How to Upgrade your Computer to Windows 8

Windows 8 is finally here. I just upgraded my Windows 7 desktop to Windows 8 and the process couldn’t be smoother.
All the existing software programs work just fine in Windows 8 and the built-in Windows Store offers a plethora of new full-screen “apps” to choose from. Desktop search is so much better in Windows 8, the UI feels more snappy and the system will boot faster. You don’t need to install a separate anti-virus program as Windows Defender is already included in Windows 8.
If you haven’t played with the Windows 8 beta versions earlier, it may take a day or two to get comfortable with the new layout but overall, Windows 8 is a must-have upgrade.

Upgrading to Windows 8 – Step by Step

If you are also planning to make the switch to Windows 8 this weekend, here are 3 things you would need:

• A Windows machine running Windows 7, Vista and Windows XP. It doesn’t matter if you have computer is running Windows XP Premium or Windows 7 Home Basic.
• A valid credit card or a PayPal account to pay the upgrade fee – you will be required to pay $39.99 for the Windows 8 Professional edition.
• An internet connection for downloading the Windows 8 installer (2.05 GB). You may also order the Windows 8 installer on a DVD though it may not be necessary as it is quite easy to create your own Windows 8 DVD.

Please note that you are opting for an “upgrade” so it will overwrite your existing copy of Windows and there’s no way you can uninstall Windows 8 to switch to the previous Windows installation.
Also, your existing software programs will only be preserved if you are moving from Windows 7 to Windows 8. If your current PC is running Windows XP or Vista, all your files and data will be preserved but you will have to reinstall the software apps after upgrading to Windows 8.
Ready? Here’s how may upgrade your computer to Windows 8.
First download and run the Upgrade Assistant program. This will essentially perform a few checks on your computer and will also suggest a list of software programs / hardware devices that may not be compatible with Windows 8.

Next you need to order your Windows 8 upgrade pack right inside the installation wizard. Choose the “Checkout” option, enter your Credit Card details and the next screen will show your Windows 8 product key that you may need at the time of installation. You don’t have to write then down on paper and Microsoft will also send a receipt of your order and the Windows serial number to your email address.
Important: What you are buying is the upgrade license that will only work on an existing Windows machine. You cannot use this Windows 8 license on a new machine that you could be building from scratch. If you wish to install Windows 8 from scratch on a new hard disk, you need the System Builder that may not be available at all locations.

The upgrade assistant will now download the Windows 8 installer files to your computer. This process may take a while since it will require the transfer of ~2 GB of data from Microsoft servers to your disk.
Tip: The Windows 8 installer files are stored in the C:\ESD\Windows\Sources folder – it’s hidden so you may not find it inside Windows Explorer.

Once the installer files have been downloaded, you can continue with the installation or you may pick the second option that says – “Install by creating media.”  Here you can save the Windows 8 installer files in a single ISO file and then, from the wizard itself, burn the ISO image into a bootable DVD. This may come handy later when you want to repair or reinstall Windows 8 later but have deleted the installer from the disk to free up disk space.

Once the DVD is ready, double-click the Windows Setup shortcut (you’ll find it on your desktop) to run the setup again.
You can either do a clean install and choose “Nothing” or use the “Windows settings, personal files and apps” option to preserve your files as well as programs (recommended).  Also, if you choose “Nothing,” your personal files (anything saved inside the User folder and on the desktop) will be moved to a windows.old folder.
Choose the first “Install Now” option and Windows 8 will finish installing itself. Simple!

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Twitter founder has smartphone ‘talk’ to cashier while in your pocket

Smartphone payment tools are getting even smarter.
Square, the San Francisco mobile payment technology company started by Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, has launched an app that lets users buy things without even taking a wallet or phone out of their pocket.
The app, called Card Case, automatically opens a “tab” for a store when you approach. To buy something, just tell the cashier your name. The cashier confirms your identity with a photo of you that the store’s Card Case app displays on its smartphone or tablet, and away you go.

“I like the idea of Card Case, because we’ve been using Square, and because it lets you pay without taking anything out of your pocket,” said Patrick Lynch, an owner of Bon Me Truck, a food truck serving Vietnamese-inspired cuisine. “It gives you the customer’s name. It’s a little more personal. Mostly, it’s easier for them.”
Lynch signed up for Card Case last weekend after it launched on Nov. 4, but so far no one has used it to pay for food. He said Bon Me has been using Square — which requires a debit or credit card to be swiped through a small scanner attached to a smartphone — since about a week after the truck opened for business in April. He estimates the truck takes about 50 credit card orders through Square per day.
Lynch said Square was cheaper than traditional credit card scanners — he saw quotes for $75 per month to lease the scanner, and $15 per month for the data connection. For its part, Square takes 2.75 percent of every purchase, but its scanner and apps are free.
“Square has been very good, just for being able to take payments on the go,” Lynch said. “And as a new business — we just opened in April — there’s no startup fees, no equipment to buy, no monthly fee.”
The service also piques the interest of customers who find taking payments through a smartphone a novel idea, he said.
“If we get one credit card order, usually we get a bunch, because everyone’s like, ‘Ooh, what’s that?’ ” he said.
Last week, Square landed an undisclosed investment from British billionaire Richard Branson. Also, former Harvard University president and U.S. Treasury Secretary Larry Summers joined the company’s board of directors in June.
Nick Holland, a payment technology analyst at Yankee Group, said Square has been a boon to small businesses.
“It’s almost a no-brainer for small businesses,” he said. “It gets them the cash flow they need with very little risk. It solves a real problem.”
Still, Holland thinks smartphone tap-and-pay systems using near-field communication technology — such as Google Wallet, and a competing product by a collaboration between AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon being tested next year in Austin, Texas, and Salt Lake City, Utah — will eventually prevail.
“Our most recent estimate is 40 million cell phones have that technology in it,” he said. “It’s going to be as commonplace as your phone’s camera after a few years.”
Online payment giant PayPal has also been rumored to be developing a new mobile product.
“They’re the 800-pound gorilla in the room,” Holland said. “They’re very keen to get into the physical world, since they’ve been all online all along.”

If you’re perfectly happy paying by plastic, you may not need to worry about it for a while. Holland expects physical credit and debit cards to stick around for another 10 to 20 years.
“Old technology works,” he said. “The biggest reason old technology doesn’t go away is because it works.”
And while Card Case’s trick of payment without taking anything out of your pocket sounds cool, Holland doesn’t see it as a killer feature.

“I’m not sure I consider (taking your phone out of your pocket) such a hardship,” he said. “I don’t see the problem that solves.”

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Smartphone app helps people share cabs

Image by Getty Images via @daylife

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- If you shudder at the thought of a $50 cab fare to get to the airport, remember, there's probably somebody else headed to the airport that can't even find a cab and would love to split the fare with you, if you could just find each other. Luckily, there's now an app for that.

"I've had this idea for years, before smartphones," Taxishare app creator Dan Fedor said.
Fedor's not a programmer; he's a lawyer who's spent a lot of time trying to catch a cab.
"Needing to get to work on a weekday morning about 8, 8:30; needing to take a cab and no open cabs to be found, but cab after cab going by me with one person in it clearly going downtown," Fedor said.
So on the days he was lucky enough to get a cab, he decided to try something.
"I would literally just pull over for people who were waiting or trying to hail a cab, ask them if they wanted to share my cab downtown, and I was never turned down," Fedor said.
Like any self-respecting innovator, Fedor had found a need, and set about creating an app for it.
Taxishare is social networking meets transportation. Already live in Chicago, now launching in San Francisco, you tap where you're headed and it finds people along the way who want to share a ride.
"You can tell by the color coded dot that they're going to your destination, plus the balloon which actually shows their destination," Fedor said.
As you ride, the app lets you use PayPal to split the fare.
Everyone wins, except maybe the driver.
"They may not be totally opposed to it but they may not be all that enthusiastic about it," cab driver and blogger John Han said.
Han says Chicago cab drivers can charge extra for a shared ride. San Francisco drivers can't. He says maybe the city should change that.
Right now, the app is just available for Android" smartphones. Fedor is hoping he can save some venture capitalists so much money on their cab fares they'll have a little left over to fund him for an iPhone version.

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How your smartphone can make you money

There’s an awful lot of power in your smartphone - and admittedly you’ve paid for it, so perhaps it’s time it starts paying its way.
Fortunately, there are plenty of ways to do this without simply selling your phone (but we’ll cover this at the end), that mostly involve getting apps to make or save money.

Sell stuff with your phone
The eBay app is a great place to start. Everyone has kit they want to sell and the app could well be easier and faster to use than your computer. With the ability to snap pictures of your wares in real-life, edit, add details and upload, it beats the same laborious process from camera to PC.
Notifications sent to your mobile also mean you can keep track on bidding and quickly answer any questions.
With PayPal also available in a handy app, making and receiving online payments also miraculously painless and fast. Tie this to eBay and bang, you’re a retailer.
Smartphone Stocks
IG Index is a site that allows you to bet on what the financial markets will do next. There's now an app for iPhone, Android and BlackBerry handsets that lets you spread bet on the markets.
We talked to someone who works in finance, who uses the IG Index to make extra money; he said the most he made in a single month was in excess of £4,000 - you could buy ten new phones with that. In addition he uses the Bloomberg app on his iPhone to ensure he can constantly study market info.
We should point out that, financial spread betting isn't without risks; it's a leveraged product- and this means it can result in losses exceeding how ever much you initially invested. The financial markets are always on the move; whilst it's highly addictive, you can't follow the changes 24-7, and you could suffer losses if you're unable quickly to respond to market fluctuations
Betting on making a profit
If you don’t want to bet on the markets, how about betting on football or horse races? Several betting apps will offer you a free bet when you first register with them. That’s almost money for nothing - but you’ll need to bet something to win something.
It's possible to make a tidy sum from this type of better. Recombu spoke to one London-based man (who preferred to remain anonymous) who won £500 in a month. He uses Betfair, because it uses a similar concepts to city trading, and as the biggest betting site let syou bet across a variety of events and sports.
He advises using iBetMate (iPhone), which uses data from the BetFair app but alongside a more personalised interface, with a better user experience.
Here are some more popular bookie app and web-app deals. William Hill offers a free £25 bet when you register, whilst Paddy Power offers up £50 (worth of) bets.
Of course, the disadvantage of being able to bet through your phone is that it can be done anywhere, so bet responsibly, and remember you have to be over 18 to bet (Check the individual sites for the terms and conditions).
Saving money with your smartphone. (Well it’s like making money...)
Voucher Cloud, Money Supermarket, Facebook Deals and even O2’s Priority Moments offer you discounts, and location-based offers.
If you’re really into your social networking, repeat visits (and logins) with the likes of FourSquare mean you can often net exclusive offers; a good example is 20% off food at Wetherspoons Pubs. You just have to become Mayor.
A good tip, visit 4squareoffers.com to find all the deals near you. Some are quite bizarre, but it’s well worth checking in at some restaurants for free drinks or a substantial discount.
The QuidCo app (Android and iTunes) app is yet another good one, just going into stores like BestBuy will afford you a 20% discount - often well worth checking out if you've investing in a high-value tablet. The app is now available for beta testing on Android phones.
OK it won’t save you money, but if you’re someone who commutes through London, it could be worth downloading. It’s 69p, but the Tube Tap app allows you to claim a refund if you’re more than 15 minutes later than the estimated duration of your trip on the underground.
Start up the app, and it’ll time your journey, and then compare to estimated travel times- you’re then only a tap away from claiming a refund.
Writing to riches
A trend that began in Japan, but one that looks set to explode alongside the popularity of the Kindle and tablets as reading devices, Cell-phone novels could provide another way of making income through your phone.
A cell-phone novel is a story created using your smartphone. Stories are typically episodic and posted onto sharing websites, such as Maho i-Land. They were originally tapped away on a numeric keypad, so think of the writing speed once you’ve downloaded the likes of Swype and SwiftKey. Lord Of The Rings-style epics can’t be far away.
Amazon offers a similar royalty structure to Android and iTunes’ app stores, with the author getting a 70% cut. Check out the full self-publishing deal online. You can also enable them to be downloaded for free on the Kindle app, and hook readers into paying for future instalments.
Make money- make a move
Time to make a move career-wise. Get more money from your next job by using apps like Xlance and Monster Jobs to search where-ever you are; whether that's on the depressingly long commute or crying in toilets on your tea break.
Make your own app
You love them, you download them you pay for them. Why not switch this around and launch your own app. Granted you’ll need an amazing, or at least popular, idea, but don’t be held back by a lack of programming know-how.
There are several sites, like FundedApps, that’ll help you along the way, provided you give them something back. The economics of it are pretty simple: once the people behind FundedApps decides to commit to your soon-to-be best-selling app, you get £250 paid up-front and a 25% share of the profits, given quarterly.
Alternatively if you’ve got some programming chops, or a friend who does, there’s plenty left to decide; will you make it a free app, and try to make money through advertising?
Remember you’ll need huge download numbers to make this resemble a respectable amount, whether you charge for the app at the initial download stage or through in-app purchases.
With in-app purchases, although the initial download is free, you then offer users advanced features, remove advertising, or simply customisable characters and new levels - at a price. In-app purchases on Android phones and the iPhone is a relatively recent addition, but has meant you’re connected to your app users - and connected to their wallet.
We talked to Adam Bunker who created the Flaregun (friend-finding) location app for both iPhone. Flaregun doesn't use in-app purchases, instead charging a small up-front cost.
To make you own app, "you definitely need to know how to code (the language is Apple's own
'Objective C'), but they make it easy from there." You will be able to 'drag and drop' components of your apps, but be warned, "you'd be surprised at how much you need to think about - even for such a simple app."
He added: "Everything needs sense-checking and working out. From idea to launch, it took us about a month and a half of spare time, of which 7 days were taken while Apple reviewed it. In its 6 days of life we've sold 694 apps."
Develop your app for all smartphones
The likes of PhoneGap means it’s even easier to develop your app for several different smartphone platforms (Android, iOS, BlackBerry, Symbian) at the same time, making it available to as many prospective customers as possible.
Be smart selling your smartphone
Perhaps the smartphone isn’t all it was cracked up to be, and you’re willing to sell up and return to the work of WAP, text and batteries that’ll last a few days.
There’s so very many sites to check, be sure to shop around to find the best price you can for a very painless way of selling your phone. Some phone reselling sites will even send out a jiffy bag. You return the phone, and wait for the money to... cheque to arrive in the post.
We’d advise sticking with ones you recognise from TV or newspapers. One of note is Envirofone. And if the buy-back value is too good to be true - it probably is. Envirofone currently offer £265 for a 16GB iPhone 4.
We’ve covered selling your phone before, and reiterate that you should be careful meeting up when selling your phone to a stranger “in the wild.” Make sure you’re in a public space, and perhaps go with a friend for security. Safety first.
source:Internet

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