Kevin John Ventura

This post is sponsored by Nuffnang.

I couldn’t imagine our life without Microsoft. As a family, Microsoft products have been essential for us. Since the revolutionary Windows 95 up to the innovative Windows 7, we have continuously used Microsoft products to meet the different needs of our family. We believe that Microsoft products are easy to use, easy to learn and easy to maintain. I can still remember how I played my favorite educational game when I was still 4 years old and how easily I learned to navigate Windows with a mouse to open my favorite game. My tech-savvy and geek mother who studied and coded stuff used Microsoft C Compiler that runs on Microsoft DOS way back in 1980.

(Left: The original 1995 CD case of my favorite educational game running on Microsoft.)

(Right: The original Microsoft C Compiler of my mother way back 1980.)

Busy is one word that best describes my family. We are actively doing stuff for school, work, church, organizations and other matters. As we cherish life together as a family, Microsoft simply surprises us with technologies that easily and efficiently manage documents, presentations, reports and connections with other people. Microsoft Office is our best friend. Without the sophisticated technologies it provides, we will not have awesome and instant solutions to our needs and be who we are right now.

(The family the uses Microsoft Windows together stays together…:D)

(Our laptops and netbook running Windows 7 and Windows XP)

As a Filipino family known for close family ties, communication is very important to us. We regularly keep in touch with my sister who is currently working abroad using our laptops and desktop PC that are all running with Microsoft Windows. With the flexibility of Microsoft Windows 7, we easily installed and used our webcam with no hardware issues. My fifty-six years old father is not tech-savvy and geeky like my mother, but with the help and the ease of using Microsoft Windows 7 and Microsoft Office 2010, he enjoys using the computer in creating his reports and in communicating with my sister.

(Left: First dinner without my sister but joined us in a voice chat)

(Right: Celebrating my birthday with my sister in a video call conference)

This is how we cherish life with Microsoft and I want you to experience the amazing things we had with Microsoft by obtaining your own PC (Personal Computer).

1. Dropbox

Dropbox is a free service that lets you bring your photos, docs, and videos anywhere and share them easily. Never email yourself a file again! Sync files in your phone, desktops and laptops.

2. Google Docs

Google Docs lets you create, share, and collaborate on documents online. And it just got better with rebuilt editors for documents, spreadsheets, and drawings, designed to improve collaboration, increase speed, and create richer documents.

3. Wunderlist

Wunderlist makes it downright simple to organize your daily life. Just create a list and start filling it with things that need to be completed. Keep track of your more important tasks with reminders and notifications. You can even create a new task for Wunderlist straight from your email inbox. Oh, and did we forget to tell you? Its free!

4. Facebook Groups

Have things you only want to share with a small group of people? Just create a group, add friends, and start sharing. Once you have your group, you can post updates, poll the group, chat with everyone at once, and more.

Groups let you share things with the people who will care about them most. By creating a group for each of the important parts of your life — family, teammates, coworkers — you decide who sees what you share.

Create your own group for thesis where you could share links and collaborate with your group mates.

5. Skype

Skype is for doing things together, whenever you’re apart. Skype’s text, voice and video make it simple to share experiences with the people that matter to you, wherever they are.

Collaborate and talk with your thesis group mates whenever there is geographic constraints

Mozilla Firefox Mobile Web Browser

Mozilla Firefox Mobile Web Browser for Android mobile phones is now out. The secure and fast web browser is now in your Android phones. Available for Android 2.0 and above. Installation requires about 17 MB internal or SD card storage.

For list of tested and supported devices you can go here.

Summer is the season right now here in the Philippines. The temperature is playing around 35-38°C  everyday. Summer time is also vacation time so young people like us often stay all day with our laptops playing games, watching movies, Tumblr, Facebook, Twitter and so-so. Our laptops generates heat as we use it. Our environmental temperature can cause also an increase of heat of our laptops. Overheating can be the cause why laptops often fails at an early age. To prevent our laptops from reaching the early death stage we must be careful on how we ventilate and cool our laptops as we use it.

I personally monitor my laptop’s temperature using this application:

CPUID Hardware Monitor

CPUID Hardware Monitor monitors your PC temperature as you use it. Eats only about 3.5 MB – 4.0 MB memory and with a very clean and basic interface. Has a Pro version that lets you remotely monitor your PC. But some hardware are not detected like my NVDIA 310M.

Rating: 4.0/5