talkingDigital

November is here, which means the holiday shopping season has begun. There is no better time of year to get a great deal on gadgets and gizmos for your friends and loved ones—and yourself. The savvy shopper should start planning long before the circulars and email blasts start arriving.

READ THIS COLUMN AS IT APPEARED IN THE BEACON

Here are some tech shopping tips, whether you’re buying locally or online.
Do your homework

It takes time to research the perfect gift and the best price. Too many people walk into a local retailer, walk up to a sales associate and say something along the lines of, “My granddaughter says she wants a tablet.”

Most stores with a computer or electronics department carry more than 20 tablets, and some are so poorly made that they are insufficient for even the most basic tasks.

The lowest price is never the best deal when it comes to tech purchases. Similarly, the highest price is not indicative of superior quality.

Retail computer service people are trained salesmen, not necessarily experts. Before asking which laptop you should buy, consider that he or she will most likely sell you what he or she would buy. Technology that fits your exact needs cannot be purchased the way you’d order at a new restaurant.

Don’t buy tech from a clothing or grocery store

Black Friday deals can be great, but there are many deals that you should avoid. Some tech manufacturers use Black Friday as a way of liquidating overstock of a product that flopped via non-traditional sales channels.

Many large clothing/housewares retailers often offer door-buster deals on tablets, GPS systems, headphones and small drones that weren’t selling well in their native retail locations.

Some of these products have known issues with reliability or construction and the traditional retailers have stopped carrying them due to high return rates.

Buying a generic or obscure brand of tech at a clothing or grocery store is an even bigger risk.

Know your prices

Before you spend $400 for a 55-inch, 4K TV on Black Friday, research the price of the specific brand you’re looking at. Shopping by specifications and price alone can cost you a lot of money.

Many companies produce special products exclusively for Black Friday using lower quality parts and fewer quality controls. If you’ve never heard of the brand, avoid it.

Research the item online

Black Friday ads can be found online long before Thanksgiving. If you see a great deal advertised, visit the store and ask which TV, tablet, camera or laptop is being sold.

Most of the door-buster deals won’t list the model number in the ads because the item is actually not marked down as much as it may seem.

Sometimes the $400 4K TV is only $450 with free shipping on Amazon. Just as often, the item is cheaper online.

The old adage “buyer beware” applies today more than ever. Follow these tips and you will not only find better deals, but you will approach the season with the confidence of an educated consumer.

Apple released the iPhone 7 last month and the world is still buzzing about it. The previous month, Samsung released—and then recalled—its wonder phone, the Galaxy 7S.

READ COLUMN AS IT APPEARED IN THE BEACON

No matter what carrier you use for cellphone service, you are likely being bombarded, perhaps tempted, by offers to get a free or reduced upgrade.

Before you join the bandwagon of early adopters, you may want to ask yourself two questions:

1. Do I need a new phone?

2. Do I really get this new phone for free?

Every gadget company makes a big whoop-de-doo about their latest phone. It may have a 20-megapixel camera, a 4K screen, and the ability to resist bullets, but those features all have one thing in common: They will never be put to full use.

Even if you need a newer phone, you can probably get a much better deal on the previous generation. Before upgrading your perfectly good phone that you’re now used to, seriously evaluate how badly you need the new features of the latest phone. If you are just upgrading so that you can own the latest device, you could throw your contract agreement off for as much as two years.

Buying a new phone outside of contract typically costs between $500 and $1,200 depending on the phone. This is why cellphone companies increase the rates of their plans and add “nickel and dime” features to coincide with the releases of major phones.

Cell companies love to offer free phones, but almost all of these offers finance the phone over the long term. Some plans roll the cost of the phone into a two-year contract; others schedule the financing of the phone over a schedule that leaves the phone paid off at exactly the same time that the next generation of phone will come out.

Before you go to your carrier and get the new phone and, most likely, a new contract, figure out exactly how much you are paying for your current service for what you get.

Look up your account online and see how much data each person in the family is using and how much the total contract costs on each bill. Sometimes you are paying a lot more than you know because of overages or extra features you don’t even use.

Some companies have a phone service rate that doesn’t include the data or the phone financing. These plans may claim that your bill is $40 per month, but then you must pay an additional $35 per month if you want more than 1GB of shared data. Then they add the cost of financing the phone. For an iPhone, this could be as high as $30 per month per phone.

Find out whether the phone is being subsidized (two-year contract must be complete before you can get another phone), financed (you can buy a new phone anytime you want, but you may not own the phone until it’s paid off) or leased (you never actually own the phone, but you can trade in your perfect-condition phone once a year for an upgrade).

It’s always best to buy a new phone the way you would buy a new car. Shop around, ask lots of questions, discuss it with your friends and family, and do the math before you buy.

I haven’t been a full-time computer support guy in years, but I continue to stay on top of the problems that are plaguing computer users today.

Read column as it appeared in the BEACON

Having an expertise in computers is similar to knowing how to work on cars or being a physician. I don’t expect that I will ever be able to attend a party or go to church without somebody bringing up a tech question.

Whenever there is a trending problem in the world of technology, I know about it right away because my phone starts ringing with calls from friends, relatives and former clients asking for help.

Here are two issues that I have been contacted about a lot over the past year and what you should know about them.

Issue 1:
Must I upgrade to Windows 10?

You don’t need to upgrade. If you do upgrade, you will be fine. Windows 10 is a solid operating system and it runs well.

Windows 10 is essentially an apology to Windows 8 users. Microsoft returned features that they removed, hid or drastically altered in Windows 8. In other words, Windows 10 is a version of Windows 8 that looks and runs like Windows 7 and Windows XP.

There are no more problems with Windows, 10 than there were with any of Microsoft’s better versions of Windows including Windows 98, XP and 7. It’s not a lemon. It also isn’t life-changing if you missed your opportunity to get the free upgrade. There are still ways of getting the Windows 10 upgrade free, but I would probably recommend that you just keep your current version of Windows until you need to replace your computer.

Issue 2: Fake security or virus alerts or phone calls

At least twice a week, I hear of someone who received a phone call or alert screen on their computer notifying them that they have a virus or other problem with their computer security.

If you receive a phone call from anyone, including someone who says they’re from Microsoft or your Internet provider, telling you that your computer has an infection it’s a scam.

You can feel absolute confidence that your computer is fine. Hang up the phone.

Even if the person knows your name or other personal information, hang up. Most of these people just gather such details from online databases and use that to build trust.

The same is usually true with security alerts you get when clicking on a link in Google or your email. If the alert asks you to call a phone number to fix the problem, don’t do it—it’s a scam.

If you can’t close down the alert, turn off your computer by holding the power button for 15 seconds and turn it back on. Everything will most likely be back to normal once your computer reboots.

I guess the theme for this month’s column is always be skeptical before listening to warnings from anyone. You’ve probably heard that Windows 10 is a terrible program with tons of problems and you will likely get a scam phone call or fake security alert on your computer in the near future.

Keep in mind that it’s usually cheaper to have a virus or security issue fixed by someone locally than it is to give a bad guy your credit card number.