Wacom has finally produced a tablet that brings their pen-and-pad technology to business and home users for a great price. Bamboo has been designed for making sketches, marking up digital documents, hand-writing notes and signing your name directly on your computer. Fully compatibility with both Mac and PC, Bamboo can be used to click through folders on your computer, become a paintbrush in Photoshop or an all-around tool in programs such as Mac Inkwell and Microsoft Office. Think about it: Nothing on a computer is as natural as the fluid motion of your own hand with a pen.

Tons of programs you may already be using have aspects that are programmed for use with a pen:

* Microsoft Office
* Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator and Acrobat Pro.
* CorelDraw Graphics Suite
* Internet Explorer
* Windows Explorer

Take a look at the full list of supported tablet-enhanced software and unlock the features you are meant to have.

Have you ever been away from home and wanted internet connectivity on your laptop without having to pay a daily fee or hunt for free public Wi-Fi just for a couple hours (or even minutes) of internet access? Luckily, after reading this article, you will probably never have to worry about it again. "Tethering" is best described as the process of connecting your phone to your computer via Bluetooth or USB in order to make use of your wireless data connection. You will never have to pay another $9.95 (or more) per day at a hotel and you don't have to buy wireless cards or any other equipment you don't already carry around with you! While the process is no walk in the park, it definitely isn't rocket science. Spending a little time to step through the procedure will lead the way for big savings in the long run.

Head over to Smart Device Central and read their Modem Tethering Guide that reiterates the benefits of tethering, provides the guides to setting up each different cell carrier and lists tether-compatible phones.

Brent - The convenience of online shopping can't be beaten, but how can I make sure I am shopping safely?

With the convenience of online shopping comes the convenience of online predators that find ways to capture your personal financial information. There are plenty of ways to protect yourself from these people, but it is also important to know what they are doing to put you at risk.

Three of the most common ways that attackers can take advantage of you are vulnerable computers, insecure transactions and unaware users. A vulnerable computer, or one without virus protection, is susceptible to all kinds of viruses and malware that are capable of capturing and reporting your credit card and social security information. In a similar manner, vendors that do not use encryption on their website can actually allow an attacker to intercept your payment information as it is being transmitted. The most difficult threat to detect for the average home user is that of an entirely false website where the attacker is posing as a legitimate transaction medium. These websites are set up to either look like known retailer websites or even as a donation site (very common after large-scale natural disasters and around holidays).

Here's how you can protect yourself:

1) Use anti-virus and anti-spyware software. Regularly scanning your system will allow you to spot and eliminate threats on your computer that could compromise your information or trick you into giving it out unknowingly. Keeping your virus definitions up-to-date will ensure that your computer will be resistant toward all of the latest devised attacks.

2) Keep your software (your internet browser, primarily) up-to-date. If your operating system supports automatic updates, you should enable it.

3) Only do business with reputable vendors. If there is any question in your mind whether a company is legitimate, chances are they are not. Look out for any email requesting sensitive information, as well. Most reputable organizations will not ask you for this via email.

4) Make sure your information is being encrypted when you send it. SSL, or secure sockets layer, is used to scramble information before it is sent over the internet to prevent it from being legible to any outside parties. If you look at the internet address of the site you are on and see "https://" instead of "http://," know that the added "s" stands for "secure." You will also see a closed padlock icon as well, though the location varies depending on the browser. Look near the address bar or at the bottom of the window.

5) Finally, check your bank statements carefully and report any unauthorized activity immediately.

From the United States Computer Emergency Readiness Team:

Why are chain letters a problem?

The most serious problem is from chain letters that mask viruses or other malicious activity. But even the ones that seem harmless may have negative repercussions if you forward them:

* they consume bandwidth or space within the recipient's inbox
* you force people you know to waste time sifting through the messages and possibly taking time to verify the information
* you are spreading hype and, often, unnecessary fear and paranoia

What are some types of chain letters?

There are two main types of chain letters:

* Hoaxes - Hoaxes attempt to trick or defraud users. A hoax could be malicious, instructing users to delete a file necessary to the operating system by claiming it is a virus. It could also be a scam that convinces users to send money or personal information. Phishing attacks could fall into this category (see Avoiding Social Engineering and Phishing Attacks for more information).
* Urban legends - Urban legends are designed to be redistributed and usually warn users of a threat or claim to be notifying them of important or urgent information. Another common form are the emails that promise users monetary rewards for forwarding the message or suggest that they are signing something that will be submitted to a particular group. Urban legends usually have no negative effect aside from wasted bandwidth and time.

How can you tell if the email is a hoax or urban legend?

Some messages are more suspicious than others, but be especially cautious if the message has any of the characteristics listed below. These characteristics are just guidelines-not every hoax or urban legend has these attributes, and some legitimate messages may have some of these characteristics:

* it suggests tragic consequences for not performing some action
* it promises money or gift certificates for performing some action
* it offers instructions or attachments claiming to protect you from a virus that is undetected by anti-virus software
* it claims it's not a hoax
* there are multiple spelling or grammatical errors, or the logic is contradictory
* there is a statement urging you to forward the message
* it has already been forwarded multiple times (evident from the trail of email headers in the body of the message)

If you want to check the validity of an email, there are some web sites that provide information about hoaxes and urban legends:

* Urban Legends and Folklore - http://urbanlegends.about.com/
* Urban Legends Reference Pages - http://www.snopes.com/
* TruthOrFiction.com - http://www.truthorfiction.com/
* Symantec Security Response Hoaxes - http://www.symantec.com/avcenter/hoax.html
* McAfee Security Virus Hoaxes - http://vil.mcafee.com/hoax.asp

One of the little annoyances that comes with every Windows Vista installation is the collection of services that run in the background that you, as a user, do not actually need. They control very small aspects of your PC and account for slow boot times, lagging applications and effect the overall performance of your newly-installed Vista machine. The Vista Services Optimizer is a small (and free) utility that can both automatically and manually control the hidden services to prevent them from bogging down your performance.

Once you tell Vista Services Optimizer how you use your computer, it will run through and make adjustments to all running services; the un-necessary ones will be terminated and others will be scaled back if needed. Some of the key features include "Services Profiles" to allow for the fast switching of preset profiles that you customize yourself, "Services Diagnostics" that can monitor the security and performance of your machine based on what services you currently have running as well as a "Manual TuneUp" mode to adjust any setting to your liking. The Smart PC Utilities site can provide you more information on the Services Optimizer as well as provide download links to learning material and source code.