Here is the strategy we use to extend the life of our laptops with a new battery:

1. Get the model number of the battery.  You can do this with one of the free tools mentioned in our post Get More Out of Your Laptop Battery
2. Search for that model number of battery on Ebay.  This will give you  a great price point to work from.  Do not be afraid of the batteries that say compatible.  It just means that it is not made by the original manufacturer.  It would be like buying an Energizer instead of Duracell.
3. Check Amazon.com, Buy.com or other retailer websites to price compare.  I have found Amazon to be great for this purpose.  Many times you can find an off brand battery that works great.

Battery Bar 

The windows laptop battery meter really is not that accurate.  Sometimes you have a 10% charge and it seems to last forever and others you have 75% and then it jumps down to 7% in no time at all.  Battery Bar takes care of this problem by giving you an accurate estimate right in your toolbar.  It also will give you charging and discharging estimates and it keeps a log of battery performance and adjust its estimates accordingly.  This means it actually gets more accurate over time.

BatteryCare

Almost all laptop batteries are now lithium-ion. This means they do not get the same problems with forming a memory that the old Nickel ones did.  The problem they do have is that their internal charge meters which means your computer does not get an accurate estimate of their internal charge and may end up shutting down to retain your data way too early.  To fix this issue you need to recalibrate the charge meter.  To recalibrate the batter you just charge up your laptop while it is in sleep or standby mode and then unplug it and use it til the batter runs out.  The downside is that if you do this too frequently you can harm the battery.  To help you know when the best time to recalibrate BatteryCare will monitor your batteries charging/discharging cycle.  Once you reach a specified rating it will inform you to recalibrate the battery

BatteryInfoView

This handy little utility is great when you think your battery is wearing out.  It will tell you the batteries designed capacity versus what you are getting.  It includes charge and discharge rates and will even tell you how long you can continue using all the applications you are currently running.  There is a battery log that can show you how the batter performed over time and under what conditions.  This can help you spot unexpected periods of short battery life and why they happened.   Finally it will show you the standard items like manufacturer, serial number and manufacture date so that if the battery needs replacing you can quickly find the right one.

I hope you find these utilities helpful.  Be sure to check back tomorrow when we will show you how to shop for a new laptop battery.

The next group is the solid middle class.  This group is getting squeezed right now with higher costs and a lagging economy.  They are cutting back and may already have purchased a new HDTV so they are either looking for a great deal or waiting for the economy to pick up before they upgrade to something newer.  This group will possibly pay up to $700 dollars for a new HDTV but they would prefer to stay under $500 if possible.

Both the above groups could have other circumstances that prompt them to buy a new tv like a child going off to college and taking the old one with them, but they will still not splurge on something really fancy for the time being.

The last group is the buy what I want group.  They are doing great right now so they can buy what they want.  This group goes high end.  They are going to purchase the latest and greatest.  This means they are in the market for one of the new LED televisions or the 3D tv's.  They aren't even looking at LCD's or Plasmas because that it so 2008.  This group will be spending at least $2000 on a new HDTV.

So as you can see this leaves us with a gap.  The gap in what the first two groups can purchase and the last group can purchase is pushing the price of some really nice televisions down to something reasonable.  The retailers are desperately trying to get people to purchase in the $1000 dollar range.  I am seeing ads for this price range all the time.  However, there is always a deal to be had for a great TV somewhere in the $300-$600 range depending on what size you get.

This is an opportunity if you are in the market for a television.  Do not get sucked in by all the new features and such.  Your main reason for buying a TV is to watch television and movies and maybe play video games.  Anything else is just extra that you probably will not miss.

The most recent great deal on a TV I have seen is at Wal-Mart.  You can get Sanyo 42" Plasma 720P HDTV for only $399.99.  The specs all look pretty good and it even has some nice little ad-ons.  If you use the link through BigCrumbs.com you can get an extra 4% cash back making this TV $383.99.

The advantages are numerous.  They use less energy, can last a lifetime (literally), and do not have the potential health hazards as the CFL bulbs.  They have already been marketed to businesses but this will be the first real push to move LED's to the consumer market.

California has tried programs like this before.  The last time the proposal was to base your auto insurance off of how much gasoline you purchase.  That idea didn't get very far, but with the advent of GPS tracking the idea of pay-as-you-go insurance may have legs.

The big savings here are for people that only use their cars for pleasure trips or live in areas where all of their necessities are close by.  Another HUGE benefit would be for people in large cities with access to public transportation.  You could own a vehicle and not have to pay through the nose levels of insurance to keep it. 

The downside to this idea is a loss of privacy.  In order to qualify for this insurance you have to have the equivalent of an automobile version of the black boxes they put on airplanes.  This device will record not only how much you drive but how you drive.  I guess the upside to these devices would be that people would be more wary of their driving habits and maybe improve their technique.  Overall as long as they are not recording my phone conversations I am all for the idea of making insurance cheaper based off of your individual driving acumen instead of broad sets of averages.  This would give teenage drivers and young adults a chance of getting lower rates (and their parents might actually be able to know where they are).

Now with the internet anybody with a computer, a camera, and a little talent can turn a personal protest into an international phenomenon.  Every business should be wary of this because they might wake up one morning and find there are three million hits on a video like this one:

United only tried to make things right after these guys had slammed their reputation.  This just will not work these days.  If you find yourself thinking I do not have the talent to produce my own video then visit the various opinion sites that allow you to share your experiences with different products and services.  My favorites are epinions (product quality), Trip Advisor (travel), and Yelp (any service).  If you are wronged or have a wonderful experience express that opinion on these sites so everyone can take advantage of our collective wisdom.

Step 1: Sign up for Google Voice (GV) and acquire your GV phone number

Step 2: Route all calls from GV to your cell phone

Step 3: Go the the settings menu on GV and on the General tab scroll down to the "Caller ID" section, click on the radio button that designate "Display my Google Voice number" and then click "Save Changes"

Step 4: List your GV number as one of the numbers you get free calls from with you cell phone carrier

Step 5: Hand out your GV number to anyone who does not have service from your cell phone carrier

Step 6: Enjoy free calling from anyone who calls your GV number

This gives you unlimited incoming calls.  The only possible annoyance here is that you cannot see the number on your caller id.  However, if you look at yesterdays post you will see that you can screen calls by sending callers to voicemail and then being able to pick up while they are leaving a message.  Also if you update your contacts in GV the service will tell you if the call is from one of you contacts.  This contacts list can be imported from Outlook, Outlook express, Eudora, Apple Address Book, and a few others.

For outgoing calls it is a bit trickier.  Once you have completed all of the steps above you will have to login to your GV account.  At the top on the left hand side there is a button that says "Call."  Click on the button and a box pops up.  Just type in the number you want to call and GV will call your cell phone from your GV number.  Once that connection is made it will call the phone number that you typed into the box.  Once again this registers as a free call from the cell phone carriers that allow you to make and receive calls to specific numbers.

The question I always get after explaining this little system is, "Is it worth it?"  And the answer is always, "It depends."  If you are my dad who uses less than 20 minutes a month this is not worth the time, but if you are a heavy user who has a very large plan it could allow you to drop down one or two tiers in pricing.  This could be a savings of $40 or more per month for some people.  When I started using this strategy I saw my minute usage drop over 600 minutes on average each month.  If there were a cheaper plan out there than I already have I could switch with no worries.  Most people find that just eliminating the cost of incoming calls allows them to switch to a lower plan.  So give it a shot and happy calling!

I use this service specifically for business.  While I am in town all calls are routed to my cell phone.  When I go on vacation I can route them to anyone I want.  This saves me a lot of hassle and makes it easy for my employer to know that the phone is getting answered.

Google Voice is free and includes these great features:

- You get a phone number that can be forwarded to any telephone that you want.

- It includes voicemail so no matter where the number is being routed the caller gets the same voicemail message

-The voicemail will actually transcribe the message (more or less) and send it to you as a text message

- It has a call screening feature that lets you listen to the person leaving the message and then pick up the call if you want

- There is a call recoding feature that can be activated on the fly

- A call can be switched from a cell phone to a land line phone mid call without the other party ever noticing

- Ability to conference in up to four callers

- Caller ID

- A Do Not Disturb feature so that all calls are routed to voicemail

- Goog411 is integrated into the service so you get free directory assistance

Google is rolling this out in waves so it is best to get on the list now so you can get the service ASAP.

Tomorrow I will show you how to get low cost unlimited calling to your cell phone using Google Voice.

This application does work with your Iphone which is a really cool way of watching online content on your home television.

Well the little guys are now sticking it in the eyes of the big four.  Both Boost Mobile and Virgin Mobile have released unlimited usage plans.  Virgin starts its plan out at $49.99 per month and you can add unlimited texting and unlimited web for $10 each per month.  Boost has gone even cheaper with Everything unlimited for $50 per month.  This is a dramatic shift in the industry and it should be interesting to see how the big four react.  Hopefully we will see these less expensive unlimited plans flourish sooner rather than later and we can get rid of the night and weekend/my five/mobile to mobile hoops that the companies currently make us jump through.