Install and run Android Apps in Bluestacks

 I’m going to show you how to use free software called BlueStack . It is app player for windows where you can run all your favorite android apps on your pc .
1) Download and Install BlueStacks .

2) You can download and use any android apps and run it on your pc. If you’re looking for specific app , click on App search and type specific app in the search bar . Click on it and download+installing process will begin . 

How to sync your Android phone with PC

BlueStacks lets you sync apps, photos and SMS messages between your phone and PC? Here’s how:

1) If you want to sync your Android phone with PC. Go to Settings and click on Cloud Connect .

2) Set up your BlueStack account .

3) Install the BlueStacks Cloud Connect app from the Android Market to your phone.

4)Open the app and pair your phone with your PC by typing in your PIN:

5)Select whether or not you want to receive SMS messages simultaneously on your PC via BlueStacks . Click “Login” and you are done!

Dual Boot Your Pre-Installed Windows 7 Computer with XP

You have windows 7 computer, but you want to have trusty XP standing by in a dual boot setup. Today we’ll walk through creating a new partition in Windows 7 then installing XP on it.

In this process we are going to shrink some free space on the Windows 7 hard drive to allocate toward a new partition. Make sure to take a moment and decide how much space to use for the XP partition. Make sure you have enough space on your hard drive for files you’ll be adding to each.

Create a New Partition

The first thing we need to do is create a new partition on the Windows 7 machine. Luckily we can do it without any 3rd party software. To begin, click on Start and type either partition ordisk management into the search box and at the top of the menu click on Create and format hard disk partitions.

The Disk Management window opens, and from here we need to free up space on the (C:) drive Windows 7 is installed on. Right-click on the drive and select Shrink Volume.  

A window pops up showing the drive is being queried for available space.

 

Now enter the amount of space you want to shrink the volume. You’re shown the total size of the disk and the amount of size that is available to shrink. In this example we’re freeing up 40GB of space.

After the process completes you’ll see the new Unallocated space. Right-click that and selectNew Simple Volume.

The New Simple Volume Wizard launches which is a straight forward process. When you get to the Format Partition section, NTFS is selected by default as the file system and you can leave that as is. You might want to rename the Volume label something else like “XP Partition” so it’s easier to identify when installing XP. Also you’ll probably want to make sure to checkPerform a Quick Format.

After the format is complete you will see the new volume as a healthy partition listed.

Now when you go into My Computer you’ll see the the new disk and notice that space has been taken away from the (C:) drive Windows 7 is installed on.

Install XP on the New Partition

Now that you know how to create a new partition on your Windows 7 machine, it’s time to install XP on it. Here we’re installing XP Professional on the new partition. Boot from the XP installation disk and start the install process.

When it comes to choosing a partition, make sure you select the one you created using the steps above. In this example we made a 10GB partition for the XP install.

If the partition you created was already formatted as NTFS you can leave it, or you can choose the FAT file system if you want. 

Basically you continue through as if you were doing a clean install on any hard drive.

Create Boot Loader

Once installation of XP is successful you can now go through and install the latest Microsoft Updates and drivers. You will undoubtedly notice that the machine is booting directly into XP at this time. This is due to XP writing it’s bootloader over Windows 7’s. To get both XP and Windows 7 as an option at the boot screen you can use the free utility EasyBCD 1.72 or their new 2.0 Beta.

 

VistaBootPRO 3.3 (free version) will still work too which you can download here. VistaBootPRO is now called DualBootPRO and is no longer free, it’s $9.95 for a single user license.

After getting the bootloader back you should see both XP and Windows 7 as options in the Windows Boot Manager.

Conclusion

If you want to set a default OS on your dual boot system, check out The Geek’s tutorial on how to set it up. To download the EasyBCD 2.0 Beta, you’ll need to register with the NeoSmart Technologies Forum first. If you’re hesitant to try out Beta software, EasyBCD 1.7.2 is also free and will still work as well.  Of course there are other ways of creating a dual boot system, but this is the method I have been using and it’s simple and effective.

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When an acquisition is as massive as Microsoft's $7.17 billion deal to purchase Nokia's mobile and services division, it has to work its way through various regulatory bodies around the world before it can become official. As something of a double-edged sword for Microsoft, because it has a minority standing (albeit growing) in the mobile world, approval has been coming fairly quickly.

Just a few days ago, the U.S. Department of Justice approved the deal; and now, the European Commission has also applied its stamp of approval to Microsoft's plans. The Commission said about the acquisition that "the overlap of the two companies' activities in this area is minimal and several strong rivals, such as Samsung and Apple will continue to compete with the merged entity." It went on to say that it didn't expect Microsoft to restrict access to Windows Phone or any Microsoft apps for 3rd party hardware makers.

Presumably, just like the Google/Motorola deal, the next step is approval in China, and then the pathway will be clear for the purchase to be finalized. Microsoft and Nokia expect to be able to close the deal in early 2014. 

source: Europa Press via The Verge

Microsoft/Nokia deal approved by the European Commission

When an acquisition is as massive as Microsoft's $7.17 billion deal to purchase Nokia's mobile and services division, it has to work its way through various regulatory bodies around the world before it can become official. As something of a double-edged sword for Microsoft, because it has a minority standing (albeit growing) in the mobile world, approval has been coming fairly quickly.

Just a few days ago, the U.S. Department of Justice approved the deal; and now, the European Commission has also applied its stamp of approval to Microsoft's plans. The Commission said about the acquisition that "the overlap of the two companies' activities in this area is minimal and several strong rivals, such as Samsung and Apple will continue to compete with the merged entity." It went on to say that it didn't expect Microsoft to restrict access to Windows Phone or any Microsoft apps for 3rd party hardware makers.

Presumably, just like the Google/Motorola deal, the next step is approval in China, and then the pathway will be clear for the purchase to be finalized. Microsoft and Nokia expect to be able to close the deal in early 2014. 

source: Europa Press via The Verge

President Obama says that he can't own an Apple iPhone "for security reasons"

When President Barack Obama first became President of the U.S., he was always seen with a BlackBerry in his hand. And even though he lobbied for a cooler phone in the Oval Office, the President received a BlackBerry 8830 World Edition with a special app installed called SecureVoice. Ironically, the app gave the Commander-in-Chief access to top secret info from the NSA. The president did say that his daughters are both iPhone users.

On Wednesday, the president was talking with youngsters at the White House Youth Summit on the Affordable Care Act. During his talk, the president noted that he is not allowed to own an Apple iPhone "for security reasons". The president does have an Apple iPad 2 which was given to him by none other than the late Steve Jobs during a Silicon Valley dinner back in 2011. Obama says that only 10 people have his personal email address. The two presidents prior to Obama, George Bush and Bill Clinton, did not use personal email.

While the iPhone does have clearance for Department of Defense employees and some government agencies, this clearance is well below what a presidential phone needs. A BlackBerry model from 2007 is the only handset owned by the president that has been certified to be used by him.

source: Reuters

Leaked Samsung doc reportedly shows KitKat update schedule

The latest Samsung Jelly Bean update may have left a bad taste in your mouth, and for good reason, but perhaps a hint of chocolate will put a smile back on your dial? A new document, reportedly a Samsung KitKat update roadmap, shows the dates for KitKat updates to the major Samsung flagship devices.

The Samsung Galaxy line will be getting KitKat sooner than you might have expected.

The document supposedly originates from Samsung R&D India but we have no idea if it is legit or not, so take the usual pinches of salt, sugar and non-dairy creamer with this one. But what the document says, if it is true, is exciting news for Galaxy owners. Both the Galaxy S4 GT-I9500 and Note 3 SM-N900 will reportedly receive the Android 4.4 update in January 2014 and the S3 GT-I9300 and Note 2 SM-N7100 sometime between March and April 2014. The mini versions of the S4 and S3 are not mentioned however.

If this document is legit, it's good news for Galaxy owners.

Considering the dodgy Android 4.3 update problems, not every Galaxy owner will be looking forward to this update with quite the same level of enthusiasm they normally would. But I think it's safe to say Samsung will test the crap out this update before they let it go live. Otherwise I can easily envision angry mobs armed with flaming torches and pitchforks marching on every Samsung store in the area. A word to the wise: get this one right Samsung. Or else.

I don't know about you, but I like KitKats better than Jelly Beans.

Are you excited to get Android 4.4 on your Galaxy device? Will you be holding your breath while it installs to see if your phone works or crashes?

How to use your Google Maps offline

I use Google Maps almost daily. Whether it be to scope out the quickest route to get somewhere or just to figure out where exactly I am when I’m visiting a new area, it’s an indispensable tool that I’ve come to rely on. However, I’m in a lot of situations where I either have no cell or WiFi reception or would incur huge roaming costs, so Google Maps becomes impractical to use. However, there are a few ways that you can get your maps offline so that you don’t need to consume data each time you want to look at them. 

 

To make a map available for offline viewing, there are two methods. For both methods, just search for your desired location first and get it up on your screen. For the first method, once this is done, just type of speak “OK Maps” in the search bar and this will automatically start a download of the specified map to your cache.

The second method is similar: once on your location, tap on the search box again and scroll down to the bottom. Here, you’ll find an option to download the map offline and once you tap on it, will download it to your cache as well. Once either of these methods have been done, you will have an offline version of your map and that you can use whenever you want.

Two methods for downloading your maps offline.

A downloaded map doesn’t require a huge amount of space, in fact. New York, for example, took up only 13 megabytes when completely downloaded. However, just for data sake, you might just want to be connected to WiFi before you start downloading all the maps that you want. Also, keep in kind that if you continue to do this that your cache for Google Maps will fill up rapidly and you should check it and clear it out every so often.

Some precautions

There are some limitations to the functionality of the offline maps, mostly to do with the size of the location you’re looking for. For example, New York and surrounding areas would be a bit too much for just one cached file and would need to be broken into smaller, surrounding areas. If you get too big of an overview of the area, you won’t be able to gather much from the information.  When you open Google Maps, the last opened map section will be opened and you won’t be able to preload other maps via search later without an internet connection. You can, however, swipe through maps that you have saved until you get to the area that you have saved, but that can be a little bit annoying. As well, offline navigation is not available.

An example of two levels of capture: Too broad (left) and just right (right).

Conclusion

The online functionality of Google Maps obviously cannot be replaced, but for those who are on the go and travel quite a bit, this may provide a small solution to the problem of always attempting to find a cell reception area or a place where you can leech a WiFi signal. As well, just having a portable offline version of a map is always indispensable, especially when exploring a new area.

The cache size before and after downloading a map. In this case, an offline map of New York.

The offline functionality described in our article relies on Google Maps version 7.0.1 which in turns requires at least Android 4.0.3.