing stereophonic mobility. So did having an AT&T long-distance calling card. When I first came to school in the States, I had to drag rolls and rolls of change to the payphone down the hallway to connect for a few minutes with Mexico to speak to my parents or to enjoy some awkward, static-filled small talk with a certain Margarita. Then came these calling cards that let you commandeer any payphone as if it were your own, without the need to have a piggy bank in tow (although those monthly bills were an invariable shocker).

Oddly enough, what should have been more obvious milestones on the road to “everything all the time” didn’t seem like such. My first desktop computer in college felt more like a spiffier typewriter than a potential conduit to all the world’s information, but then it wouldn’t be another decade until I “dialed” online after getting one of those AOL CDs in the mail (it was probably the 10th one I’d gotten). And even that didn’t feel so noteworthy, truth be told; I quickly grew bored of a couple of chat rooms and went back to the TV.

Amazon did feel epochal, this notion that you could be sitting in your PJs at midnight and order a book from your bedroom that would show up a few days later at your doorstep. The memory of those first orders in the late ’90s still gives me chills, even now when I can download two entire books onto my iPad in the time it takes to board a plane, as I just did.

Let’s get back to TV for a second. That’s been an entertainment constant throughout my life, but precisely because it has been a constant—at least the physical act of staring at a screen—it’s the starkest illustration of how we’ve moved from a life of fleeting moments to this everything-all-the-time age.

The World is Getting Better, Not Worse! The Saturday Evening Post

Smartphone Plans*

*All prices and fees subject to change
**Prices and fees vary depending on location and availability of service

Your Guide to Low-Cost Smartphone Plans The Saturday Evening Post

Apple iPad Mini. Photo courtesy Apple Computer Inc.

1. Apple iPad mini
The late Steve Jobs once declared 7-inch tablets too tiny to be useful, but the company he cofounded decided otherwise when it saw consumers snapping up smaller slates made by its competitors. The result is the iPad Mini, which does nearly everything its predecessor does, but at a much lower price. The iPad Mini has a 7.9-inch screen that works well for Web browsing and streaming video, although the resolution is surprisingly lower than that of Apple’s 7-inch competitors, which cost $80 to $130 less. The iPad Mini includes optional 4G LTE service, which costs an additional $130 plus a monthly cellular charge. The tablet’s aluminum and glass exterior is sleek and slim—just what you’d expect from Apple. Its front- and rear-facing cameras capture high-definition pictures and video too. Its biggest advantage can be summed up in one word: apps. Apple’s App Store has more than 275,000 programs created for the iPad—a vastly greater selection than what you’ll find in competing app markets from Google, Amazon, and Barnes & Noble. Priced from $329 for a Wi-Fi model with 16GB of storage to $659 for a Wi-Fi plus cellular unit with 64GB; the iPad Mini is the upscale option in a crowded market.

Top 4 Tiny Tablets The Saturday Evening Post

Microsoft Surface RT

Microsoft Surface RT. Photo courtesy Microsoft.

While the Apple iPad is the, um, apple of everyone’s eye, the Microsoft Surface RT may be the best iPad challenger to date. Featuring a tablet version of touch-oriented Windows 8 software and an innovative built-in kickstand and a screen cover that doubles as a keyboard, the Surface RT looks like a winner. As of press time, its release was scheduled for October 26. If you can wait a bit, other hardware manufacturers, including Asus,
Dell, Lenovo, and Samsung, plan to sell Windows RT tablets, too.
Price: Microsoft Surface RT $300-$800.

Nintendo 3DS XL and Wii U

Nindento 3DS XL. Photo courtesy Nintendo of America Inc.

Game consoles and games are always welcome gifts, and Nintendo has the novelty edge this season with two new products. Its 3DS XL is a larger version of its 3DS handheld console, and the Wii U console (on sale November 18) has an innovative touch-screen controller called the GamePad that works as a handheld game machine when your TV is off.
Price: 3DS XL $200; Wii U $300 (basic), $350 (deluxe).

Apple MacBook Air

Apple MacBook Air. Photo courtesy Apple Inc.

The ultra-slim Apple MacBook Air is a top tech pick among well-heeled gift-givers, but a new crop of Windows 8 Ultrabooks merit a closer look. Thin and light like the MacBook Air but with a lower price tag, Ultrabooks are easy to carry and turn on instantly like a smartphone or tablet. One notable and affordable example is the Lenovo IdeaPad U310, which is 0.7-inch thick and weighs 3.7 pounds. Future Ultrabooks will feature touchscreens with the touch-and-swipe capabilities of mobile devices. This may raise the question, are such devices more tablet than laptop? (Fortunately that’s not your problem.)
Price: MacBook Air $1,000-$1,500; Windows 8 Ultrabooks $800 (average price); Lenovo IdeaPad U310 $704.

Barnes & Noble’s Nook Simple Touch with GlowLight

Nook Simple Touch GlowLight. Photo Courtesy Barnes & Noble Inc.

Bookworm on your shopping list? Barnes & Noble’s Nook Simple Touch with GlowLight solves a major shortcoming of non-backlit eReaders: Namely that the screen is very difficult to read in a dimly lit environment. As its name suggests, the product has a backlight that you turn on or off, making reading a whole heck of a lot easier in the sun or in the dark.
Price: $140.

LG Mouse Scanner

LG Mouse Scanner. Photo courtesy LG USA.

If you’re shopping for something truly unique, the LG Mouse Scanner is a computer mouse and scanner in one device: Simply click its scan button and roll the mouse across documents, magazine pages, photos, or anything else you’d like to digitize. It converts scanned text into editable Word documents, too.
Price: $130.

Canon EOS M

Canon EOS M. Photo courtesy Canon Inc.

As with all things tech, the camera market is changing rapidly. With the improved quality of smartphone cameras, there’s a drop in demand for basic point-and-shoot cameras, notes Yung Trang, president and editor-in-chief of TechBargains.com. But premium SLR cameras are still in high demand. For example, the Canon EOS M offers super high resolution, better lenses, and it allows even amateurs to take professional quality photos and video.
Price: $800.

Google Nexus 7

Google Nexus 7. Photo courtesy Google Inc.

Shopping for a tablet, but trying to stick to a budget? The Google Nexus 7 is an affordable, high-quality product with a bright 7-inch screen; a 1.2-megapixel, front-facing camera; and Android Beam, an NFC feature that’s handy for exchanging information wirelessly with compatible devices. Other 7-inch tablets to check out include new versions of the popular Amazon Kindle Fire
and the Barnes & Noble Nook Tablet.
Price: Google Nexus 7 $200-$250; Amazon Kindle Fire $160-$600; Nook Tablet $180-$200.

Samsung Galaxy S III

Samsung Galaxy S III. Photo courtesy Samsung.

Looking for an Android phone? The Samsung Galaxy S III boasts a gorgeous (and ginormous) 4.8-inch display, yet fits comfortably in one’s hand. Slim and stylish, the handset has a slightly curved shape, supports 4G LTE networks, and includes a great 8-megapixel, rear-facing camera.
Price: $200 with a 2-year contract from multiple carriers.

Apple iPhone 5

Apple iPhone 5. Photo courtesy Apple Inc.

Naturally the new Apple iPhone 5 will be at the top of many “Dear Santa” letters. Its 4-inch, high-resolution display is slightly longer but not wider than the 3.5-inch screens of previous iPhones. This sleek, aluminum-and-glass handset supports speedy 4G LTE cellular connections, has better front- and rear-facing cameras, and adds a few bells and whistles, such as spoken driving directions with turn-by-turn navigation.
Price: $200 with a 2-year contract from multiple carriers.

Apple iPad

Apple iPad. Photo courtesy Apple Inc.

Finally, the third-generation Apple iPad and its predecessor the iPad 2 remain at the head of the tablet pack. The latest model has a dazzling high-res screen, a better rear-facing camera, and the Siri voice assistant popularized by those ubiquitous, and, to some, annoying, TV ads. (Look for Apple to debut a smaller iPad very soon.)
Price: Apple iPad $500-$830; iPad 2 $400-$530.

Your Ultimate Hi-Tech Gift Guide The Saturday Evening Post

Would you toss your car keys to your 10-year-old child and say, “Have fun—be home before dark!”? Would you leave your front door unlocked, with a sign in the driveway saying you’re on vacation? No, of course not. You understand the dangers these activities would pose to your family’s physical safety and privacy.

However, many of us go online every day—and allow our children to do so—with little or no awareness of the tremendous power at our fingertips, or the potential risks in cyber space. The amount of sensitive and personal information we keep on our computers, smart phones or laptops, and post on our social media sites is staggering. While the efficiencies and convenience of online connectivity have revolutionized how we work and play, without a true understanding of the cyber threats and basic precautions, we put our family and ourselves at risk. More than 19 million records have been breached so far in 2012, resulting from hacking and malware attacks, lost or stolen laptops and smartphones, skimming credit card numbers and a plethora of other types of cyber scams. An estimated 40 percent of all households have been affected by a computer virus.

Don’t become the next statistic!

October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month, an effort coordinated by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, along with many governments, businesses, schools and other groups to help improve cyber security preparedness. It’s a great time to evaluate your family’s online activities and take some basic steps to protect yourselves.

Take the Pledge!

The Center for Internet Security, a national not-for-profit, is conducting a national Cyber Security Pledge campaign during Awareness Month to help users understand good practices for staying safe on the Internet and affirm a commitment to online safety. You can join thousands of others across the country and sign the pledge online by visiting CIS at https://msisac.cisecurity.org/cyber-pledge/.

Make sure you know these top tips for being a smart cyber citizen:

• Use and maintain antivirus software.
• Keep your operating system patches up-to-date.
• Always use strong passwords—a combination of characters, numbers and letters. Make sure you have separate passwords for each account you have—and don’t share them.
• Do not visit untrusted websites or follow links provided by unknown or untrusted sources.
• Be careful what personal information you distribute, particularly on social networking sites.
• Teach children not to post or share personal information such as their photograph, address, age or activity schedule. Teach them not to respond to cyberbullies. Report incidents of cyberbullying to school administrators and local law enforcement when appropriate.

By employing some of these basic practices, we can protect ourselves and improve our chances of NOT becoming the next victim of an online scam or attack. Make sure you are doing your part to stay safe in cyberspace.

Tips for Being a Smart Cyber Citizen The Saturday Evening Post

From left, Apple MacBook Air, Lenovo IdeaPad U310, and Samsung Series 5 14.0” Ultra.

Laptops today are undergoing a dramatic makeover. These slimmer, sleeker, portable PCs promise longer battery life, faster performance, and (yes!) less back and shoulder strain.

Any discussion of ultra-thins must start with Apple’s MacBook Air (apple.com/macbookair), the iconic, razor-thin portable that famously slides inside a manila envelope. The Air is both durable and light; and since it uses flash memory to store files rather than a spinning hard disk, it’s a lot quieter, too. The Air exemplifies Apple’s attention to detail. Its backlit keyboard, for instance, automatically illuminates in low-light conditions. The 11- and 13-inch models start at $1,000 and $1,200, respectively.

The MacBook Air’s popularity spurred Windows PC makers to create Air-like laptops called “Ultrabooks,” a term coined by chip-maker giant Intel. An Ultrabook shares many of the Air’s most desirable attributes: less than an inch thick; 3- to 4-pound weight; the ability to turn on instantly like a smartphone or tablet; and battery life of 5 to 9 hours. Top-tier laptop makers, including Acer, ASUS, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Samsung, Sony, and Toshiba, sell Ultrabooks today, and many more models are coming soon.

Most Ultrabooks lack a DVD drive, which isn’t a problem for most users. With the advent of streaming audio and video, as well as cloud services that back up your files online, discs are rapidly going the way of floppies.

“I think eventually all notebooks will become slim,” says Bob O’Donnell, computer analyst for IDC, a technology research firm. He predicts the average selling price for Ultrabooks will be around $800 by the end of 2012.

In fact, many Ultrabooks are already there. Lenovo’s stylish IdeaPad U310 ($800; lenovo.com) has a 13.3-inch display, weighs 3.75 pounds, and is available in a trio of fashion-forward colors, including Cherry Blossom, Aqua Blue, and Graphite Gray. The battery lasts up to 7 hours.

The Samsung Series 5 14.0” Ultra ($800; samsung.com) weighs less than 4 pounds and features a 14-inch display. This sleek notebook somehow manages to squeeze in a DVD drive, too.

The VIZIO Thin + Light ($900 to $1,250; vizio.com) has an aluminum frame and a clean, minimalist look that rivals (some might say copies) the MacBook Air’s sleek aesthetic. Available with a 14- or 15.6-inch screen, the Thin + Light weighs 3.4 or 4 pounds and runs 5.5 to 7 hours between charges, depending on the model.

The newest Ultrabooks add something most laptops don’t have: a touchscreen. Why? Because Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system, which debuts this fall, is built to run on both PCs and touchscreen tablets. New laptops such as the Acer Aspire S7 let you navigate the screen in two ways: using traditional touchpad and keyboard commands or by tapping the screen as you would with a smartphone or tablet. It remains to be seen, however, if touch commands on a laptop make sense, particularly if it means holding your arm in an elevated position for hours on end.

Meet the Ultrabooks The Saturday Evening Post

With today’s dependence on electronics for work, play, and just about anything to do with productivity, you may often find yourself staring at screens for more than 10 hours a day. With this in mind, it’s important to protect your eyes by minimizing harsh whites and enlarging text size in common programs, regardless of how old you are or how good your eyesight might be.

To lessen the long-term damage computer screens could cause to your eyes, or if your vision isn’t strong enough to read tiny text on your screen, try these tips for PC or Mac computers to make things easier on your oculars. Most of these tricks are simple enough that you won’t have to reinvent (or buy) the wheel. Running Windows 8? These tips apply as well.

1. Attack the problem at its source—drop your monitor brightness. Your screen is the culprit, so why not adjust it to fit your ergonomic needs? Your monitor should come with a how-to guide that will show you how to adjust brightness, contrast, color, and other features, allowing you to tweak these levels and reduce eyestrain. If you can’t find a guide, a brief search on Google for the screen’s manufacturer manual should prove fruitful. If you’re still unable to find any documentation for your monitor or television, all models come with buttons that allow the user to explore menu options that are often hidden. Experiment with these, and you should be able to reduce your monitor’s brightness levels in no time.

2. Invest in a pair of computer readers. Computer readers are glasses that have protective coatings on their lenses designed to lessen the harsh whites that screens can emit. Most readers have a magnifying effect, so you’re practically getting a two-for-one deal. Some companies such as Foster Grant produce readers as cheap as $30. If you’re looking for something a little more high-end and you’re willing to drop the cash, Gunnar Optiks makes a line of sturdy readers that are not only protective but stylish as well. Gunnar’s prescription program lets you combine vision correction with protection. Be wary, however, as the cheaper models can bite holes in your wallet; non-prescription Gunnar models range from $60 to $100.

3. Use the magnifiers. Microsoft is aware that sometimes computer text isn’t the easiest to read. Found with almost all versions of Windows, Magnifier is a versatile program that can enlarge certain parts of the screen wherever your mouse or keyboard cursor is located. If you have a Mac, use the included Zoom software to make reading text a little easier on the eyes.

4. Increase your browser display size. Most screens nowadays come in wide-screen format, and that doesn’t adapt well for documents. Browsers often display websites in a column fashion as well, leaving wide, empty margins. Remove the margins and zoom in on your page by holding down Control and scrolling up with your mouse until the page fits your monitor nicely. On the Mac side, you can increase most browser window sizes by pressing Command and + a few times.

5. Lower the desktop resolution. Your resolution is what makes up your screen in vertical and horizontal “lines.” The more lines the screen has, the smaller images and text will appear. By right-clicking on your desktop in Windows, you can adjust your screen resolution to a lower setting and make those images and text blocks pop. On a Mac, you can find a list of supported resolutions under the Apple logo, System Preferences, and then Display.

6. Increase the Windows text size. Windows 7 has an option to change the text and other items on-screen under the Display option under the Personalize menu, found by right-clicking on the desktop. This option is just limited to three settings: smaller, medium, and larger. Fortunately, an adjustment here should bode well for anyone trying to save their eyesight.

7. Give your eyes a break. Staring at a screen for too long certainly isn’t healthy and can give you computer vision syndrome, or CVS (not the pharmacy). If you find yourself locked onto a screen for too long, look away from the screen, focus on an item in the distance for approximately 10 to 20 seconds, and then focus on an item closer to you. Repeating this a few times should keep your eyes from getting tired.

8. Go outside! Being inside all day not only messes with your sleeping rhythms, it can also have an effect on your eyes. Expose your eyes to different levels of light. This can also kill the monotony of a day’s work at the office!

Whether you have poor or eagle-eyed eyesight, these steps can certainly help you keep the effects of long-term screen exposure at bay. They won’t prevent eyestrain completely, but combining all these steps will significantly save your eyes so you can keep staring at screens for several years to come.

8 Vision-Saving Tricks for Computer-Related Eyestrain The Saturday Evening Post

Let’s take a trip back to my childhood. The year was 1992, and “Too Legit to Quit” was still my favorite song. I had the stereotypical late ’80s boom box and carried the cassette tape (which I bought with my allowance, of course) around with me like a prized trophy. I even had a little dance to go along with song. I was cool (or at least I tell myself this), and life was good.

One hot summer day, my parents took me and my brothers down to the beach for some fun, and my music had to come along with me, despite my dear mother’s protests. The boom box was set down on the towel, and I ran off to play in the lake, kicking a plume of sand up behind me that went right into the boom box and ruined my precious childhood song.

The moral of this story? “Too Legit to Quit” was a terrible song, and I should have listened to my mother and not brought unprotected electronics to the beach.

Fortunately, there are some things you can do to keep your electronics safe out on the sand.

Ditch your camera

While that fancy $600 DSLR camera sure does take nice pictures, hauling it to the beach probably isn’t the best idea in the world. Besides exposing it to the elements, you never know who or what you’ll come across at the beach—or rather, who or what will come across you. No need to let some random young surfer-wannabe splash water on your camera.

Instead, pick up a relatively inexpensive waterproof camera. A waterproof device will be able to withstand the punishment of a kid-friendly environment, while giving you the peace of mind that your expensive investment isn’t going to get damaged. Check out our advice on waterproof cameras for some ideas.

Think waterproof

It might seem like overkill, but a waterproof case can be indispensible for a day at the beach. Not only is it going to protect your phone against those accidental swims in the ocean friends are often wont to impose, but it’s also going to make sure that no sand gets in your phone.

The best way to pick up a case is to hit your local sporting goods store for a quick fix, or hop on Amazon if you’ve got a couple days to wait for delivery. Just do an Amazon search for “waterproof cases iPhone” (or whatever your phone is) and you’ll get a bunch of great results.

A couple things to keep in mind though. First, be ready to spend between $35 and $50 for one. Any less and I wouldn’t recommend it, since you might be getting an inferior product (and you don’t want to take that chance with your $600 smartphone). You should also be willing to get a waterproof case that doesn’t exactly match your device, especially if you need to pick one up right now at the sporting goods store. There are cases which are waterproof that work just fine with an iPhone inside them, and generally run a bit cheaper than cases meant specifically for the iPhone.

An added benefit to the waterproof case is that you can—and should!—take your favorite gadgets hiking with you, safe and dry despite the elements.

Get some fresh air

We’ve all been there, out in nature with our cell phones when some dirt or other debris gets on it that we just can’t get off easily. When you’re at the beach, the key danger is sand, which isn’t a friend of any electronic device. It’s hard, coarse, and can easily damage fragile eletronics.

The best way to get sand out of your electronics is to blow your device clean with some compressed air. Don’t hold the air right up against your gadget. Instead, hold it back a foot or so; you want just enough air to be impactful but not so much that you’ll damage any sensitive components. You may have to give your device a couple blasts of air, but eventually, all the sand will make its way out—and onto your floor. (Another great tip: Do this outside in the garage.)

Remember the basics

And yes, the final item on our list is simply an umbrella. Why is such a basic item necessary for the high-tech aficionado? It’s simple, really. If you’re going to be out in the sun, then your devices are going to get hot—really hot. I recently found this out the hard way when spending the day relaxing by the pool with some co-workers. I reached for my iPhone, which despite being protected in a good case was not only burning-hot to the touch but also wouldn’t function. It even popped up an error message letting me know it needed to cool down.

When your phone is telling you to get some shade, it’s probably a good idea! So our last tip to protect your gadgets at the beach: keep ‘em cool and out of the sun!

And in case you you were wondering, my iPhone was so hot that we were able to watch a drop of water quickly evaporate off its screen. Now that’s a sunburn!

How to Keep your Gadgets Safe at the Beach The Saturday Evening Post

While Yelp’s a handy little thing, claiming the broadest range of restaurants in its database, sometimes it’s refreshing to try something a little different. We’ve rounded up six of the best food-spotters, including a couple you might not have heard of.

1. Urbanspoon

Admittedly, this app is almost as well-known as Yelp, but it comes with such a great gimmick that we couldn’t leave it out. If you don’t know quite what you want to eat, Urbanspoon’s “shake” feature makes the decision for you by randomly picking a restaurant from the area to match your criteria.

In addition to that handy feature, the database itself is well stocked with information on all sorts of local eateries, including reviews from fellow diners and professional critics. Urbanspoon is really the granddaddy of dining apps—it has been around since the iPhone App Store launched in 2008.

Download: Urbanspoon for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Kindle Fire
Price: Free

2. Zagat to Go

This is the most pricey app on the list, coming in at $10 for iPhone and iPad users and $25 for Android users. It’s important to realize just what you get for your money—this isn’t just another variation of the same features offered by everything else.

Based on the best-selling Zagat books (which retail for about $15), this app compiles the same amount of information that you would find in 45 individual city guides. That includes detailed info on each of Zagat’s rated restaurants, of course!

It also features one very, very handy feature that makes it well worth the price of admission: offline mode. When you’re traveling overseas or somewhere without access to 3G service or Wi-Fi, offline mode is invaluable. All of the information you need is stored directly on your phone, so you can search, browse, and choose to your heart’s content.

Download: Zagat to Go for iPhone, iPad, and Android
Price: $9.99 for iOS; free for Android (but $24.95/year after a six-month free trial)

3. Eat St.

Taking a slightly different approach to searching for eateries, Eat St. comes courtesy of Food Network, which has created a searchable database to help you find the best food trucks and street food in your city. Perfect for your inner foodie hipster, the GPS-enabled app shows map locations for stationary food carts plus any mobile trucks that pop up from time to time. (It’s worth noting that the accuracy may vary for mobile units.)

Where possible, detailed vendor information is provided, including menus and even Twitter contact details, plus the ever-helpful specials and deals on offer.

Download: Eat St. for iPhone and iPad
Price: Free

4. LocalEats

If you’re not a fan of big-name, multinational corporations’ sticking their fingers into your burgers, then this is the app for you. LocalEats only provides information about dining locations that are truly local—not a national chain to be found.

In addition to searching by price range and operating hours, you can even get really crunchy and look for the best local vegetarian eateries. With this in mind, LocalEats is ideal for people who like to try new things, find unique places, and get to know a city’s hidden highlights. If you just want a Big Mac, you’re going to have to keep looking.

Download: LocalEats for iPhone or iPad
Price: 99 cents for iPhone; free for iPad

5. OpenTable

One of the more practical apps on this list, OpenTable helps you find restaurants that have tables available at your chosen time. Enter the restaurant name to find out when tables are available, or enter a date and time to find places nearby that have a spot for you.

Well-suited to spontaneous types commonly in a “What’s for dinner?” quandary, OpenTable does have the ability to search in the future, but it’s better suited to people looking for somewhere to eat right now.

Download: OpenTable for iPhone, iPad, Android, and Windows Phone
Price: Free

6. Foodspotting

For fans of Pinterest, Flickr, and food porn in general, Foodspotting is a heavenly combination of social networking and photography, with a handy restaurant-finding app thrown in as well. When you load it up, you’re treated to images of dishes other people have submitted. If you’re in the mood for eye candy, you can simply browse the pretty pictures. Otherwise, filter things to show only the latest uploads, the nearest geotagged spots, or the “best” pictures as voted by the community.

It’s a twist on the traditional food finder, as you’re looking for specific dishes rather than restaurants—but sometimes you don’t realize you’re craving a slice of pie until you see it in front of you.

Download: Foodspotting for iPhone and iPad, Android, and Windows Phone
Price: Free

Looking to go off the beaten path?

After all that, if you’d like to find something a little more unusual for your next meal, turn to the masters of the Travel Channel, Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimmern, and your trusty iOS device. Regardless of which chef you’re more fond of, both Layover and The Bizarre Foods Locator will help you find tasty treats around the world.

Bourdain’s app, inspired by his hit show The Layover, shares his personal favorite hotels, bars, restaurants, and hot spots from 10 major cities. The Bizarre Foods Locator, on the other hand, has presented fans with a list of more than 700 restaurants that Zimmern has eaten at, complete with GPS locations, contact details, and menu suggestions.

Six Apps for Dining on Vacation The Saturday Evening Post

Couple taking pictures of themselves with mobile phone. Courtesy of Shutterstock.

1. Kayak

Kayak makes it easy to search for flights, hotels, and car rentals. And features a packing list maker. Track your flight, convert currency, and check out tours or attractions around your destination all in one app.

Download: Kayak for iPhone and iPad, Android, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free

2. TripAdvisor

Find travel information, customer reviews, and travel forums at TripAdvisor. You may find a bunch of Facebook friends are already on TripAdvisor writing reviews! Know before you go which restaurants and hotels are worth visiting. TripAdvisor posted reviews are delayed for verification, to minimize suspicious content and keep everyone honest. TripAdvisor also alerts the owner or manager of any establishment that receives a negative review.

Download: TripAdvisor for iPhone and iPad, Android, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free 

3. TripIt Travel Organizer

TripIt organizes your itineraries so there is no need to print them out. Just link your email account to TripIt, and TripIt will pick up every confirmation number you receive into your inbox. Whether it is a flight, hotel, or dinner reservation, as long as it contains a confirmation number, TripIt will organize everything into one easy-to-access itinerary. If there are any flight delays or last-minute changes sent to your email account, they will also be updated automatically.

Download: TripIt for iPhone and iPad, Android, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free 

4. Where

Eat. Drink. Play. There’s an app for that. Where uses the GPS chip inside your smartphone to create an all-purpose tool to take with you when you travel. Walk, drive, or fly, and Where will find your location and give you on-the-spot information on where to get cheap gas, what the weather will be like, movie showtimes, the best places to eat, traffic conditions, or news headlines. Browse the Yellow Pages or the Yelp directory.

Download: Where for iPhone, Android , or Windows Phone.
Price: Free 

5. MapQuest

Even if you’re not venturing far from home, it’s always good to have a GPS system with you just in case, and MapQuest is the best free app for that. MapQuest makes it easy to find hotels, restaurants, gas stations with prices, and coffee shops at your fingertips. Use the text search option to find less popular locations such as campsites. All locations are labelled along your route to make pit stops easier on the go.

Download: MapQuest for iPhone or Android.
Price: Free 

6. Google Translate

Google Translate saves you from not only buying a library of language books but carrying them around, as well. Google Translate offers over 50 languages, from Afrikaans to Yiddish. Type in a phrase or a word, and have it translated on the spot. Google Translate will give you the written translation and the option to hear the phrase spoken. Newer versions of Google Translator Toolkit use human translators to translate entire documents.

Download: Google Translate for iPhone and iPad  or Android.
Price: Free

7. XE Currency

XE Currency calculates the conversions between more than 180 worldwide currencies. Access live foreign exchange rates, up-to-date currency news, and historical rates. You can also choose to receive email updates with currency rates and news or follow the economic indicators calendar. Use XE Currency to create and track comparison charts and to calculate prices even in remote areas.

Download: XE Currency for iPhone and iPad, Android, or Windows Phone.
Price: Free

8. Urbanspoon

Shake up your next great meal, literally. Just give your mobile device a shake and watch nearby restaurants fill your screen like a slot machine. Urbanspoon uses the GPS on your smartphone to pick popular local restaurants throughout the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, and Australia.

Download: Urbanspoon for iPhone, iPad, or Android.
Price: Free

9. Wikitude

Wikitude turns your smartphone into a virtual tour guide. Point your smartphone camera at a monument, landmark, or street view, and the augmented reality guide overlays user-contributed content onto the image, putting a wealth of information about the view at your fingertips. Wikitude matches your position to the landmarks you point the camera at and tells you about them.

Download: Wikitude for iPhone and iPad  or Android.
Price: Free

10. Postagram

Postcards for a new generation, Postagram turns sending touristy postcards with clichéd phrases into a cool piece of mail for your family and friends to receive while you’re gone. Just take a photo using your smartphone, and the Postagram app does the rest. Postagram prints your photo onto a postcard along with the mailing address and message you provide from your device, then sends it through the mail. Without even doing so much as buying a stamp, you can send Postcards from all over the world.

Download: Postagram for iPhone  or Android.
Price: Free plus 99 cents per postcard

Ten Handy Vacation Apps The Saturday Evening Post

Landscaper’s Companion

With 15,000-plus pictures and information on more than 25,000 plants, this app is a virtual encyclopedia of gardening. Want the specifics on a plant’s sun exposure, water usage, growth rate, and bloom times? Comprehensive search tools make these facts easy to find. The app currently lacks information on tropicals and orchids, but we expect this to be remedied soon, as the developer periodically adds additional plants and images for free.
Price: $2.99 for iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch and $4.99 for Android devices.

Grow Your Own

How do I know when my blueberries are going to be ripe? How can I keep aphids away from my roses? This handy app from the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) provides essential advice for part-time farmers. Grow Your Own steps you through the growing process month-by-month, recommending the best times to plant, prune, weed, mulch, and harvest, depending on the crop. And if you need to buy seeds and supplies, the app’s “Buy Now” button links directly to the RHS Online Plant Shop. Hey, the app is free, and they’ve got to earn a living somehow.
Price: Free for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch.

Bugs in the Garden

Blast those infernal bugs! If you need help ID’ing the creepy crawlies devouring your daffodils, Bugs in the Garden can help. With more than 40 photos and illustrations of beetles, moths, aphids, caterpillars, grubs, and other common bugs, this app helps you spot troublesome and beneficial insects alike. It also includes tips on how to attract helpful bugs (like ladybugs) and send the bad ones packing.
Price: Free for iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch and Android devices.

FlowerPedia

If you’re a flower person, this app’s for you. There are three versions of FlowerPedia. The free “lite” version has 100 high-resolution flower photos and limited information on flowering plant families from around the globe. The iPhone edition is far more comprehensive: 2,800 flower images; a search tool for finding flowers by common name, Latin name, and country and state/province; and the ability to identify flowers by their anatomy. The $9.99 iPad version is the most beautiful of the trio, with larger, dazzling photos that turn your tablet into a coffee-table flower book.
Price: Free “lite” version; $4.99 for iPhone; $9.99 for iPad.

Moon Gardening

This visually appealing app is useful if you want our nearest celestial neighbor (i.e., the Moon) to guide your gardening practices. Lifeware Solutions’ Moon Gardening brings this ancient practice to modern times by offering time-tested growing tips, such as the best times to plant, prune, weed, and harvest crops based on the current Moon phase in your area. It’s a bit scant on details, though. For instance, Moon Gardening has too many links to outside sources on the topic, rather than providing the information itself. It’s fun to use, however, particularly if you’re curious about the Moon’s phases.
Price: $1.99 for iPad.

Garden Plan Pro

As gardening apps go, Growing Interactive’s Garden Plan Pro is a tad pricey, but its planting toolkit is much more comprehensive than most garden-variety guides. The app’s extensive design tools let you create a simple garden with single plants—or far more sophisticated projects with fruits and vegetables planted in multiple rows and/or squares. Garden Plan Pro has detailed growing information for more than 140 plants, and offers sage advice on how to rotate crops. The app takes a bit of practice to master, however, so be sure to watch the tutorial video before getting your hands dirty.
Price: $19.99 for iPad.

Grow 2.0 The Saturday Evening Post

Photo by Tyler Olson via Shutterstock.

Due to rapid advances in technology over the last few years, maintaining a broadband connection has become essential for many of us in our daily lives. Streaming more HD movies, downloading music, and using data-heavy video chat services like Skype and FaceTime can make basic broadband speeds seem a bit sluggish.

Luckily, you do have some options to choose from. We’ve taken a look at three of the larger broadband providers in the country—Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Verizon—to show you some options if you would like to dramatically increase your internet speeds.

How fast is my broadband now?

The average speed that Americans get from their home internet service is 5.8 megabits per second (Mbps). Those numbers may seem decent, but those speeds place the United States in 13th place worldwide, behind countries like Latvia, the Czech Republic, and Romania. Even the city with the fastest internet service in America, Boston, Massachusetts, only averages 8.4Mbps—a speed that wouldn’t place it in the top 50 cities worldwide.

America’s slow broadband speeds aren’t due to lack of availability but a lack of knowledge among cable companies’ customers. Cable companies push low-end broadband packages, because they are usually cheaper—and much slower. For instance, most Verizon customers don’t have a clue that Verizon offers broadband with speeds of 300Mbps on June 17—the fastest broadband connection in the country, fast enough to download a two-hour HD movie in under two minutes.

What are my high-speed options?

Photo by Tyler Olson via Shutterstock.

Aside from Verizon’s world-class offering (which costs $204 a month), there are other extremely fast options from Comcast, Time Warner Cable, and Verizon.

Coming in right behind Verizon’s highest broadband package is a 150Mbps offering that costs $94 a month. Another option is an $84-a-month plan that will get you speeds of 75Mbps. Be aware of the hidden costs with Verizon; all of these prices are contingent upon a two-year contract (if you don’t sign, the price goes up $5 a month, plus you have to pay a $100 equipment fee) as well as Verizon’s home phone service (another $5-a-month surcharge if you don’t have it).

Time Warner Cable also has faster options for you, but they are nowhere near what Verizon is offering. Time Warner’s highest offering is $79 a month, which gets you speeds of 50Mbps for your home internet needs. For $49 and $39 a month, you can get speeds of 30Mbps and 20Mbps, respectively. All of these prices are promotional and will rise after the first year.

Comcast does offer higher speeds than Time Warner Cable, but it comes at a premium. At 105Mbps, Comcast’s fastest option comes in at $199 a month, $5 cheaper than Verizon’s highest option, which offers speeds nearly three times as fast. For $115 a month with Comcast, you will get speeds of 50Mbps, while $72 a month will bring you speeds of 30Mbps.

Is it worth it?

If you live by yourself and are not an avid internet user, you may not need this kind of speed. But if you live with techies or have teenagers who are constantly on the internet, it will definitely come in handy.

Even with all of the advances in technology, your broadband connection shares a trait with your water heater—if everyone uses the hot water at the same time, the water will lose heat more quickly than it would otherwise. The same is true with broadband. If you are streaming Netflix and surfing the web on your iPad, your 5Mbps internet connection will take much longer to download that large file than it usually does.

If you are experiencing slow speeds or just want a faster connection, a super-fast internet connection is definitely worth paying for. If you do choose to upgrade, you will miss out on all the fun of buffering Netflix shows, slow-loading YouTube clips, and long waits for file downloads—but we’re sure you’ll find something to do with all that free time.

Is It Worth Paying For Super-Fast Internet In Your Home? The Saturday Evening Post

The idea for a wireless control had been in development for a long time, as you can see in the 1938 advertisement for a wireless radio controller. Philco called its “Mystery Control” —

the most miraculous radio invention since radio itself… Imagine!  Remote Control, without wires or plug-in connections to radio, to electric outlet or anything else.

[Without] jumping up and running to and fro… Without moving a step… without budging from your chair… you turn the dial on the Mystery Control. Like magic, you hear the station change on the radio! You regulate volume! You even turn the radio off!

The controller worked with 11 different models of Philco radios, including the monstrous-looking console, the 116RX. The unit itself, according to the company, was no larger or heavier than a book. You can judge the size for yourself in this photo.

 You carry it around as easily… place it wherever the mood strikes you—anywhere, in any room, upstairs or downstairs, as near to the radio as you wish or as far away as you can enjoyably listen.

Isn’t this the one radio comfort you’ve wished for?  No more trudging back and forth to run the radio.

What about that old radio of yours, now?

It turned out that Mystery Control wasn’t the “radio comfort” everyone wanted. After three years, Philco took it out of production.

Looking back now, it’s surprising the product wasn’t successful. Philco knew this market. They’d been selling wireless remotes since 1931 in their Lazy X system:

“[S]omething really new in radio… a radio you can listen to in absolute ease and comfort. A radio that doubles the number of stations and variety of programs you enjoy—by making it so easy to change from one to another.”

Hard-wired remote for a 1950 Zenith TV.

Other radio makers must have sensed the demand for remote control, but they relied on the more dependable wired control. In 1950, the remote controls for RCA, Zenith, and Philco TVs were all connected by wire to the set.

Technology purists might protest that a wired controller isn’t truly “Remote Control.” But the term was formerly applied to all sorts of now-unremarkable devices. In the 1920s, the automotive industry, for example, used “remote control” to describe the hood release and door handles inside the car. And when they began mounting a transmission lever on the steering column in 1934, they referred to the new feature as “remote control gear shifting.”

"Remote control gear shifting."

POST script: The Wire Age

As we enter the wireless age, it’s interesting to read this item, written as the era of modern technology was just beginning.

 Future annalists may well describe the present period of our history as the wire age.  In no part of the economy of our daily lives are we divorced from wire. It is our slave, and yet an ever present master.

The editors point out to readers that they sleep on wire mattresses, eat food protected by wire screens, travel by cable car or by electric railways powered by wire, often passing over wire bridges. They announced themselves across telegraph or telephone wires, and made their way through the night streets of their city by great numbers of electric lights wired together.

Across our fields are strung thousands of miles of barbed wire. Our clocks are set by wires, our watches run by wires, our books are stitched with wires, our pictures hung by wires, and…

Wait for it…

… and our politics managed by wires.

Losing Touch: The Evolution of Remote Controls The Saturday Evening Post

If you’ve bought or adopted a pet within the last few years, you’ve probably heard of microchipping. It’s a process that has largely become standard procedure in most adoption centers and vet clinics, frequently included with the standard new pet services like vaccinations and spaying or neutering. Despite the high-tech name, we’re not actually talking about turning your puppy into a robot. Microchipping is actually a very simple procedure.

Preparing our robot puppy overlords

Photo by Daniel Lobo.

A microchip implant is a tiny, integrated circuit placed under the skin of a dog, cat, or other animal. Using passive RFID technology, it contains an identification number that is linked to a database. Pet owners can register their pet’s microchip through various websites so that if the animal is ever lost or stolen and then found, a shelter or veterinarian can return the animal where it belongs.

The chip itself is just a tiny bit bigger than a grain of rice, and it can be implanted without anesthesia in just a few minutes at a vet’s office. It doesn’t hurt the animal at all, and once it’s in place, neither you nor your pet will even know it’s there.

Standards and information

When pet microchips first became available, every company that made a chip used its own database and its own radio frequency, requiring a proprietary scanner to read. This proved to be a huge issue for shelters and clinics, which needed multiple scanners in order to check the animals that came in.

Thankfully, most manufacturers now follow the International Standards Organization (ISO) guidelines for animal microchips so that any chip created following those guidelines can be read by any scanner. The United States doesn’t require that animals be tagged with an ISO-compliant chip, but several other countries do. In the United States, vets and shelters must rely on scanners that can read the ISO chips and the four major types of proprietary chips available today.

Show me some identification

The chip itself isn’t like a driver’s license, containing a lot of identifying information, nor is it a GPS location device. The only information the chip contains is a unique identification number and sometimes the phone number or website for the registry of the company that produced the chip.

Photo by Patrick van IJzendoorn.

It’s up to you, the pet owner, to make sure that you register the chip and keep your information up to date. The vet, shelter, or adoption agency where you acquired your pet should provide you with the instructions for setting this up initially. If you move or change phone numbers, make sure you update the chip registry!

Beam me home, Scotty

A study cited by the American Veterinary Medicine Association points out that lost dogs and cats with microchips are successfully returned to their owners 52.2% and 38.5% of the time, respectively, versus just 21.9% and 1.8% for dogs and cats without microchips. Even pets that have traveled thousands of miles have still been reunited with their owners, thanks to microchips.

One piece in the responsible pet owner puzzle

Photo Courtesy of smlp.co.uk

Being a responsible pet owner is an ongoing process. Your furry companion needs regular veterinary care, and it’s a great idea to ask your vet to scan your pet’s microchip whenever Fluffy’s in for a checkup just to make sure it’s still in working order.

While the microchip technology is very well tested, it’s not completely foolproof. Make sure that your dog or cat is wearing a collar and tags at all times, including at least one tag with a phone number where you can be reached. If Fido wanders down the road and is picked up by a good Samaritan, it’s much easier for that person to call the number on his tag than figure out how to get him to a vet to read the microchip.

The heartache and angst of losing a pet can be devastating, but planning and diligence — and a little dose of technology — will give your beloved companion a much greater chance of finding his way home!

Cyberpets: Microchips Help Lost Pets Find Their Way Home The Saturday Evening Post

The price of electricity has gone down by two-thirds while the cost of gasoline, with taxes, has almost tripled.

It was time to revive the electric car industry. One company was already claiming remarkable savings of money and energy.

On the average, each electric car with batteries being recharged at night will use fifty dollars’ worth of juice a year. And most of the current will be drawn at off-peak hours after midnight, which means far more efficient use of generating equipment.

However, Furnas was quick to explain the limitations.

"Hey, look at the old car!" A 1920 Detroit Electric, still running in 1960.

You can’t rip engine and gas tank out of a heavy, Detroit-sized car, substitute batteries and electric motor, and expect dazzling performance. Instead of a more-than-l00-horsepower engine, you [will] have one or two electric motors delivering four to sixteen horsepower at best.So the new electric must be as small as a foreign economy car and specially engineered for lightness—glass and plastic get the call as body materials. And then you [must] settle for… forty miles per hour top speed, and ninety to 100 miles’ range per recharge.

These numbers held true for cars powered by traditional batteries. But several companies, including Union Carbide, Lockheed, Dow Chemical, General Electric, Gulf Oil, and Chrysler, were working on a more powerful source of electricity: the “fuel cell.”

The fuel cell’s efficiency is amazing. The best-designed electric-power plant, burning oil or coal to make steam to run a generator, cannot transform into electricity more than 40 per cent of the potential energy in the fuel used. Internal combustion engines are even less efficient. But fuel cells are getting close to 80 per cent under laboratory conditions and will soon do better.

The 1963 Chrysler Turbine

But for all its promise,  the electric car lost momentum. Two years later, Chrysler was off pursuing another Big Idea: the turbine engine.

The gas-turbine engine will run on any fuel that will flow through a pipe and ignite with air. Diesel and fuel oil, kerosene, white gasoline, Greasy Kid Stuff*, moonshine, and presumably even Chanel No. 5 for motorists addicted to conspicuous consumption —all will work just fine.

Chrysler is prepared to provide turbines in volume by 1966 or 1967.

[* hands up, anyone who remembers where this phrase originated—ed.]

Electric cars had apparently posed too many problems to succeed.  Turbines had too many advantages to fail:

A turbine would use about 300 pounds less metal than a conventional V-8. In a sales year such as 1963, this would amount to an aggregate saving of more than 1,000,000  tons of metal.

The turbine, with only about 60 major parts, would be far simpler and cheaper to produce.

Demand for motor oil would slacken enormously. There would be no further need for antifreezes, rust inhibitors, or special lubricants. Other casualties: pistons, rings, valves, radiators, fan belts and carburetors. Spark-plug sales would plummet— the turbine uses only one plug.

And yet… Chrysler built only 5 prototypes and 50 production models. Detroit got over its infatuation with turbines and, by 1967, was back to flirting with electric cars.

Ford and General Motors announced this fall that they were working on new electric cars, and Sen. Warren G. Magnuson (D., Wash.) introduced a bill to spend $10 million developing such a vehicle.

Once again, the automakers hoping to get consumers excited about the electric car. As they told Post author Roy Bongartz:

There is hardly anything in it or on it to wear out or go on the blink.

Gone with the engine itself are motor oil, filter, pump, and pressure gauge; pistons and rings; generator, distributor, spark plugs, air filter, radiator, water pump, hoses, antifreeze, fan and fan belt.

There is no driveshaft—thus no hump in the floor— no transmission, no starter motor, no exhaust pipe, and—of course—no exhaust.

The lovable feature of the electric is what it hasn’t got: it hasn’t got troubles.

The Corvair, electrified.

Chevrolet had already begun showing off its prototype, a version of the Corvair called the Electrovair II.

With a 115-horsepower motor weighing just 130 pounds, it could reach 60 mph in just 16 seconds.

The top speed is 80. Though it weighs 800 pounds more than the Corvair, the car was engineered to equal Corvair performance except in range: Electrovair II’s range is only 80 miles.

As it turned out the electric car was left in long-term parking for over 50 years, along with other auto innovations like—

• the driverless car, which is “guided by a continuous cable… on the roadway [that] communicates with a computer in the car… to control steering and speed.”

• the air-cushioned car, like the Ford Levacar, which rode on a friction-free cushion of air.

• the single-control design: “the ‘Unicontrol’… a short gear stick that controls the acceleration and deceleration, steering and braking of a car.”

The 1962 GM Firebird III Turbine with Unicontrol.

Where did they all go? Why did none of them ever reach regular production? Why did automotive technology remain virtually unchanged for over a century?

It’s easy to say the automakers didn’t want to change, but that wouldn’t explain the money and time they poured into developing new vehicles.

Some have argued that the oil companies suppressed any technology that would reduce the nation’s dependence on petroleum.

A less fanciful but more plausible explanation is that very few consumers are “Early Adapters,” as Geoffrey Moore described them in his book, “Crossing The Chasm.” Most Americans won’t buy new technology—no matter how amazing it is—until they see its immediate benefits. As long as gasoline hovered around $2.00 a gallon, and the cost of gas-powered vehicles remained affordable, the couldn’t see any advantage in more for an electric car.

POST script:

You probably noticed 1960 price of gasoline above (31¢). The Department of Energy has an interesting graph that adjusts the price of gasoline to 2004 dollars (when *sigh* gas was still less than $2.00 a gallon.) Their figures show that the low price of gasoline (“Current $ Gas Price”) across the 20th Century, was actually not so inexpensive when translated into modern costs (“Constant $ Gas Price).

The Long Delayed Future of the Automobile The Saturday Evening Post