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I’m going to help some people out today by explaining a little bit about resolution and what it should mean to you. The term has become a little loose when we talk about electronics and printed media, but they pretty much go hand in hand. When we talk about print resolution, we refer to it as dpi (dots per inch). Obviously the more dots you have in an inch the better the quality of the print will be. Of course, if you are printing an image that does not match up with your printer resolution, then you are just going to be getting a very high quality print of a low quality picture.

What I mean by this is that your digital media also has a resolution; but we measure it on a screen as ppi (pixels per inch). Now when you scan a photo or image onto your computer it must be set to a high dpi during the original capture session. Meaning that when you scan something, you should be doing so at 300 dpi. There is also a scale function with scanners. This can be set by giving an output size or a scale percentage. If it is at 100% scale and at 300 dpi, then your print will pretty much look almost exactly like the original at the same size. Anything below 100% scale will be smaller than the original and anything above 100% scale will be larger than the original. Just remember to always scan at 300 dpi if you are printing though. Another thing you should be conscious of is that scanners degrade images over and over if you use a copy of the original. Printers lay down small dots or small square that blend together to make the complete image and when you scan that and try and reprint it, it always looks horrible. Try to avoid that and always scan the original if possible.

Onward we go. Now for some info about digital cameras. Megapixels… for some people this word can be scary; and others, mean nothing at all. The basic thing to remember though is that the higher the megapixel setting is on a camera, the better quality picture it can produce. Now granted, a 10 megapixel camera can also yield very poor results if not set correctly. Your camera will have settings that allow you to change how big your image will be when you take it.

Here is a basic list of what you can do with certain resolutions:
0.3 Megapixel - Outputs a 640×480 image - prints up to 2×3 good
1 Megapixel - Outputs a 1280×960 image - prints up to 5×7 very good
2 Megapixel - Outputs a 1600×1200 image - prints up to 8×10 very good
3 Megapixel - Outputs a 2048×1536 image - prints up to 11×14 good
5 Megapixel - Outputs a 2560×1920 image - prints up to 16×20 very good
7 Megapixel - Outputs a 3072×2304 image - prints up to 20×30 very good
10+ Megapixel - prints 20×30 original photo quality

If you have a camera that has a very high megapixel count, then make sure it is set to the highest quality setting if you plan on printing it. Of course if you take all images on uber high, then you won’t be able to take as many as you would if they were on a lower setting. It just depends on what you want to do with them in the long run. You might have experienced problems emailing pictures that were taken with a 7+ megapixel camera. That’s because the images are big and the file size is therefore also quite big. You should try to downsize images to around 640×480 to send by email. At that size they are small enough for a quick transfer by email and also large enough to be printed as a 2×3.

I hope this has helped someone out there. Comments are welcome and I will check them out to see if I can assist you in any other way.

So… you just got back from the store with you shiny new PC. Wrapped up all nice in that cardboard box. You think to yourself about how great that deal was they had for this cool computer… until you hook it up and year goes by. Then what, because now you are stuck with a machine that was only semi-good for its time and cannot be easily upgraded.

Let me shed some light on some things that you might not currently know or understand. First off, PC’s that you buy from retailers are “Priced right PC’s”. At this current time in the world, most of the general public do not buy a PC for what’s inside… but by price range. PC’s in retailers are in specific price ranges to maximize their profit. And when you buy a PC like that, then you never really know what’s on the inside. Of course they put system specs on the box and other things that you already probably don’t really understand but they never actually give a maker of the components inside the PC. You wouldn’t want to buy a Corvette with a VW Beetle’s engine in it, right? It’s the same way with PC’s. Except people are being had every day from this. It’s not that the PC you bought doesn’t work like it’s supposed to. The point is… they use crappy components and charge you as if they were name brand components. I’m sure a lot of you out there have had PC’s die because they just wouldn’t turn on after a few years of use. Retail PC’s are bad about using cheap power supplies that die in a year or two. They know you don’t know how to fix it and they know that all you will do is just go out and buy a brand new PC. Therefore tripling there profit in the long run.

PC manufactures are getting better though at using more reliable components. The only drawback with that is, they are charging even more money for it. They are trying to compensate for the manufacturing process. They still have to assemble them by hand so they are going to charge you a lot more. If you were to spend, let’s just say $1000 on a new PC. And you bought a new PC from a retailer, you could use the same amount of money and build your own PC and it will be at least x2 faster than the store bought PC. It just takes a little research and time to receive all the parts and to put it together. You can do a Google search for how to put a computer together and badda bing badda boom, you are all set. It may seem hard at first but trust me, it’s not that bad.

Also, when you buy a PC from a store you get all that unwanted junk software and other crap that you have no idea what it does or where it’s at on the PC. If you build your own, what you put on it is all that’s on it. Another thing that kills me is when the retailer says that you get a free copy of QuickTime or Yahoo Messenger or other stuff like that… WHEN THEY ARE ALREADY FREE ON THERE WEBSITES.

I hope this little bit of info has been useful too you and I really hope to gets some questions from you guys. I will help you to get started and off in the right direction.

Happy Computing

I swore to myself that I wouldn’t post gaming news as my first post ever, but today… THREE!!! Demos for the PC have been released and they are all blockbuster hits. The first two demo’s I have played for about 15 to 20 min. but the last one I am downloading now.

The first demo is Time Shift.
This game puts you in the body of a high tech super soldier with armor that allows you to speed up, slow down or completely stop time for a brief amount of time. If you have every played any game with bullet time (slow motion) you will know that it is helpful, but not necessarily needed to complete the game. Just from playing this demo, you must rewind time to make it through a passage before it is completely obliterated by an enemy mech walker. So you MUST use the time change to beat this game. It is a fast passed shooter and it looks just amazing.

The second demo up for download is the much acclaimed Call of Duty 4.
If you have never played any of the COD games in the series then my friend… you are only hurting yourself. COD 1 - 3 have all been set in the WWII era and I guess Infinity Ward finally realized that people were ready for something new and exciting. COD4 puts you in today’s war era. High tech weapons and advanced fighting tactics. The demo for this game is a little buggy on my PC. Not really the visuals, because they honestly do the game much justice, but there is definitely a problem with the sound. Sometimes it is really loud and then it gets really quite… even when your right smack in the middle of the firefight. Other than that the game play is what you have come to expect from the series. Solid controls and action packed missions.

NOW FINALY MAY I PRESENT THE LONG AWAITED UNREAL TOURNAMENT 3 DEMO!!!!!!
My friends, there is no other more anticipated game other than Crysis than this one. In a long list of UT games, this one promises to be super freakin sweet. With graphics that will make your parents huddle into the fetal position and beg for mercy. Game play so immense you’ll feel like your inside the game ripping it up with your team on the battlefield. If you have a PC that can handle this demo, then please go and get it. It is worth every second it takes to download it.