I joked about a USB toaster in a previous post but now it looks like my dreams have become a reality, or is it? I know one colleague at work that would die for a USB toaster.

Now all I need is a USB bread maker, a USB Butter Churner and a USB frying pan and I’ll be able to do a full English breakfast without leaving my desk. The I’d be able to become even more of a lard arse than I already am.

USB Toaster! Real Or Fake? - More bloopers are a click away

Isn’t USB great? What did we do without it?

USB tennis anyone?

PC World (Not us here at PC Whirled) have taken the trouble to do a scratch test and general user drop test to see how the Apple iPhone holds up to everyday use. It appears like it stands up to general wear and tear quite well. I haven’t got one but my first test would be to see how well it does when it goes skidding across a wet road at night, as my usual phone dropping occurs when leaving the pub and pulling out my house keys. The usual occurrence is the battery falling out and a few scratch marks on the screen.

If anyone wants to donate an Apple iPhone for me to stress test I’ll gladly give it a go…………..where’s my hammer.

Everyone likes to have the latest piece of technology in their pockets, whether it be to impress the ladies or make friends and families envious because basically we’re all a bunch of egotistical, selfish, show off, bastards. So it’s no surprise that the current must have piece of mobile technology is the Apple iPhone mobile phone. If like me you can’t actually afford one or you don’t have trouser pocket space free then why not knit yourself one like the one shown on daddytypes.com

It’s a common myth that any old mouse mat will do but most of the input device issues reported to us can be traced to an incompatible mouse mat. A whole range of problems are caused by incompatible mouse mats the most frequently reported being:

• Hardcore Pornography images randomly placing themselves in your temporary internet files directory
• Being shit at online games
• Right and left clicks alternating
• Mouse tremble

So next time you’re buying a mouse mat make sure it’s compatible with the mouse you use.

Sometimes explaining a technical support issue over the phone or via email can be difficult and for this reason we’ve started inviting people to post their technical support requests with video. It enables us to make a quicker diagnosis of the issue allowing the user to get back to their day-to-day PC routine such as, super poking people you vaguely know from the past on Facebook, watching endless hours of crap on Youtube and reading worthless dribble on blogs like this.

Our first video technical support question comes from SpaceHunk95@yahoo.cock who asks;

Basically, SpaceHunk95@yahoo.cock is asking,

“I’ve taken my PC to bits and spread it out over the table, turned it on and stuck a pen nib across two of the motherboard electro conductive tally whackers and all it does is make a continuous beeping noise. What should I do?”

Well SpaceHunk95@yahoo.cock, turn it off, put it all back together and stop f*@king about with it, surely you can find better things to do? Nice Spoktech 520 PSU though brother, I bet that packs a real punch!

Turning off your laptop can be very difficult………especially if you’re a retard.

Now, who’s a silly billy then?

USB stands for Universal Stick-em-in Bits. It was developed as a way for all the extra bits we want to add on to our computers that the manufacturer hadn’t allowed for when they built the computer. It’s also handy for attaching additional hardware in preperation for when the internal hardware goes tits up, for example a backup hard drive.

My top 3 essential USB peripherals are;

1. The Shytech USB Toaster - We all get a bit peckish whilst we are working away on our personal computers so the Shytech USB Toaster is the answer to all our USB toasting dreams. Shytech have been pioneers of USB kitchenware add ons and are planning to launch the USB GFLMFGM or Universal Stick-em-in Bits George Forman Lean Mean Fat Grilling Machine in summer 2008.

2. The Crapware USB Laptop - A must have for all you computer nerds out there. It’s a laptop that runs from your USB port on your laptop or your desktop. Shit hot!

3. The Brabantia USB Bin - This Brabantia USB bin synchronises with your PC desktop trashcan and you can throw stuff off your real desk in it as well. Brilliant! It’s a bit pricey at £500 just like the real Bribantia bins and of course you’ll need authentic Brabantia USB bin bags as well.

Previously on PC Whirled (Not to be confused with PC World) I wrote an article on what to do when your desktop icons fall off. It’s a common problem and one we get asked about all the time. As a follow up I thought I’d let you know of some of the search terms people have Googled on the Internet who have the same or similar problem.

So here’s my top 10,

1. “my icons disappeared off my desktop” - Shitter mate, see my article.
2. “all icons disappear off of desktop” - All icons, damn those slippy desktops, try lying your monitor on it’s back.
3. “all my icons disappeared off my desktop” - Yep, join the club my friend.
4. “desktop icons disappeared” - Just like that, they’ve gone!
5. “desktop icons have discovered” - This is a new one on me, I’d love to know what. Drop me a line and let me know.
6. “desktop icons-lost” - They’ve just gone-a-wondering around my PC and got theirselves lost.
7. “fallen desktop icons” - Like fallen angels, they’re hiding behind the trashcan jacking up on web 2.0 juice.
8. “find my icons lost on pc” - They’re lost buddy, there’s no finding them.
9. “program fallen off desktop” - Whooa there, not just the icon the bloody program??? Pisser!
10. “why is my desktop icons going on and off?” - Why is they indeed, those darn icons are going discotastic.

This is a regular support request we get here at PC Whirled and it’s not just unique to laptops. It’s a complex issue to trouble shoot as well with no single magic solution. Depending on the make of sound card you have installed or whether you’re using the onboard sound controller on your motherboard the answer is never straight forward.

The basics explained

Ok so, first of all it’s not the music that has left your laptop (we always have a good chuckle when we hear that suggested) it is of course the band that plays the music. Most people don’t realise that sound cards are actually powered by very tiny bands and the quality of sound card performance is dependant on the quality of the band resident on the card. In future posts we’ll talk further about this but for now you just need to grasp the tiny band concept.

The day the music died

We’ve all been there, you boot up your laptop first thing of a morning eager to dive into a heavy day of social bookmarking and tag cloud surfing and the usual windows startup music doesn’t play. “That’s odd” you think, “maybe I just didn’t hear it over the hard drive grinding noise”, so you try playing one of your mp3s and still nothing.

So, What has happened?

Well it’s quite simple really, overnight the band have decided to leave. There are many reasons why this might happen and we’ll look at some potential reasons along with some potential fixes in later posts.

A temporary fix

There are two possible temporary fixes,

1. Buy a new laptop and threw the other out. The new laptop will come pre-configured with new soundcard and therefore a new resident band.
2. Have someone sit by your side using a different laptop with working sound and instruct them to mirror your actions thus creating the missing audio

Imagine if parts of the Internet were restricted and you had paid money to read shit like this blog, not a nice thought is it? That’s why it’s important for everyone to support Net Neutrality and Internet Freedom.

You can find out more about Net Neutrality and Internet Freedom over at WeAreTheWeb.Org

Alternatively you can watch this little video they’ve put together which illustrates what it’s all about.