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When you delete a file in Windows, only the reference to the file is removed from the file system table. The file still exists on disk until other data overwrites it, leaving it vulnerable to recovery. There are many tools available out there that allow you to securely delete files so they cannot be recovered. This article provides a summary of some of the free tools available out there, many of which are portable, allowing you to securely delete files you may temporarily save to public computers....

What Types of EV Charging Stations Are There? There are three types, or “levels,” of EV charging stations available as of this writing: type 1, type 2, and type 3. Type 1 is the slowest, while type 3 can charge an EV’s battery most of the way in about an hour. Before we dive in, we should review some terms. Charging stations are called by multiple names, all of which mean the same thing, which can add to the confusion about which one to pick....

Are the photos you take with your iPhone or iPad backed up in case you lose your device? If you’re just relying on iCloud to manage your important memories, your photos may not be backed up at all. Apple’s iCloud has a photo-syncing feature in the form of “Photo Stream,” but Photo Stream doesn’t actually perform any long-term backups of your photos. iCloud’s Photo Backup Limitations Assuming you’ve set up iCloud on your iPhone or iPad, your device is using a feature called “Photo Stream” to automatically upload the photos you take to your iCloud storage and sync them across your devices....

Researchers at MIT, using a network analyzer, tested the impact of tin foil helmets on receptivity of radio-frequency signals. They highlight the method and results in the study abstract: While their conclusion is a bit tongue-in-cheek, the irony of foil helmets increasing reception of government-reserved radio frequencies is certainly not lost on us. On the Effectiveness of Aluminum Foil Helmets: An Empirical Study

Connecting to the internet from Wi-Fi hotspots, at work, or anywhere else away from home, exposes your data to unnecessary risks. You can easily configure your router to support a secure tunnel and shield your remote browser traffic—read on to see how. What is and Why Set Up a Secure Tunnel? You might be curious why you would even want to set up a secure tunnel from your devices to your home router and what benefits you would reap from such a project....

There is a way around this problem. You can share a folder on your Windows 7 host machine and then map that folder as a network drive in your Windows 8 virtual machine. We’ve shown you how to transfer files between a Windows 8 PC and a Windows 7 PC. This method uses that procedure, but there are also some settings you need to work with in VMware Workstation to ensure that you can both access your Windows 7 host machine and the internet through the VMware network connection....

This past month we covered topics such as alternative search engines that respect your privacy, tips and tweaks for getting the most out of Chrome, using camera Raw tools to develop digital photographs, and more. Join us as we look back at the most popular articles for May. The Best Articles of May Note: Articles are listed as #10 through #1. How To Use Camera Raw Tools to Develop Digital Photographs...

Every week we bring you interesting highlights from the history of geekdom. This week we take a look at The Legend of Zelda’s 25th anniversary, the Gutenberg press, and the unveiling of primitive super computer ENIAC. The Legend of Zelda Series Turns 25 The brainchild of Nintendo game designers Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka, The Legend of Zelda entered into popular culture on February 21, 1986. Link, the young hero of the Legend of Zelda series, struck a chord with players across the world and is the most recognizable Nintendo character besides their iconic Mario....

If you’ve ever noticed a process named “Windows Shell Experience Host” in your Task Manager window, you may experienced a fleeting curiosity and then gone on about your business. Here’s what that process is and why it can occasionally eat up some people’s CPU and Memory. RELATED: What Is This Process and Why Is It Running on My PC? This article is part of our ongoing series explaining various processes found in Task Manager, like Runtime Broker, svchost....

Many of you worked to keep old laptops from getting scrapped by dusting them off and donating them. Mark writes: Wbrown does the same: I also do the same with old desktops as well. They really appreciate them and It gives me the satisfaction of resurrecting an old computer. EchoGecko shares a veritable laundry list of his past projects: Hit up the original comment thread for dozens of other suggestions for squeezing more life out of your aging hardware....

By far and away the most common technique deployed as carefully isolating work from home life. Carol writes: Carol’s last point–that you can fail to find a stopping point for work–certainly resonates with me. I just recently moved my home office from an open area off the kitchen to a remote upstairs bedroom and can’t believe what a difference having an out-of-sight office makes in terms of being able to successfully unplug at the end of the day....

QWERTY — so-called because the letters at the top-left corner of the keyboard begin with QWERTY — is the most common keyboard layout. But some people think alternative keyboard layouts like Dvorak and Colemak are faster and more efficient. You can switch keyboard layouts by changing your operating system’s keyboard layout setting, although the letters printed on your keyboard won’t match the new layout. You can also get keyboards designed for Dvorak or Colemak, if you like....

Today we have a look at how we can backup our virtual machines on one server, and then restore them on another server configured to run Hyper-V without requiring any third-party tools. Exporting a Virtual Machine To get started, open up the Hyper-V Manager MMC Console. Now right-click on the virtual machine you wish to export, and select export from the context menu. Hit the browse button and select the folder you wish to save your exported virtual machine, then click on the export button....

Apple just introduced a new 10th-generation iPad in October, with a higher price tag than the previous 9th-gen model. Now the previous iPad has returned to its all-time low price of $270. The 2021 iPad, also known as the 9th-generation iPad or 10.2-inch iPad, is Apple’s entry-level tablet. It has 64 GB of internal storage, a 10.2-inch screen, Wi-Fi 5 (802.11ac), an 8 MP rear camera, a 12 MP front-facing camera, and stereo speakers....

IKEA Lack tables are, either by chance or design, the same width as AV and rack-mount computer gear. In this mod IKEAHacker reader Eric Shook needed a cheap and simple AV rack with clean lines. A little measuring, sawing, and bracing later, and he had a custom rack that fit his components perfectly. Should he need to adjust things in the future for a taller or shorter component he can swap out the existing legs with new ones made from the left over scrap....

Reader Eric did comprehensive testing using various test suites, boot and shutdown, and other testing to see whether disabling the page file break your system or give a performance boost. Conclusions: You can run Windows without a pagefile if you have enough RAM. There’s pretty much zero benefit to disabling the pagefile. You should definitely check out the full (very long) article for all the details. The Windows 7 Pagefile And Running Without One [TweakHound]

Data Breaches Are on the Rise The increase isn’t just limited to the frequency of reported incidents, but also, the volume of compromised data, records, and files, because while the number of breaches dropped drastically between 2019 and 2020, the volume of records exposed more than doubled. But in a world where data breaches and leaks are an everyday occurrence, it’s every company for itself. And since prevention is no longer a viable option, companies now focus on response and damage control....

Branches are a core feature of Git’s version tracking and are used constantly by teams working on the same software codebase. We’ll dive into how they work under the hood, and how you can use them to improve your Git workflow. What Are Branches, Really? Branches are used to split off Git history. You can think of Git commits like a line of changes going back in time. You can “checkout” any of these commits and move your local directory back in time to the state it was at when that commit was made....

Multitasking on the command-line can be really confusing for beginners who use Screen. Using Byobu puts a host of system stats available at a glance while making it easy for newbies to work without memorizing hard-to-remember keybindings. GNU Screen is a godsend for most people who are working in terminal. It allows you to spawn multiple instances and let’s you disconnect from them and return to them later. It’s also pretty notorious for having a high learning curve....

How to Archive a Facebook Group When you archive a Facebook Group, you won’t be able to create posts or like or add comments. You won’t be able to add more members, but existing members will be able to view the group. You can restore the group to its former glory at any time. You can archive a Facebook group from the group’s page from either the Facebook website or the Facebook app on iPhone or Android....