How to

Horrendous airport delays make headlines every holiday travel season. Sadly, not even the most carefully planned travel itinerary can help you survive flight delays, cancellations and other snow-induced shenanigans.

Until now.

After undergoing my own 36-hour airport nightmare last summer, I understand the sheer frustration of being bumped time...after time...after time. I know what it's like to curl up on a concrete floor or contort into a deceptively uncomfortable chair. Pulling from my experience as an airport refugee, I've put together this brief prep list and extensive tick-tock guide of what to do, where to go, and how to remain sane during a 36-hour vacation at the concourse. It's going to be a wild -- if stationary -- ride.

The Situation

Weather is obviously the biggest factor leading to terminal limbo, but a combination of unpredictability, bad timing and high commuter volume really turns a rosy-cheeked getaway into an extended bout of humbugging. According to stats from the Federal Bureau of Transportation, last December saw the highest percentage of delayed flights and twice as many cancellations as the 2009 average. Both trends extend back more than 20 years.Read more

Now that wireless networks are everywhere, computer burglars, aka hackers, are having a field day, attempting to invade your privacy and worse yet, steal your identity. Believe me, you don't want that to happen.

That is why we strongly suggest that you take the following steps to secure your network:

1. Almost all routers and access points come with an administrator password that is a weak default, like "password" or the manufacturer's name. Replace the default passwords on every wireless router or access point you purchase with passwords of your own. Imagine, for instance, how many "dlink" networks there would be in the world if none of our customers renamed their routers? Hackers make it a point to know every company's default passwords. By simply defining a new password, one that will certainly be easier for you to remember than the default, you will establish the protection you need to halt hackers from accessing your network or devices.

Most reputable vendors supply easy set-up wizards with their devices. Just follow the directions to rename your router or device with something unique and easy for you to remember. But be careful not to be so creative or simplistic that you provide sensitive information with the name you give your device. "Smith Family Router" is not the best idea. Be sure to write it down and keep it someplace safe for future reference. Without it, the only way to access the router or access point may be to reset it to factory default settings. which will wipe away any configuration changes you've made.Read more

April 22, 2009 – With less than two months remaining until full-power analog TV broadcasts go digital across the nation, www.ConnectYourBox.com and www.ConecteSuConvertidor.com were launched today. Sponsored by one of the most popular digital-to-analog converter box brands, Zenith, the new Web sites answer common questions about setting up the boxes.

"We're taking thousands of phone calls each day from consumers who have purchased the Zenith DTT901 converter box but don't understand how best to connect it to their analog TV," said Zenith Senior VP Richard Lewis. "And while it's not difficult to hook up a converter box to an analog TV, more than one out of four callers had connectivity questions, which is similar to what the FCC is experiencing with its DTV Hotline.

"The new ConnectYourBox.com and ConecteSuConvertidor.com Web sites are specifically designed to answer the most common questions, providing step-by-step instructions with photos on how to connect an analog-to-digital TV converter box to an existing TV set," Lewis continued. "And a lot of people have questions about how to keep using an old VCR—we cover that as well."

Among the top connectivity questions asked by DTT901 customers on the Zenith help line (1-877-9ZENITH) are "what kind of cables should I use?" and "how, exactly, do I connect my converter box to a TV or VCR?" Read more

Your hard drive just crashed, and you're afraid you have lost a bunch of important files. What do you do?

First you swear a lot, then you let panic wash over you. Then you shoot a dirty look at the "helpful" family member who asks if you backed up your files on disk. (Of course you didn't.)

After all that, take a few deep breaths and know that there is a good chance you will see those lost files again. In fact, you may be able to recover them yourself.

First, you should make sure it really is the hard drive at issue. Remove the hard drive and use a USB universal drive adapter to hook it up as a secondary drive to another computer. If your files don't show up, you know the hard drive is in trouble and you will have to invest some money in attempting to retrieve those family photos or that project for work. Remember that there are no guarantees your files will be recovered, yet in most cases, the data can be saved even when it appears that all is lost. Read more

Setting up a new home theater system is exciting, but, with equipment and components and wiring galore, it has its share of pitfalls – many of which are avoidable.

As with most home improvement projects, preparation - and a bit of forethought - is key. Consider these simple installation tips from the experts at CableOrganizer.com – a leading provider of home theater cable, wire and equipment management solutions:

Account for power requirements
Make sure that your home’s circuits can handle the power load placed on them by home theater devices. Before you plug in and run all of those audio/video components, find out how much power you have running to your home theater room, as well as the total amount of power that will be drawn by the electronics. If the load is too heavy, reconfigure your equipment so that you don’t blow the circuit! And always remember: if you’re in doubt as far as power capabilities for a home theater go, there’s no shame in having a professional assess the situation. Where electricity is concerned, it’s always better to be safe than sorry. Read more

As the holiday frenzy winds down, it's time to make that shiny new PC you received do more than Google, check email, and play solitaire. The processor, memory, disk, and connectivity provided by your newest computer puts that old dinosaur you bought 2-3 years ago to shame. So why limit yourself to running those same old tired programs? Here are a few ideas for giving your new PC a real on-line workout...

1. Tune into Internet radio: If you enjoy music, you probably used your old PC to play an occasional CD or download music using a program like iTunes. But contemporary computers can also be used like high-quality stereo receivers, playing media streamed live over the Internet to PC-connected speakers or headsets. Some Internet radio stations are free –- for example, Live365 is an index to hundreds of Internet radio stations worldwide. Other sites charge for access to commercial-free broadcasts – for example, XM satellite radio customers can listen to those same XM stations over the Internet from home or office PCs. While it's possible to listen to Internet radio over dial-up, using a broadband-connected computer delivers better quality. Read more

There's the teen who refuses to turn off her cell phone, the toddler booting the back of your seat and the $5 bucket of popcorn that tastes like it's been around since the silent era. Isn't going to the movies supposed to be fun?

If you'd rather watch movies at home than go to the theater, you're not alone. About 73 percent of your fellow movie-lovers feel the same, according to one Associated Press-AOL poll. The majority of respondents said they would rather watch movies at home, citing crowds, uncomfortable seats, expensive tickets and costly concessions among the aggravations of going out to the movies.

No wonder building a home theater is one of the hottest trends in home improvement, and electronic items like home theater systems promise to continue as hot sellers. If the idea of having your own home theater is appealing, you don't have to pay pros to do the job for you. You can enjoy a home theater experience without the expense of professional installation by doing it yourself.

Here are some basics for building your own home theater: Read more

Maybe you're remodeling to optimize TV watching at home. Perhaps you're gearing up to secure virtual front-row seats to the “Big Game”. It's entirely possible that you're simply using the national conversion to 100-percent digital TV broadcasts at midnight on Feb. 17, 2009, as a good excuse to bring home a shiny, new high-definition TV.

Regardless of your motivation for the purchase, after eagerly unpacking your cherished widescreen DLP, LCD or plasma TV, you'll see there are many different options, tweaks and adjustments to make in pursuit of the best possible viewing experience. One oft-forgotten detail is how to use lighting in your media room or home theater. Read more

It's the time of the year when meals are shared and holiday memories are made, but are you taking the best photos to share with friends and family? If you do not feel confident behind the lens and your pictures stay trapped on your camera, these tips will help you take photos you'll be proud to share with others.

Here are five tips to best capture and share your favorite holiday moments:

Tip 1: Use the flash indoors and out
For the best outcome, use the flash when taking photos outdoors. This applies to photos taken outside -- no matter what the season. The flash will lighten the shadows on the subject's face caused by the sun. If subjects are under a tree, or have a shadow cast on them, this trick is especially helpful to lighten them. A flash can help neutralize the lighting source even during the high noon period of the day when the sun casts deep shadows. Read more