The Tech Guy Episode 1908 Transcript

Please be advised this transcript is AI-generated and may not be word for word. Time codes refer to the approximate times in the ad-supported version of the show.

Leo Laporte (00:00:02):
Podcasts you love from people you trust. This is TWiT. Hi, this is Leo Laporte and this is my Tech Guy podcast. This show originally aired on Sunday, July 3rd, 2022. This is episode 1,908. Enjoy listeners of this program. Get an ad free version. If they're members of club TWiT $7 a month gives you ad free versions of all of our shows plus membership in the club. Twit discord of great clubhouse for TWiT listeners and finally the twit plus feed with shows like Stacey's book club, the untitled Linux show the giz fiz and more go to twit.tv/clubtwit. And thanks for your support.

Leo Laporte (00:00:50):
Well, Hey, Hey, how are you today? Good to see you. Leo Laporte here, the tech guy, and it's time to talk about computers in the internet and home theater and digital photography and smart phones and smart watches and augmented reality and smart cars. And boy, there's a lot of stuff in tech these days when I first started doing this show, not when I started as the tech guy, that was 2004. That was the modern times when I started doing call in technology programming in the early nineties. That was simple. Those are easy times. We, we barely talked about the internet and when we did it was saw this university defense department network of computers that you'll never have access to <laugh> it was windows three, one. You know, I mean, it was, it was a simpler time. Linux wasn't even invented.

Leo Laporte (00:01:43):
It was invented in 1992. That's actually maybe right about when I started doing this, we've come a long way, baby. Now it's pretty much everything in the world. Isn't it? It's all tech, anything with a chip in it, phone number eighty eight, eighty eight, ask Leo 8, 8, 8 8 2 7 5 5 3 6. That's another thing that's changed used to be you know, that's a toll free number from the us and Canada used to be, you know, you needed a toll free number because it was so expensive to call long distance. <Laugh> not no more. Doesn't cost you anything on your cell phone, usually, right? You're already paying for unlimited long distance calls, unlimited and calling internationally a few pennies a minute. Wow. That you can, I think you can trace to antitrust laws and the breakup of mob bell. I think that's pretty clearly the biggest success story of antitrust legislation that may be in breaking up standard oil.

Leo Laporte (00:02:41):
I don't know. I don't go that far back, but when mob bell was broken up long distance prices over the next few years, tumbled because companies like MCI could come along. Do you remember that in the early days, MCI, who was forbidden from using the lines owned by mob, be for the longest time, once mob bell was broken up, MCI could then offer long distance service. Do you remember that? And you'd get a pin, a number that you would dial first. So you'd pick up the phone, you'd dial this long number, your MCI number, and then you could make long distance calls for cheap. I mean, for the time cheap, if you know, 10 cents a minute or whatever, I just wonder what those early MCI toll charges were. I mean, they weren't what we have now, but that was the breakthrough. And, and then competition, right?

Leo Laporte (00:03:35):
And competition and competition, of course <laugh> the phone companies have re merged. In fact, MC was bought by Verizon <laugh> WorldCom, another one offering cheap, long distance. You'd have a WorldCom card right. Bought by Verizon. It's kind of my Bell's almost reassembled itself at and T is the death star that behemoth Verizon <laugh> then there's, T-Mobile the young upstart plucky amongst young upstart. Who's now as big as the other two. So I, you know, but Hey, we still have, we have competition. Competition leads to lower prices. And the thing that mob bell argued for years, oh man, we, you don't want us to break up because we are preserving the sanctity, the strength, the power, the reliability of the nationwide network. If you broke us up people would be putting their own using their own phones. Yeah. You re only us old timers. Remember this, you couldn't buy your own phone. You had to rent a phone from a company called Western electric, a subsidiary of Mabel. You rented the phone. There was no innovation, cuz there wasn't any need for, there was no competition and you couldn't put your own line. That was another thing that changed with again good antitrust regulations. The very famous Carter phone decision Supreme court was ended up making that difference, allowing you to connect a device other than an Western electric rented handset to the telephone network.

Leo Laporte (00:05:16):
54 years ago, the FCC Carter phone in 1968, before Carter phone at and T owned it all. They made the phones, they rented you the phones. You could not connect anything to like a modem, like a modem couldn't connect it unless it was from Western electric and they didn't make modems <laugh> so you wouldn't have been able to com connect your computer equipment without at and T's permission. Boy, that was an important decision. It was a huge decision very famous case. So good. Now we have competition in some areas, I guess there are now, you know, what happens with monopolies is they reform and you have to kind constantly keep on 'em. So now we have this whole issue with Google being so powerful and you know, and this, you know, kind of the same situation, your phone now has everything on it. It's more than your phone. It's a computer, it's the computer for many people in their pocket that has everything in it. And that's why nowadays when they're investigating criminality, what do they do? They seize your phone. Interesting

Leo Laporte (00:06:36):
Case here, the justice department this week seized iPhones from two attorneys involved in the January 6th, the probe campaign advisor for Donald Trump, John Eastman, who was the guy who kind of set up the, the coup. He figured it all out in legal filing. June 22nd federal agents stopped him as he was leaving a restaurant and took his iPhone 12 pro. Now you'd think, boy, I mean, that was a long time ago. You'd think Eastman would've erased any trace. If there were illegality, if he did anything wrong, he certainly would. He, would he be carrying around his phone? Well, the judge who signed the warrant must have thought so, oh, here's an interesting thing. Eastman says they took the phone and then showed me the warrant. I believe that because they don't want you to mess with the phone. If they know, you know, if a bad guy has a phone in his hands and you say here's a warrant for your phone bad, guy's gonna make that phone a little harder to get into. Eastman says quote, he was, and this is a little line in the whole story, but one, I noticed he was forced to provide biometric data.

Leo Laporte (00:07:48):
That's <affirmative> and that's interesting. So they took the phone. Here's the warrant. Now I want you to unlock that phone with your face once unlocked, of course federal agents almost certainly connected it immediately to a device that sucked all the data out of it. That's what they do made by a company called celebrate. You just, you plug it into the lightning port. All the data is now on a, on a drive inside that box, the phone, you can lock it again. Doesn't matter. I got everything, but this is an important point. He was forced to provide biometric data. And there is a, there's a debate in the courts over this and different courts have ruled differently, but it has generally been held

Leo Laporte (00:08:37):
That you are protected from in self-incrimination, right? We all agree. We know that you are protected by the constitution and the fourth amendment against self-incrimination and, and unlawful search and seizure. And the courts pretty much agree in that. You know, what they don't agree on is what is self-incrimination. Some courts have ruled and most courts seem to agree that asking for a password is in effect, especially for a phone where you presume there's a lot of good juicy stuff on there asking for the password for that phone would be Tanem out to saying incriminate yourself. So many courts have said, police cannot ask for the password. They can take the phone, but they can't ask for the password. That's why you remember the FBI went after apple saying, help us unlock this phone. It was locked and they couldn't compel the defendant to give him the pass word.

Leo Laporte (00:09:33):
Well, the defendant was dead in this case, but point remains and it's happened in many cases. However, biometric information. That's interesting. Some courts have held that's different. You're not self-incriminating if the police hold the phone up to your face in it unlocks, or are you isn't that? I mean, isn't that pretty much the same as entering a pin? Well, courts have said no again, there's not universal agreement. And I, and I think this needs to be clarified, but in general, in case you're ever held up by a federal agents and they demand your phone, you might want to know this. And this is why they took his phone before they gave him the warrant. When you have an iPhone with face ID or touch ID, if you press and hold the screen on and off switch for two seconds, you can lock it. And once locked, it needs your password, your pin to unlock it. Face ID no longer works.

Leo Laporte (00:10:35):
Law enforcement department of justice knew that, obviously, cuz they said, give me the phone. And then they said, here's a search warrant. And then they said, look into the phone and unlocked it. <Laugh> according to most recent court decisions. That, that, that was what they needed to do to get into that phone. And it, it apparently was not, it's not considered by many courts. We'll see, I suspect this will become a case. John Eastman did not self incriminate by providing the biometric information. Whether it's the fingerprint of the face would is self incriminated. If they demanded the password and he didn't have enough time to press that button for two seconds to lock it so that they couldn't do it without a password. Wow.

Leo Laporte (00:11:21):
That is a minor little footnote in all the stories about this, but that's an important one. And I think the other important one is that these phones are more than just a telephone. This is not, this is not your Western electric phone that you plug into the wall and you make hello operator. This is this is your life in here, right? All your location, information, all your texts. I have all my passwords in there. I have my identification documents, my social security number. I mean, everything is in this phone. That's why you wanna lock it and keep, keep tight regulation. You know, who has access to this phone though? Every app that you put on it, you know, I just bought a water bottle that a stupid purchase. I don't recommend it, but it's a water bottle that monitors how much you drink, right?

Leo Laporte (00:12:08):
So you drink, you know, you're supposed to drink enough water. So you say, I wanna drink 64 ounces a day. And the water bottle, somehow magically measures that it's made China nice instructions got 30 pages of instructions, one tiny page per language. It's 30 different languages. And the first thing you're supposed to do to use this bottle is hook it up to your phone, get the app, right? The app says, I want location information always. Why do they need location information to know how much water I've drunk? It's Chinese company, Chinese app asks for location information. Hmm. And probably most of us just go. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I just want to go, I wanna know how much water I drank. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Fine. This phone uses Bluetooth to see the bottle, wherever it is automatically copy the ounces from it. But I have to think there's more going on <laugh> than just that the apps on your phone no more than law enforcement does. And, and, and this is why apple and good for them has introduced ways to restrict the amount of information an app can ask for. But still apple knows all

Leo Laporte (00:13:20):
88 88 ask. That's just a fascinating subject. I think we're gonna see some more court decisions on this. I have a feeling, I have a feeling maybe even the Supreme court end up ruling are, is that self-incrimination. If they say, look into this phone and unlock it, is it, or is it Leo Laport tech

Kim Schaffer (00:13:38):
<Laugh>.

Leo Laporte (00:13:38):
Does this have anything to do with phone call? Is

Kim Schaffer (00:13:40):
This the same Vienna song?

Leo Laporte (00:13:42):
It's Vienna calling is vie briefly. I, I, you know, I know Vienna's is a beautiful place in Virginia as well as of course Austria Mozart played there. I'm gonna be there for new year's Eve a couple of years, but I hate to say it, but when you say the word Vienna, I almost always wanna yep. Sausage. Yep.

Kim Schaffer (00:14:03):
<Laugh>

Leo Laporte (00:14:05):
Yep. That's a sad thing.

Kim Schaffer (00:14:08):
<Laugh>

Leo Laporte (00:14:09):
They may not even have anything to do with Vienna sausage, but for some reason, in my mind you say Vienna, I say sausage, sausage,

Kim Schaffer (00:14:17):
<Laugh> word

Leo Laporte (00:14:19):
Associa. Thank you. Armor. It's a thin par boiled sausage traditionally made of pork and beef and a casing of sheeps and intestine. Ooh,

Kim Schaffer (00:14:28):
What

Leo Laporte (00:14:29):
Can and a can, right? That's why they call it a Vienna sausage Vienna

Kim Schaffer (00:14:32):
Sausages

Leo Laporte (00:14:32):
And a can because you, if you said that you wouldn't want one, I

Kim Schaffer (00:14:35):
Don't want one <laugh>

Leo Laporte (00:14:36):
Yeah. In, in Austria, what do they call it? A Frank foot Al. So who should now you've learned more than you ever cared to know. I, I

Kim Schaffer (00:14:46):
I'm glad Chris isn't on today. Cuz we might be offending him. <Laugh>

Leo Laporte (00:14:51):
Wow. As they say, wow, who should I start with this fun show? Let's go to Matthew in Newport beach, Newport beach, California. Thank you. Kim Shaffer phone angel. Hello? Matthew Leo Laport. The tech guy.

Caller 1 (00:15:06):
Hi Leo. How are you doing today?

Leo Laporte (00:15:07):
I am. Well, how are you?

Caller 1 (00:15:09):
Pretty good. Pretty good. So I have a, an issue. I have the Callie, six monitors running Ableton software with the Ts audio interface.

Leo Laporte (00:15:20):
Holy cow.

Caller 1 (00:15:21):
Okay. And a, a moue subsequent 37 plugged into that as

Leo Laporte (00:15:25):
Well. You are a musician. You could play Vienna calling right now.

Caller 1 (00:15:30):
<Laugh>

Leo Laporte (00:15:31):
You're set. Are you? I take it you're are you a professional musician or is this just a great setup for fun?

Caller 1 (00:15:36):
This is just a setup for fun.

Leo Laporte (00:15:37):
Nice.

Caller 1 (00:15:39):
Oh, thank you. Thank you. So when I play, when I open the do and I plug him, I use my mode just, just as is it sounds great.

Leo Laporte (00:15:47):
What other radio show do you listen to where you might hear that sentence? When I open up the D and I play it on my MOG, it sounds great. You wouldn't hear that on any other show, but here D is a digital audio workstation. It's what you edit music with. You plug it into your MOG, which is your it's probably not a real Mogue. It's a, it's a, it is. It's a real MOG.

Caller 1 (00:16:08):
It's a hundred percent real.

Leo Laporte (00:16:10):
Moue is it a vintage?

Caller 1 (00:16:13):
No. It's it's their,

Leo Laporte (00:16:15):
They still make 'em. Wow.

Caller 1 (00:16:17):
Oh yeah. They still

Leo Laporte (00:16:17):
Make that's the original synthesizer. The Mogue synthesizer. Wow. That's cool. I love it to that. So it's, A's an analog, is it analog device that you plug it into? Yeah.

Caller 1 (00:16:26):
Okay. It is an analog.

Leo Laporte (00:16:28):
Yep. But it has a mid interface. Yes. Okay.

Caller 1 (00:16:33):
Yes. so the question is when I, it sounds great to the mug, but the moment I hit playback, I'm getting crackled pops and all type of robot noises.

Leo Laporte (00:16:42):
Yeah. That's a mismatch in the sample rate or the bit rate. Usually it's a sample rate. So if they have to have, you know, and when he, obviously, if the sample rate's wrong, it's gonna sound really funny. It's either gonna sound sped up or it's gonna crackle or weird things are gonna happen. So somewhere in, along the line, and it's probably in the mid interface, which is supposed to set this all up, the wrong message got sent

Caller 1 (00:17:09):
It's

Leo Laporte (00:17:09):
Okay. Sometimes the order that you turn these things on can fix this.

Caller 1 (00:17:14):
Oh.

Leo Laporte (00:17:16):
Cause what happens? Remember the Mavis is gonna have a handshake with the computer and the Mavis is gonna say, all right, I'm gonna send you 16 bit 24 six, 16 bit 192 kilohertz audio or whatever. It's the clock is the problem and this clock rate. And then the computer goes, okay, got it. And I'll know how to play it back because I'm gonna play it back at exactly that same sample rate bit rate and clock rate. I think that's what's happening is the handshake is not properly. Executing could be a bad mini cable, could be, you know, something else like that, but try turning 'em on, in a different order.

Caller 1 (00:17:51):
Oh my gosh. I, I have tried so many things and no one ever even tried to, no one's even mentioned that that that would be an issue.

Leo Laporte (00:17:58):
Handshake is a very common issue in computing because when you turn on your TV, for instance, and your stereo, the HT I cable, they have to do a little agreement. It's a little negotiation between them about what we're gonna send and what you're gonna receive. And I think that's, what's going on. Leo Laport, the tech guy. Now I could be completely wrong, but which door are you using? You said Ableton. Yes. Yeah. I'm, that's the first thing to look at? Does the is it a Mavis? Is that what you're using?

Caller 1 (00:18:30):
No, a

Leo Laporte (00:18:31):
Volt you're using the volt. Does the volt have a clock in it that it can sync with? Cause that's the other problem is you could have a, this clock could be at a sync.

Caller 1 (00:18:40):
N not that I'm aware of, but let me just add something. So what I, I have, I'm running windows 11 when I first had windows 10, this wasn't an issue.

Leo Laporte (00:18:49):
Oh, wow.

Caller 1 (00:18:51):
Yeah. And I switched over windows 11. Yeah. And now this became an issue.

Leo Laporte (00:18:53):
So there I don't, is there a setup for mid configuration control panel? Yes, there is. Here we go. Is there on windows 11? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe it's installed by Ableton on a Mac. There is actually a, a, a system preference pain for mid that, that would set all of this stuff on the windows. This is

Caller 1 (00:19:14):
A PC.

Leo Laporte (00:19:15):
Yeah, I know on windows. I don't know, but I don't think there is one built in so many people make music on max that they build it in, but I bet you able to installs it. So you wanna look at your mid control panel and just make sure it's set the same as the MOG is.

Caller 1 (00:19:34):
Okay.

Leo Laporte (00:19:35):
And then sometimes you don't have to do that because, you know, in theory, these guys are gonna go, Hey, what, what are you sending me? Well, I'm sending you this. Okay. I'll you know, sample

Caller 1 (00:19:43):
Eight.

Leo Laporte (00:19:44):
Yeah. Do you have that there? Same. Then look at

Caller 1 (00:19:48):
They're the same.

Leo Laporte (00:19:49):
So the bit rate and the sample rate are the same. And then there's also a clock for synchronization that, that also could give you exactly what you just described is very, is a very common problem with, you know, interface, musical interfaces like this. They have to have the same bit rate, clock rate and clock

Caller 1 (00:20:12):
Would, would it be possible? It's a driver issue because when I play like music through just anything.

Leo Laporte (00:20:18):
Yeah.

Caller 1 (00:20:19):
Would you recommend like an Nvidia legacy driver?

Leo Laporte (00:20:23):
You think it's the Nvidia? Huh?

Caller 1 (00:20:25):
I, I think I've said so I've spent like two hours with the Sweetwater tech. He went through my computer. He's done everything. I even bought a new audio interface. Hoping that would be the issue. And it's still the issue, huh?

Leo Laporte (00:20:38):
Yeah. I think I, you know, by when you say you upgraded a windows 11 and that caused, it sounds very much to me that it's a driver, it's a software issue, not a hardware issue. There's something in the clock is set wrong. It needs to be 24 pulses per quarter note <laugh> there is, here's an article on sweet sweetwater.com on how to sync mid devices. I will put that in the show notes, cuz that might, might have some additional information. You said you talked to Sweetwater.

Caller 1 (00:21:13):
Yes.

Leo Laporte (00:21:13):
They went all through my candy. They're they're good. I like Sweetwater. Yeah, they are. They cause they put candy in the box, but <laugh> could be a different port. Might help the the, the, which, what kind of machine is it? Self-Built or,

Caller 1 (00:21:31):
Oh, it's no, it's a HP Oman.

Leo Laporte (00:21:34):
Laptop. Oman. Okay. So I don't know if the Oman has multiple probably not most laptops don't but sometimes there's multiple root hubs on a, on the USB and, and maybe one's messed up or, you know, so try different ports. Yeah, this is the kind of thing. This really sounds like a you're not using a hub, right? You're you're connecting direct mm-hmm <affirmative> yes. Okay. Cause that can affect this handshake as well. Well, there's some ideas if you, if you're interested and we've talked before, I know Matthew, if you're interested, the chat Myers C TV might have other ideas for you. They're they're working on it too. They're using their collective minds. I have to run cause we that's car time. What kind of music EDM or what do you make?

Caller 1 (00:22:22):
Yes. Electronic.

Leo Laporte (00:22:23):
Nice fun. Huh? What a great hobby it is. All right. We'll talk. Love it. We'll talk again. Let me know how it works out. All right, Sam in front of a beautiful Detroit summer sky, all my friends, I love I was back in Providence over the week. We, and I love June back. East's so gorgeous. So pretty. It is. We've got June gloom today. It won't get outta the sixties and it's overcast and it's just yicky

Sam Abuelsamid (00:22:57):
Sun's shining today. It's 80 degrees

Leo Laporte (00:22:59):
Out. Oh, so nice. Here we go. Time for Sam Abul, salmon, principal researcher at guide house insights. He's our motoring expert does a podcast called wheel bearings@wheelbearings.media. Love it. When Sam comes in here and talks about cars. Hi Sam.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:23:19):
Hi Leo. How are you this week?

Leo Laporte (00:23:20):
I'm great. What are you driving this week?

Sam Abuelsamid (00:23:23):
I was originally scheduled to have a Cadillac CT, five black wing, but the day before it was due to be delivered, got a note from the fleet company saying yeah it was damaged in a previous loan and we're still waiting on parts for it. So we're gonna give you a Chevrolet bolt E V oh, which is fine because I I've been asking to get one of those onto my schedule anyway. So

Leo Laporte (00:23:44):
The bolts are the, among the least expensive EVs and we love our Chevy bolt. We, after the rebates and everything, it was 20 grand and it's a great little car. My, our, our son own is his car and the UV is they're like somewhat enlarged version of that.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:24:00):
Yeah. It's it's about six inches longer, a little bit longer, about three inch longer wheel base. And about three inches off the back. Did you like it? Yeah, I, I still have it in my driveway. It's doing great. It's getting, you know, it's very, very energy efficient. It's got a range of 247 miles.

Leo Laporte (00:24:17):
That's so nice. So

Sam Abuelsamid (00:24:17):
Nice. So it's a little bit less than the regular bolt cuz you know, it's a little bit taller and heavier, but otherwise you know, largely the, the same driving experience and it's actually they, about a month ago, GM announced that for the 20, 23 model year bolts which come out this summer, they were going to lower the price. So the current price on the, the regular bolt as I think about $32,000 and they're dropping it to about 26 and a half. So it's going down by almost $6,000. And in fact after they did that, they announced that anybody that has bought a bolt or bolt U UV since they went back on sale in April or may after the, after they stopped production for a while for to deal with the recall is going to be getting a check back from GM for $5,900. What

Leo Laporte (00:25:09):
Nice.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:25:09):
Yeah. So BA basically they're, they're retroactively repricing, the 22 models to the same price as the upcoming 20 threes.

Leo Laporte (00:25:18):
I'm guessing this is kind of a strategic move more than, you know. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:25:23):
I, I think it's a couple of things. It is strategic, you know, and part, part of it is, you know you know, there, there's probably some, there was some reputational damage down the car, but I recall, right. But you know, and, and so they wanna address that and making it cheaper, but also next year GM is bringing out an electric version of the Equinox, which is slightly larger model, which is their their compact crossover. It's their top, it's the top selling Chevrolet vehicle after the, the Silverado pickup. And they've promised that that one is gonna have a starting price of $30,000. Wow. So

Leo Laporte (00:26:01):
How the wait a minute now Ford says they lose money on the mocks at 50,000. How is GM selling these vehicles and making money? Are they making maybe they're losing money? Well, they

Sam Abuelsamid (00:26:11):
Never said they were making money. Oh,

Leo Laporte (00:26:14):
<Laugh> so this is, this is to get a foothold in the industry.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:26:17):
Yeah, well, especially right now I suspect the GM is probably losing money on these bolts. Wow. I think, you know six or eight months ago, they, they were probably breaking even on it now I'm, I'm pretty confident they're losing money because the price of key commodities for the batteries, the, the nickel, the, the cobalt the lithium all those prices have spiked over the last year. And so that is causing battery prices, which have been in a steady decline for the last decade to go back up again. Yeah. So I, and that, and that's the same reason why Ford has said that, you know, they've gone from making, you know, being profitable on the mock to be losing money on it. So, and we've already seen, you know, in some other EVs, Tesla has raised their prices several times in the past six months for GM just announced a price increase for the Hummer EV of $6,000. So basically what they took off of the bolt, they added to the <laugh> added to the Hummer. And and I, I expect, we'll see more price increases on other EVs in the coming months. As long as these these metal prices continue to, to stay high, it's still

Leo Laporte (00:27:35):
A saving for the consumer, especially with gas prices where they are. I would've imagine.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:27:41):
I mean, well, especially for, you know, for something like the, the bolt, you know, you can get starting works out to about $26,500 is the starting price. Yeah. It's

Leo Laporte (00:27:49):
Amazing

Sam Abuelsamid (00:27:50):
For that. Yeah.

Leo Laporte (00:27:51):
No, you gotta pay for your electricity, but there are ways to

Sam Abuelsamid (00:27:54):
Reduce that's way cheaper than gas. Yeah,

Leo Laporte (00:27:55):
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:27:56):
I mean, even, even if you're, even if you don't have solar, if you're, you know, if you're still getting electricity off the grid I think current, like off peak prices in California, I think are somewhere around 16 or 17 cents a kilowat hour, their

Leo Laporte (00:28:10):
Battery must cost close to $26,000. I

Sam Abuelsamid (00:28:14):
No, it's not, it's not that bad cause okay. Because the thing you gotta remember about the bolt is that, you know, the battery is relatively small because it's a relatively small

Leo Laporte (00:28:24):
Vehicle, relatively

Sam Abuelsamid (00:28:24):
Small car. Yeah. Yeah. You know, it's only a 65 kilowat hour battery, right. Unlike the, the one in a Hummer, which is about 240 kilowatts horse, bigger than that's way about afford size. Yeah. So, you know, the, the bolt, the bolt battery probably costs about somewhere around nine, $10,000. Okay. Maybe a little bit more right now. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, if, if you're looking for affordable an affordable EV if you want to get into an EV and, and you want something that's not crazy expensive the bolt is a fantastic option right now. It's a great car. Also the Hyundai Kona EV is another great option. That one has a starting price of $34,000, and Hyundai is still eligible for federal tax credits of $7,500. So works out to be roughly the same price as the bolt.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:29:15):
And the, the GM is no longer eligible for the tax credits, the federal tax credits because they, several years ago, they hit the 200,000 sales mark. So GM and Tesla are already phased out of tax credits. As of this quarter is that just ended Toyota also hit the 200,000 sales mark for plugin vehicles. So they're starting in October, they're gonna start their phase out for their EVs. And probably probably by the end of the third quarter Ford end of the third quarter, maybe into the fourth quarter, Ford will hit that 200,000 mark as well. So it's unless, unless Congress you know, gets its acted together and, and starts expanding these incentives again tho those prices are gonna start to go up as well. Because you know, you're not gonna have that option for, for some of those tax incentives anymore.

Leo Laporte (00:30:15):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. What do you think the chances are that they will extend those incentives?

Sam Abuelsamid (00:30:20):
I think as long as they are, they have the current balance of power in there. And Joe mansion is the zero from West Virginia zero. Yeah. In fact, if, or perhaps could slightly less than zero, if

Leo Laporte (00:30:30):
He could get cars to run on coal, he would. So, yeah, you're right. Yeah,

Sam Abuelsamid (00:30:34):
Yeah, yeah. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> so yeah, that's, that's not, I, I, I sincerely doubt that's gonna happen, unfortunately. Because you know, that is the, probably the single biggest stumbling block to people adopting EVs is, is the cost. Well,

Leo Laporte (00:30:48):
And you could argue that the subsidy, I don't know, you could argue on one hand, it's good for the country to move to EVs. I could argue on the other hand that it's spending money, we don't really have, I, I'm not sure where I sit on that fence and yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:31:00):
Well, I mean, I've always thought the way the, the current incentive system is set up is flawed anyway. Yeah. because it, you know, basically most of the people who've gotten, those incentives are more affluent people looking forward, early

Leo Laporte (00:31:13):
Adopters. Yeah. <Laugh>

Sam Abuelsamid (00:31:14):
And, and, and other high end vehicles. Yeah. Who, who arguably don't really need that money. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's people who would normally buy something like a Toyota Corolla or a Chevy Cruz, they're the ones, you know, at the lower end of the market that

Leo Laporte (00:31:29):
Who really should be so that's. I agree. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:31:31):
Yeah. We've,

Leo Laporte (00:31:32):
We've bought four EVs. All of which we got the $7,500 federal tax break plus California breaks, which made them very much more important.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:31:40):
I think, I think that there should be an income cap and also a price cap on the

Leo Laporte (00:31:44):
Vehicle show maps,

Sam Abuelsamid (00:31:45):
Nothing over $45,000 gets an incentive.

Leo Laporte (00:31:48):
No, I, I completely agree with you, you know, we should subsidize it for the people who can he'll afford the EVs. Sam bull, Sam principal, researcher guide, house insights. He podcasts@wheelbearings.media. And he's always a welcome guest here on the Tech Guy show. Eighty eight eighty eight ask Leo is my phone number. This 4th of July weekend. Be a good time to call calls are pretty slow yesterday. Give yourself a chance to get in right now, more of your calls coming up. Yeah. We bought, we must have bought the bolt right at the end of the subsidies.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:32:21):
Yeah. I think, I think you got yours in 2020 or

Leo Laporte (00:32:25):
20 20 19, I think

Sam Abuelsamid (00:32:26):
2019. Oh yeah. We

Leo Laporte (00:32:27):
Might have been a 2020 model in 2019, but I think we got in 2019. Yeah.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:32:32):
Yeah. So yeah, you, you were, you were right around the, just about the end where they hit that 200,000 mark.

Leo Laporte (00:32:37):
Lisa's also a hell of a negotiator. She really got the cut down like a lot.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:32:43):
But I mean, you know, now, you know, you can get one, you know, out the door, I mean, less taxes and, you know, and other fees and stuff, but, you know, 20 starting at 26 and a half grand, which is a pretty decent price, you know, for, for a brand new car. Yeah. And it's, it's a really good car. Yeah. You know, I mean, it gets great range. It's, you know, it's comfortable to drive it's surprisingly roomy for its size. It's very well packaged. So, you know, I think it's a great option for a lot of people and, you know, the, the, the Kona is also a great car. Roberto Baldwin Mike, my wheel bearings, cohost he and his wife have a Kona EV ah and it's, you know, it's also a, a, you know, fantastic little EV you know, is great for great for city driving, you know, both of them, because they're comparatively small, they're easy to park, you know, easy to maneuver around in cities. They're, they're surprisingly quick 200 horsepower and, you know, lots of instant torque. So they're actually actually real, you know, really good to drive. So

Leo Laporte (00:33:43):
I saw an ionic yesterday. Those look beautiful too.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:33:46):
Yeah.

Leo Laporte (00:33:47):
There's some nice EVs out there.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:33:49):
Yeah. There there's a lot of new movies coming. You know, as of last fall, there were 20 EV name plates available for sale. Wow. In the us by this year, by the end of this year, that number should be somewhere around 45.

Leo Laporte (00:34:05):
Yeah. I saw that Ford is stopping lease buybacks now. So yeah, I'm still, I was grandfathered in cuz mine's pretty old. So if I decide to buy it at the end of the lease I can, but I think anybody buys leases now you're you have to,

Sam Abuelsamid (00:34:19):
And this, well, this is something Tesla's been doing for a while. They,

Leo Laporte (00:34:21):
Is it cuz they're so valuable in, in the used market that they don't don't wanna let you buy it better. 

Sam Abuelsamid (00:34:26):
Yeah. It's, it's a couple of things. Yeah. They, they wanna make sure that they can get inventory for their dealers of sell and used cars. Yeah. And you know, they figure they can get a, get a better deal, you know, selling it that way. They can, they can make more money on it. Right. Plus also I think that in general there is gonna be a shift over the, the coming years to the manufacturers wanting to retain some degree of control over the vehicles, over their lifespan. So that at the end of life of the vehicle, they can take back that battery yeah. And recycle the battery. Right. Or repurpose it for storage applications, things like that. Right. Right. So they, they, they see a lot of upside up yeah. A lot of lifetime value in that battery.

Leo Laporte (00:35:16):
Well maybe I should keep my mock <laugh>. I may not, maybe I will buy it out. I don't know what the

Sam Abuelsamid (00:35:21):
Buyer well, you know, and it turns out, let's see, yours will be up what next year? 25 or 25. Okay. yeah, by then, you know, hopefully the inventory situation will be better. Is that right?

Leo Laporte (00:35:34):
No, 24. I've got two more years on the lease. You're right. You're right. February 24.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:35:39):
Yeah. So hopefully the inventory situation by then will be, will be better. Yeah. But you know, right now, you know, if you have a vehicle that you're leasing that you know is coming up on the end of the lease, unless you've already ordered something to replace it you might be in a better situation. And actually, even if you have something lined up already to replace your lease vehicle, if you, if you can afford to buy it, buy it out at the end of the lease, you're probably in the, the numbers will probably work out that it's actually to your advantage to buy it right now and then just turn around and sell it. Cuz you can probably make profit on that. Holy cow, because the residual value is holy cow, that was calculated, you know, two, three years ago. That's probably less than what it's worth on open market right now.

Leo Laporte (00:36:23):
Yeah. Can you stick around for the top? Yep. All right. We'll talk in a few. Thank you, Sam. Yeah, let's play some 4th of July music. That's a great idea. Leo Laport, the tech guy born in the USA. Eighty eight eighty eight. Ask Leo the phone number (888) 827-5536 Tori. Anywhere in the us or Canada. Let's go to diamond bar. Next. Karen is on the line on Karen.

Caller 2 (00:36:48):
Hello? Hello. I am very sensitive to wifi and I, I need to have a phone that has an ear Jack. I would like one that has an a card for storage, like an SB card. And I also need to stay with a 4g. Can you gimme some suggestions there? Antiques or

Leo Laporte (00:37:11):
Well, all phones have wifi. You can, you can turn it off obviously. So if that's sufficient for you

Caller 2 (00:37:19):
Headsets headsets, I can't do the, you know, the, well,

Leo Laporte (00:37:22):
Let me tell you something about that. Yeah, sometimes people say, well, I don't want to use Bluetooth headsets cuz of the radio waves. But if you plug in headphones, you're actually just putting an antenna in the phone and powering it right up into your ears. There's more RF coming through the headphones that are wired than unwired.

Caller 2 (00:37:41):
What about the, there are earphones that are, they have a, like a canal in them. They're not filled. They're like clear

Leo Laporte (00:37:48):
If you heard. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. That's just air. Yeah. Yeah. We that, yeah, they, they don't sound quite as good, but yeah, they, yeah, you could do that. That's an you need, so the way those work is somewhere along the line in the headphone, there'll be a little transmitter box. So you plug it into the phone. There'll be a little transmitter box that then makes the sound. It's like a little speaker that then goes through an air tube into your ear. That's very common. That's what the TV anchors are wearing those. They have hollow tubes going into their ear. Okay. More those for years. It's fine. I don't know if anybody makes hollow tube headphones for cell phones though. That's interesting. So let me, let's, let's start with getting the phone. You probably want a phone with a headphone Jack because at least that will give you a way of, you know, that's gonna require a headphone Jack, I'm gonna guess.

Leo Laporte (00:38:41):
Okay. And the more and more phones are eliminating headphone jacks, but there are a few, you know, they've just not given up. I actually like it. I prefer a headphone Jack. So Motorola's phones still. Some of them still have headphone jacks. And actually I really like these they're called the motos M OTOs the, the Moto G is very good. And they come up every year, they update it. So I think it's the G nine currently. And I think that current, you should check obviously before you buy, but some of the older motor, I know the older ones do. There is a Google phone that still has a headphone Jack, not the current pixel six or, or the upcoming six, a but the five a is quite a nice phone. It's under $500. Water resistant still has a headphone Jack, but you said you want a micro SD card slot too, didn't you? Yes, yes. Yeah. Those are disappearing as fast or not faster than headphone jacks.

Caller 2 (00:39:43):
If I used support lectures and things like that, these are, these are recorded.

Leo Laporte (00:39:49):
So you record 'em onto the SD card and then you could pop it and put it somewhere else and play it back, huh?

Caller 2 (00:39:54):
Correct.

Leo Laporte (00:39:56):
Ah, so what we now want is a phone that has a headphone Jack and an SD card slot

Caller 2 (00:40:02):
And isn't 5g.

Leo Laporte (00:40:05):
Yeah. All of them. Oh, it is not. 5G is only LTE. Oh boy. We really you're gonna have to go back in time. Fortunately a lot of older phones don't have 5g and they're still being sold. I would say probably the Motorola. I'm trying to think if the Motorola has SD card slots though. Boy, you, you came up with a good one. You know what? There really needs to be a site where you could enter in all these specs. Yeah. And it would narrow it all down. Wouldn't that be cool?

Caller 2 (00:40:34):
Yes. It would be

Leo Laporte (00:40:35):
Yes. Then you could do like a little calculator and say what you need. The, the one I go to for this is GSM arena and I think that they do have something like that. You certainly can see all the specs of all the phones and they will tell you phone by phone. I would look at the motos. The Modo G stylist is 4g has a headphone Jack. I can't, I'm not sure if it has a <laugh> this is hysterical. I'm not sure if it has a SD card, we need a little comparison selector. Here we go. Let's see. I'm on GSM arena right now. I, I think these are very nice phones and they, fortunately Motorola is still sells plenty of phone cuz they sell kind of mid, mid to low price phones. So they sell plenty of phones without 5g in them.

Leo Laporte (00:41:28):
Yeah. So I think there's some good choices. Why don't you go to GSM arena and you can it's a lot easier than trying to trying to do it at a, a store cuz the stores won't have as many choices and then you'll be able to pick the one you you want that has the things you want in it. Let me look and see if I can see if the 2022 stylist 4g has a headphone Jack. It does have a headphone Jack. Now does it have yes, it has a card slot. Ladies and gentlemen. I think we have a winner winner, chicken dinner, the Moto G stylists for 2022, no 5g headphone Jack. These are pretty good phones, great batteries, 5,000 million amp batteries. And it does support an SD card, which means you could record and put it on the SD cards. So I think we have, I think we have a winner thanks to GSM marina. I've narrowed it down $279 on Amazon. That's another thing that's great about it. Motorola, these motos are very, very affordable. I hope we've helped you Karen. I, I would, without hesitation recommend that the Moto G stylus from 2022, David's on the line. He's next from to hunger, California. Hi David.

Caller 3 (00:42:45):
Yep. Hi, how

Leo Laporte (00:42:47):
I am. How are you? I'm feeling well myself. Are you are you troubled by some technology that I can help you with?

Caller 3 (00:42:55):
Yeah. I am having trouble tuning, television frequencies. And I wonder you said something about television going?

Leo Laporte (00:43:07):
Yeah. They've moved everything. <Laugh>

Caller 3 (00:43:10):
Yeah, I know like test it.

Leo Laporte (00:43:12):
<Laugh> so do you have a TV? So you've got an antenna. I presume that's why it's

Caller 3 (00:43:17):
I have, yeah, I have a couple of antenna.

Leo Laporte (00:43:19):
Okay. Do you, what you need is a TV that will scan all the frequencies and find the channels. That's the easiest thing to do. Yeah.

Caller 3 (00:43:27):
Yeah. I'm not having trouble with that, but when I get one channel I lose another one <laugh> so because my antenna rotates.

Leo Laporte (00:43:36):
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah. All right. So I'm gonna point you to a couple of sites that will help you with this one' called TV fool at TV, fool, TV, fool which is a site that will you enter in your address or your zip code. And it will tell you where the towers are that you're aiming at. And it will also help you choose an antenna that will hit all the towers that are near to you.

Caller 3 (00:44:06):
Well, I was wondering, are they reducing the the watage? Are they reducing the,

Leo Laporte (00:44:15):
They may be, they may be. I mean, that's gonna be on, that's not mandated. That's not required. They did have to Mo you know, remember we had the digital analog to digital conversion. That was problem under one for your analog TV antenna. That was some years ago, remember the FCC was offering you cheap digital converters and all that, that we went through that a few years ago, but currently ongoing is they're moving some of the frequencies, almost all the TVs are doing this. And, and if you're watching local stations over the air, you'll see periodically announcement rescan, because we're gonna be moving channel seven to a slightly different frequency. So things will disappear. OTA over the air. TV is the best deal in television. It's the least compressed the highest quality. If you get at TSC 3.0, you might even get some 4k, but you'll certainly get very good HD on modern broadcast channels.

Leo Laporte (00:45:11):
But the thing is to get the right antenna. So TV, fool.com is a great place to start to see which stations you can get, where they are and even get some antenna advice. Another one for antenna advice is antenna web. So it's TV, fool.com, which by the way, every time I talk about it goes down, cuz they don't have a very powerful server. So if, if it's <laugh>, if you go there and say, it's not working, come back in 10, you know, half an hour, it'll probably be all right. All the people in the radio show are now going there now. So TV, fool.com and antenna, web.org. They also have a location thing and their, their goal is again, not only to help you find the channels, but what antennas will help with this. And you could probably find an antenna that will get everything. Leo Laporte the tech guy. Yeah, that's a good, a very good point. They may not be weaker, but they're digital. So there is a cliff that they, you know, when you, when the signal, instead of degrading, instead of ghosting, you know, remember the old days of TV where it ghost and you get weird, weird patterns and stuff, it doesn't do that anymore. It just stops working. Just goes, boom, Johnny.

Speaker 7 (00:46:23):
You know, we love to do the show until on radio.

Leo Laporte (00:46:25):
Okay. Hey Sam, go ahead. It's all yours here.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:46:28):
Okay. alright. So we got a bunch of questions in the chat. I'm gonna try and go through I'll start off with the Honda HR-V the new HR-V which they just had media drive program for that a couple of weeks ago. I did not get a chance to, to go on that. So I haven't driven it yet. One of my podcast co-hosts Nicole Wakeland did drive it. The new HRV is quite a bit larger than the old one. It's now based on the civic platform instead of the the Cadillac or instead of the Honda fit. And it's more powerful than before it's roomier. It's a little less interesting looking. It's a little, little blander looking but you know, it should be a really good vehicle. You know, it's a Honda that, you know, their stuff is always really good.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:47:16):
You know, I put my own money down on a Honda. We, we bought one a couple years, a few years ago. The Cadillac lyric I think some let's see RCB is me has asked multiple times in here. Will I comment on the lyric? Yeah. so I did, I did drive the lyric a couple of weeks ago. It's it's an excellent vehicle. It's <laugh> I like the comment. One of my friends made it's the best electric Cadillac ever built. It's also the first electric Cadillac, but that's beside the point. No, it's, it's actually really good. It's it looks great. Really nicely done. Interior interior, nicely executed interior beautiful 33 inch curved LCD display across the, the dashboard with the, the instrument cluster, the, and the infotainment system. It's, it's very roomy.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:48:10):
Drives drives really well. I'll, I'll find, I'll drop the link to my review from Forbes in the chat. The only issue I had with it was at the time that I drove it a couple of weeks ago, there were still quite a few software bugs that they were still ironing out. And they were they had apparently two OTA updates already lined up to go, actually ran into a GM executive, Don Nicholson, Dan Nicholson yesterday at a cars and coffee event. I was chatting with him about it and he said they've already pushed out one of those OTA updates to the cars that have been built, the lyrics that have been built and they're gonna start shipping lyrics to customers in the next week or two and they should have the second OTA in there as well to fix some of those software bugs, but overall really excellent luxury electric crossover.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:49:06):
So if you're, if you're looking for something you know, in that kind of midsize crossover segment in a, you know, premium vehicle I would definitely recommend taking a look at that. Although the 2023 model year is all sold out. They're gonna start production of 24 models late in Q1 of next year of 2023 and start shipping those early in, in quarter two. So March or April timeframe and they're taking orders for those now. So if you're, if you're interested in one, you'll wanna get your, get your order in soon before those are sold out as well. What else we had here? Somebody had a comment about Kia charging dealer premiums. It's important to keep in mind that in the us for established automaker that aren't startups like Tesla that have dealers that have franchise dealers.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:50:01):
Those dealers are independent businesses. They are not owned by the manufacturers. And the way the system works is the, the manufacturer sells the cars to the dealer, and then the dealer sells the cars onto customers. And there are laws in many states that in fact, explicitly prohibit manufacturers from selling direct to consumers, which I think is highly problematic. But, you know, when when car dealers have been very successful over the last century they've managed to buy a lot of politicians that have put laws in place to protect their financial interests. So it's the, these independent dealers that are charging the premiums. And, you know, this is a byproduct of capitalism when you have a supply and demand situation where there's not enough supply and more, too much demand prices are gonna go up. And, you know, dealers are unfortunately a lot of dealers, not all of them, there are some that don't charge dealer markups, but some of them you know, do, and that's, you know, the individual dealers making that choice to mark it up and, you know, the same is true.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:51:06):
You know, when we have the opposite situation, when consumer demand is down and there's too many cars on the lot waiting to be sold, that's when you get discounts, you know, so it works both ways, you know when, when there's more, more inventory, then customers can go in and negotiate the price down from the, the, the manufacturer's suggested list when there's not enough supply, it goes the other way around. So if, you know, if a dealer is looking to charge you a huge markup over the, the sticker price in the car, go find another dealer. There's, there's lots of other dealers around, you know, and just walk away unless you absolutely must have that car right now that, that specific vehicle, but definitely you know go, go shop around see comp see, will the lyric come with the newest version of super crews?

Sam Abuelsamid (00:51:56):
Yes, it will. Although it won't the super crews won't be enabled on there until later in the fall. Because right now one of the things they did on the lyric is they moved to an all new compute platform it's based on the Qualcomm Snapdragon ride platform. And so GM has had to rewrite a lot of the software to work on this, on this new compute architecture. And they're still working on that. They wanna make sure that's a hundred percent right before they, before they ship that actually the, the Chevy bolt E EV that I'm driving right now also has super crews on it. And it works really well as a hands free system. It actually works better than, than Ford's blue crews system that was on the F-150 lightning. I was driving a couple of weeks ago.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:52:41):
Is it true that Mercedes-Benz is getting out of the entry level car market and focusing on more premium luxury cars? So, yeah. At least here in north America they've been discontinuing some of the smaller, some of the, the, the cheaper cars in their lineup. Are there, you know, no, no Mercedes-Benz is cheap, but, you know, things like the CLA and some of the other smaller vehicles that they've had again, you know, this goes back to what we're seeing from a lot of other manufacturers where sales on those vehicles has been, have been declining over the last several years. And so they're gonna focus on, you know, the cars that consumers actually seem to wanna buy. So, you know, in this case, you know, we'll, we'll see them continue to sell cars like the, the GLB and crossover and the GLC crossover you know, at the smaller end of their lineup.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:53:34):
But you know, just as, as every other manufacturer's doing, when they have a limited supply of things like chips that they can, that they can use to build vehicles, they're gonna go for the ones generally that, you know, they can make the most profit off of, I mean, it's just, it's it's business. It's just the way business works. How is the us infrastructure on recharging stations or EV repair service stations? So it's gonna, it's getting better. There's more charging stations, public charging infrastructure being put in all the time. The infrastructure bill that was passed earlier this year they're currently in, in the process of rolling out the, that program to give those grants that seven and a half billion dollars. It was set aside for charging infrastructure that should fund about 500,000 new public charging stations.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:54:28):
And they, a couple of weeks ago, they announced some of the rules around that requiring that the chargers that are, that are installed with this money be accessible to everyone. It can't be limited or specific to any particular brand needs to be accessible to anyone that wants to use them. There are rules as far as uptime requirements, cuz that's been one of the problems with the a lot of the current chargers is a lack of reliability. So any company that wants to get some of this federal money is gonna have to guarantee something like 99% uptime for the chargers. So it, it will get better in the coming years. And especially as there are more people driving, EVs, more people utilizing the chargers. So, so, so there're actually generating revenue. And one of the problems up until now is there, there were more chargers than EVs or, you know, relative to the number of EVs that were, we had an oversupply of chargers and they, they didn't get enough utilization and they weren't generating enough revenue to pay for the repair upkeep of those chargers.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:55:33):
So hopefully that

Leo Laporte (00:55:34):
Be Sam, you to man. Thank you so much. Really appreciate pleasure, Leo, have a wonderful week. Enjoy. Yeah, a beautiful Michigan summer.

Sam Abuelsamid (00:55:43):
I will talk to you next week.

Leo Laporte (00:55:45):
All right. Thank you, sir. All right, why? Hey, Hey, how are you today? Leo Laporte here, the tech guy, time to talk computers, the internet, home theater, digital photography, smart phones, smart watches. You know, that kind of thing. Technology eighty eight eighty eight, ask Leo the phone number (888) 827-5536. Toll free from anywhere in the us or Canada outside that area. You can still call us eighty eight eighty eight, ask Leo. We had a caller last call of the hour. Very worried about wireless interference with her biological self. I'm not gonna mock that. I don't think it's a problem. I don't think there's any evidence that it is. I know there's no evidence that it is although oddly the world health organization at one point a couple of years ago said, even though there is no evidence that interf, you know, radio frequency from a phone will harm you in any way.

Leo Laporte (00:56:44):
Even though there is no evidence it's not. It's what not what they call ionizing radiation, the kind of radiation that would be harmful to human cells. Even though there is no evidence, prudence would dictate you don't carry the phone and your person and you don't hold it to your head and all that stuff. I thought that was kind of a strange recommendation here. We are a couple of years later, still, no evidence, lots of evidence to the contrary. We've had cell phones. Now we've been holding them to our ear for 20, maybe 30 years, no increase in brain cancers or anything like that. So I don't think there's a lot and certainly 5g is no worse or better still non-ionizing. There are a lot of conspiracy theories about 5g, but there's no reason to fear it. She did want headphones that didn't have a wire in them.

Leo Laporte (00:57:39):
So she could listen to the phone without now. And I did point out that and you know, studies maybe are a little mixed on this, but wired headphones are not better than wireless headphones. They are not because you're effectively attaching a, a wire to a device that is radiating, you know, radio emissions, and then putting the wire other end of the wire in your ear. So it's actually radio frequencies going right at that wire into your ear. So she said, well, what about wireless? And there are, in fact we use 'em and we've used 'em for years in television tubes, acoustic audio tube headphones. In fact, I put a link in the show notes to O which is the brand we use here O T T O they have a 3.5 millimeter Jack on one end. And and then kind of halfway up the end.

Leo Laporte (00:58:27):
They have a little basically loud speaker it's tiny, but it takes the electrical impulses and turns 'em into sound, which then travel up a hollow tube into your ear. So it's like, you got a little, the speakers down there instead of, you know, on the headphone, which means there's no wire going into it. And I guess if, if you know, you were to accept the premise faulty, though, it may be that the radio interference is bad for you. And I know a lot of people they'll just say, well, Leo's a show for the industry and clearly it's bad for you. How could it not be bad for you? You know, modern life is probably bad for us, but it's modern life and we're moderns. So there's no evidence is bad for you. Anyway, you could do this. There is this drawback to doing this, though.

Leo Laporte (00:59:12):
These are listen only. They don't have a microphone in them. Maybe I could find one that does, there's no reason you couldn't put a microphone where that speaker is still have a hollow tube to your ear, but the microphone would be down there. They just don't. I don't think they make 'em because maybe they do. But I haven't found one because you know, generally these are used in television where you have a microphone on your <laugh> on your lapel or whatever. Somebody probably makes hollow tube with a microphone maybe for a police, right?

Leo Laporte (00:59:47):
Here's a, the decibels custom molded security radio surveillance, earpiece set, same thing, hollow tubes, Thermo fit, designed for clear acoustic tube radios. Oh, these are just the earpiece. Eh, anyway, we'll keep looking. See, I aimed please. I'm not, I, you know, if, if you're worried about that, that's fine. I don't, I don't want you to expose something yourself to something you think is a health hazard. I just am pointing out that there's no evidence that it is, but if you think there is fine, protect yourself, that's fine. I carry my phone right here, my, my chest pocket. And I put it up to my head <laugh> and I listen to it and all that. And I have little earbuds, that little radios they're transmitting. You really want to get scared. Some of the earbuds that you know, that you put in your ear, like the Google earbuds they connect there's one earbud that connects to the phone.

Leo Laporte (01:00:43):
The other earbud connects to the, the first earbud. How does it do that through your brain? There's no wire, but it, through your brain, it transmits through your head. So your left ear is pairing to the phone. Your right ear is not pairing to the phone. It's pairing to the left ear. I think the shortest point between the left ear and the right ear is your brain. No, I'm scaring you Mar Marty is on the line from Kala Hawaii, Kala on the Haah. Hello, Marty where's, which, which island is KP, which island is Klipp on.

Caller 4 (01:01:19):
It's on the big island,

Leo Laporte (01:01:20):
The big island. I'm so jealous. Beautiful, beautiful. Which side?

Caller 4 (01:01:26):
The south side of the big island is

Leo Laporte (01:01:29):
That the

Caller 4 (01:01:33):
Wet, the the poor side, whatever you wanna call it,

Leo Laporte (01:01:37):
The poor side, wet side, best side. How about we call it the best side?

Caller 4 (01:01:42):
It is the best side.

Leo Laporte (01:01:43):
Let those rich people stay in the dry side. I'm going to the best side.

Caller 4 (01:01:47):
There you go. So I'm sitting here with the phone next to my head. I hope I'll be okay.

Leo Laporte (01:01:54):
<Laugh> you know, if you, if you're gonna go, at least you're gonna go in paradise.

Caller 4 (01:02:00):
Well, hopefully, so here's my question. The many as you know, many websites, you go to have these little messages somewhere about cookies. Yeah. And this particular one says this site uses cookies. So now, you know, and

Leo Laporte (01:02:21):
That's, that's, my site says that. Yeah, <laugh>

Caller 4 (01:02:24):
So

Leo Laporte (01:02:26):
That's me being passive aggressive, by the way, <laugh>

Caller 4 (01:02:30):
Casting no aspersions on you. How do I know that when I see these warnings that they aren't put in the in the browser window by a bad guy. And when you click on accept or,

Leo Laporte (01:02:47):
Well, any button you click, if there's a bad guy, there, anything you do could be bad. Those, you know, that's a good point. Sites are required by the E it's not even by, it's not American regulation. It's a European regulation. The predates, the GDPR, the, the general data protection regulation from Europe for privacy. It, it, in my opinion, the reason I'm passive aggressive about it is it's nonsense. It's nonsense. And the regulators who pass that law in the EU and enforce it are, are just wasting our time. Every time we go to a website, there's another cookie banner, but you have to do it. The fines are huge. The cookies, what cookies are, same thing. You know, when you're using a, a program and you save the settings, you have to save settings. When you're using software. Otherwise, every time you went to Facebook, you'd have to log in.

Leo Laporte (01:03:46):
Otherwise, every time you went to your Gmail, you'd have to log in and tell it what folder you're in and all that stuff. Cookies are your settings. They're saved on your hard drive. They are not inherently bad for you when they were designed. And they were designed by Mozilla. When they first came out with Netscape, they were designed with privacy in mind, believe it or not, the cookies are designed in such a way that only the site that set the cookie can read it. So I've go to Starbucks and save my favorite frappuccino, half calf decaff with a twist. Starbucks remembers that. But when I go over to Duncan, they can't see that Starbucks cookie, cuz it's not theirs. It's Starbucks. So that protects your privacy. But you know, these these sites, they love to spy on you. And they, you know, because advertisers want this information.

Leo Laporte (01:04:38):
So sites figured out a way around it with something called third party cookies. If I go and you've seen this, if you go to a site that has the Facebook like button, you know, thumbs up, why do you think Facebook did that? They did that because now Facebook is on that page and can set a cookie. Facebook now knows you went to Starbucks. And by the way, if you then go to Duncan and there's a Facebook like button, they know you went to Duncan, they can read their own cookies. They still can't read the Starbucks or the Duncan cookies, but they still know you went to those sites. They can track you around the web.

Caller 4 (01:05:13):
Now Facebook knows everything.

Leo Laporte (01:05:14):
And, and of course it was Facebook that invented this, but now everywhere you go, there are sign-on cookies from a Google, Facebook, Microsoft, apple, and all of that, because it's just a little bit of code from those websites embedded on the Starbucks site, all of the, and I shouldn't blame Starbucks, cuz you know, anywhere you see these, all of those are there to track you so everywhere. There's a like button. Facebook knows I've you've visited that site. So those are called third party cookies. And those are a, obviously they're a privacy problem. All modern browsers have a switch block, third party cookies. Unfortunately the EU decided because of this, all cookies are bad. They're not they're necessary. And most sites, for instance, my personal website, I use a cookie for one thing only you could set it to light motor dark mode. And I, as a convenience to you, the visitor would like to remember that.

Leo Laporte (01:06:08):
So next time you visit, it could be in light, motor, dark mode. Am I invading your privacy by doing that? No, I'm helping. I'm helping. And I don't have a Facebook button on there or anything else, but I still have to put a banner that says, yeah, I use a cookie. So what I meant on that side, the banner says, I use a cookie for your light and dark settings. And, and then there's a little loophole cuz you don't have to do anything about it. Just say, okay, I have to let you know I'm using cookies. It is the biggest single waste of time in the world. Billions of clicks a day for no good reason. It does nothing. It saves you nothing. <Laugh> it's just annoyance. And so I'm a little passive aggressive on our website. Yeah. Like most other sites, very few sites don't use cookies.

Leo Laporte (01:06:54):
We use cookies. I almost, I, I used to for a while I said get over it. But then I decided not to be so mean. You don't have to worry. There's not, that's not malware clicking a button. Look, clicking a button is, is, you know, potentially risky anywhere, but it's not gonna do anything. What you wanna watch out for is if there were a banner that says, yeah, we use cookies, give me your name, address, phone number and credit card number. And I'll make sure you don't see this again. That would be a problem cuz yeah, you don't know where that came from and the way the web is designed, it's possible to embed third party stuff, you know, on the web and that's bad guys take advantage of that. But I do not fear. You are safe. You're certainly safe on my site. <Laugh> it's a good question though. Why do we see these everywhere about your site? I know other sites. I

Caller 4 (01:07:42):
I'm worried that that some nefarious site we use the same message, but the when you click on, okay, it will do something worse.

Leo Laporte (01:07:53):
Yeah. Nothing. They can't really do anything with okay. That they couldn't do without. Okay. In other words, that, okay, button is connected to some programming code called JavaScript. That Java script can run, whether you press okay or not. So if a site's hacked, it's hacked, you know, they don't need a button. You're not giving 'em permission to do anything. It's it's fine. If it's hacked, it's hacked. Doesn't matter if there's a button, they can do whatever they want. So do not worry. Click the button. If you want some sites better than me have a whole lot. They've spent on a lot of money on code where you can say what kind of cookies we can use and all that. I'm not required to do it. So I don't, I think that's ridiculous. It's absurd, but it's a great, I'm really glad you asked. Now you can put the phone down.

Leo Laporte (01:08:39):
You don't have to keep it next to your head, but I'm glad you asked Marty. But no, nothing, nothing more harmful. Click clicking the button than if you didn't click the button. That is not a risky thing to do. Clicking a link, going to another page, risky downloading something risky, filling out a form that says it's your bank, but it's not with your password risky, but clicking a buttons on this. Leo LaPorte, the tech guy more calls right after this, 88 88, ask Leo, I put this, I know that because I put this song in a 4th of July playlist that I made some years ago for a party. I used to be the guy, you know, cuz I knew how I knew how iTunes worked to make the playlist. I put this in and somebody said, you know, the line is American woman get away from me.

Leo Laporte (01:09:23):
It's probably not the most patriotic song ever. Okay, fine. I like it still. It's good song. 88, 88 ask Cleo. We are playing 4th of July music. I hope you have it in good 4th of July weekend, our little town which can always barely afford the fireworks every year in Petaluma, California. There's a notice in the newspaper. Well, we don't think we have enough money to do the fireworks. They're only gonna be two, two minutes this year or, and then somebody comes along and says, I'll give you some money and they do it last minute. This year that we're gonna have fireworks. That said, well because of the drought and the fire hazard and cuz we're broke. No fireworks. Everybody went Aw. And then they announced we're gonna have a laser light show instead. Oh, okay. And we're gonna project it against the mountain. So everybody you can see Sonoma mountain from here will see the light show.

Leo Laporte (01:10:17):
So I don't know what that's gonna be like. Have you seen the drone shows? Those are wild though. I, they, maybe they cost more. They probably do cost more than fireworks, but boy, those are great. What they can do with those drones. They have fleets of hundreds of drones that, that are coordinated to fly together and make American flags that wave and all sorts of things. If you go to YouTube and look for drone shows, you'll, you'll see some of these unbelievable. And I would bet that. I dunno, we love our fireworks don't we? But I think a lot of, for fire reasons and others, a lot of communities are doing drone shows tomorrow, you know, doing American Eagle, a waving flag, that kind of thing.

Leo Laporte (01:11:08):
Eighty eight, eighty eight, ask Cleo the phone number, our website tech guy labs.com. I put that there it's changed a little bit. If you used it in the past, the server the site we were we had, the old site was running on a content management system. That's the software on the site that was getting old and was gonna be insecure next year. And when we went to the company that serves it for us and said, well, how much to update it to the new version of Droople that's the content management system we use. They said, it'll be a quarter of million dollars please. And I said <laugh> so we decided not to do that. We actually have two sites. My podcast network has a site, twit.tv, also running DLE. We're gonna have to pay quarter million dollars to fix that site. I didn't want to pay half a million for two sites.

Leo Laporte (01:11:55):
So we merged the two. So tech I labs.com has now moved over. You still go to the same place through the magic of the internet type Tech Guy labs.com. It'll take you to twit.tv. It'll take you to the Tech Guy shows. You'll see all the shows there. We put audio and video from the shows up after the fact, we have a podcast too. You can subscribe to the podcast there, but we'll also put it's doesn't have as much of the stuff that we had in the old shot site, but it does have, I think what you need, which is links. In fact, we're gonna put some links to tube headphones. You can use on your phone that do have a microphone auto and some other companies offer those. So we'll put links up there. We put a transcript after the fact computer does it.

Leo Laporte (01:12:34):
We go through it, make sure it's accurate. Put that up there. And also links to the music will be up there. It's episode 1908 and it'll all be free and open and easy to use. Tech guy labs.com, Leo LaPorte Tech Guy, Leo LaPorte Tech Guy. You see the problem here, musical director, Laura, you start that song. I want hear the whole thing. I want to hear the whole thing. And then you gotta, then you gotta Google it on Wikipedia and you gotta get what every verse means. And it's an afternoon shot. So maybe we should just stop right now, Marty on the line. Oh, that was Marty. Now that was Marty. And in K oh lucky guy. Now it's our friend Kel the deaf blind Potter on the line. Hello, Kel

Caller 5 (01:13:21):
Man. How you doing?

Leo Laporte (01:13:22):
I'm doing great. How are you?

Caller 5 (01:13:24):
Good. The best day of my life. Yesterday's not here. Tomorrow's not here. We're right here today. Right?

Leo Laporte (01:13:30):
You are such an inspiration. I love you. Kelvin. Always love hearing from you. Welcome.

Caller 5 (01:13:35):
Thank you. So I have a question and it's gonna be a little bit different than most of my calls. Cause I'm always dealing with live issues or video things

Leo Laporte (01:13:44):
You stream. We should say for people don't know, you stream live on Twitch while you're making pottery. People can watch you do it. It's and you've got a big old setup that we've talked about before. Really cool stuff.

Caller 5 (01:13:55):
Yes. All, all of it. Def blind potter.com

Leo Laporte (01:13:59):
Def blind potter.com.

Caller 5 (01:14:02):
So I wanted to ask you a question. And I don't know if you'll know this answer because it's an accessibility question, but I it's one that I, I can't find it online right now. So with windows 11, cause I'm currently using a windows 10 surface book two and I keep getting the popup for windows 11, but with the screen reader, readers are the screen readers like M VDA and jaws able to handle windows 11 right now.

Leo Laporte (01:14:32):
Well, that's a really good question. I believe they, I believe they are the good news about windows 11 is it's really just windows 10 with a nice new paint job. So it isn't hard for them to get, I mean, I, they have to adjust for the new user interface, for instance, the start menus in the middle and stuff like that. I'm looking at freedom scientific site. They do jaws, which is you know, I used to tell, tell people, oh, you know, you should go with something else like Orca because jaws is so expensive, but they've really reduced the price on this considerably. And do you use jaws? What do you use Kelvin?

Caller 5 (01:15:15):
No, I use MBDA

Leo Laporte (01:15:17):
That's open source. Yeah.

Caller 5 (01:15:19):
Yeah. Yeah. And since I can write my own software in my own code, it makes it a lot easier for me. So

Leo Laporte (01:15:24):
Yeah. And obviously you're a little bit more skillful than a lot of people. That's pretty impressive. NV access.org for N VDA. Let me see what they say about windows 11. You're right. To be, you know, nervous. In fact, I think that's a good reason not to accept Microsoft's blandishments and go and stay with 10 and say, yeah, fine. You know, you've got till 20, 25, 10 is not out of date that they're gonna continue to update it. It's still really in many ways the current version of windows. So there's no, no urgency jaws, freedom scientific says jaws works fine with 11. I don't, I'm looking on the NV access site and I don't see any specific, but because it's open source, I'd be shocked if it's, if it doesn't. I mean, that's something people would work on right away. Wouldn't they?

Caller 5 (01:16:17):
Yes and no, there there's there's hiccups in the N VDA, like backend on certain issues. Like if I'm using Excel, like there's certain just nuances that that are not there, but they work. Then the other one that I also use in narrator, which is the windows

Leo Laporte (01:16:34):
Yeah. That comes with and that's in 11 that's. Yeah. That's there still, I haven't heard of any changes in narrator between 10 and 11. This is what N VDA says on their GitHub site, cuz they're open source, although N V D a can run on any windows version, starting from windows seven, service pack, one building N VDA from sources currently limited only to windows 10 and above. So it sounds to me like they don't have a problem at all with windows 11.

Caller 5 (01:17:02):
Nice. All right. I'm getting ready to launch a new new product called the CME cane. So I was like, should I start learning how to use windows 11 in this, launching this product?

Leo Laporte (01:17:14):
That's a, that's another challenge. You know, everybody who does software has to deal with this, you know, how important, how important is it to support windows 11 Microsoft? The last time I checked windows 11 adoption has been pretty strong. I mean, it's, there's still more windows, 10 users. I think there's still more windows XP users, to be honest with you. But because Microsoft is being pretty aggressive about it. In at least in the first six months, it was very strong adoption. Apparently that is kind of slowed down this year, about 16% at the beginning of the year of windows users were using the latest windows 11. So it's, you know, it's not, I think it's gone up down to about 20%, so it's not completely dominant. Windows, windows 10 is 20. Believe it or not get this windows 10.

Leo Laporte (01:18:09):
They, 21 H two is 28%. The 21 H one is 26%. So together that's about half the envi, the, the world, but so 11 is still you know, a quarter of fraction of the total usership. So there's not a lot of urgency yet. And especially if you're appealing to blind users, which the CME cane is, of course for blind users, they're probably doing, having the same questions you are, should we, should we change to 11? And I think the prudent thing, the smart thing for anybody using a specialized software is to not move until you're absolutely sure that, you know, it's worth doing.

Caller 5 (01:18:46):
Yeah, I agree. Yeah. I, I wanted to put it out into the, into the, into the radio and kind of see what did we get? I know there's one guy that calls in who's an expert, Julian

Leo Laporte (01:18:58):
Vargas.

Caller 5 (01:18:59):
Yeah. Julian. Yeah. And so I'm good, but I, I, I don't keep up on 

Leo Laporte (01:19:04):
All the bad Melvin. You're more than good. <Laugh>, you're amazing. I am. I, I mean, you're doing better than, than people who have sight and can hear and all that. You're doing great. Deaf, blind potter.com. Sales is pottery there. If you wanna know more about the seame cane, you can learn more about it there. So you're gonna start making those, huh?

Caller 5 (01:19:24):
Yeah. So we're getting ready to do cross the border over to Mexico to start the manufacturing process. And then we just got a deal for testing and Louisville. I can't really give too much information on that, but yeah, we're getting ready to light up the world, light up the blind and allow 'em to be light to the, to provide them safety. So I'm the first ever to create a fully lit up lighter blind cane.

Leo Laporte (01:19:50):
The idea being that, you know, of course all pedestrians are at risk. These days is terrifying going out there. But imagine if you couldn't see you're using a cane the sea me cane lights up and and alerts drivers, at least if they're paying attention alerts drivers that you're out there and to be careful.

Caller 5 (01:20:10):
Yeah. Good. And it looks like a lifesaver. So you might as well be. It's

Leo Laporte (01:20:14):
Pretty cool too, right? Firework

Caller 5 (01:20:15):
Skills.

Leo Laporte (01:20:15):
Yeah. I think a lot of kids would go, I, I gotta have one of them. <Laugh> I gotta have one of them.

Caller 5 (01:20:20):
Yeah.

Leo Laporte (01:20:21):
Yeah. That's awesome.

Caller 5 (01:20:22):
The beauty of it, you can see it from a hundred yards away and we're basically giving power to the 253 million line individuals in the world. And it estimated 87, 80 7 million of us get hit by a car. So what 

Leo Laporte (01:20:37):
87 million.

Caller 5 (01:20:39):
Yeah. So if you take the research, that is one of every three visual impaired people. And so you take one of, take one of those and then out of the three, you would get the 87,000,001

Leo Laporte (01:20:50):
In three has been hit by a car.

Caller 5 (01:20:53):
Yep.

Leo Laporte (01:20:53):
That's horrific.

Caller 5 (01:20:57):
So, oh,

Leo Laporte (01:20:58):
I'm so sorry. That is just awful. Just awful. You know, we still are building, you know, I would love to bicycle to work, but it's just too dangerous. We're still building, you know, areas, residential areas with no sidewalks, no bike paths. The car is taken over the country. Cities, you know, are building huge swaths of taking over huge swaths of area. Just for parking lots. We gotta do something about this. This is crazy. I, I had no idea. One in three. I had no idea. That's terrible. Well, good luck on the, see me cane. That's so important. What you're doing deaf blind potter.com. You can buy his pottery there and you can see his streams. You can watch him work. That's pretty incredible. Calvin, always a pleasure hearing from you.

Caller 5 (01:21:49):
All right. Thank you, Leo. Yeah, you guys have a good

Leo Laporte (01:21:52):
One eighty eight eighty eight. Ask Leo the phone number website tech ilab.com. We'll put a link to a deaf line Potter there. If you don't, you don't have to write it down. You can just go there at the end of the day. Tech guy labs.com more calls right after this. Now going on a cruise next week, I'll be here in the weekend after I will not, Micah will be hosting on Saturday. I will be gone on Saturday and Sunday. And then again, the following Saturday and back on the Sunday in three weeks, our TWiT crew

Leo Laporte (01:22:25):
Yeah, long dog. I, yeah, if I, you knows really, I'm not sure what the internet situation's gonna be like. What I will probably do. I mean, I I'll check in, in in the discord and the IRC sometimes I'll do that. If I can get online, what I'll probably do or almost certainly do is record some stuff with me and Paul, like little videos or whatever. I think I'm gonna bring the drones. So maybe we'll get some drone selfies and stuff. And we'll, we'll post those Leo LaPorte tech guy, 88, 88, ask Leo hope you're having a great 4th of July weekend. Glad we could be together. Allen on the line from seal beach, California. Hi Alan.

Caller 6 (01:23:04):
Hey Leo. Welcome. I have a question about Android phones or tablets. Okay. Have gone beyond their life, as far as the security patches, they need to be thrown away or do they still have some use?

Leo Laporte (01:23:18):
Ah, that's a really good question. It's, you know, it's kind of analogous to the question about people with older versions of windows, older, max old, you know Chromebooks. What do you do after the security patches stop? In theory, they are vulnerable, not instantly, but if somebody comes up with a hack and probably, you know, at some point that will happen, they won't get fixed. But the good news is in many cases, those older devices aren't really targets. Hackers would much prefer to hack something more recent where there's some real financial worth. Android's a little different because Android is always under attack and Android, frankly is not very secure. If you're B, when you buy a new phone, you should absolutely buy a phone where the man and not all of 'em are like this, where the manufacturer is guaranteeing you at least three years of updates. So you know that phone's gonna be good for three years, but then you have the really reasonable question. Well, what do we do after the three years?

Leo Laporte (01:24:20):
It's it's, you know, <laugh>, I, I guess here's how you could make it more safe. You should get rid of any apps that aren't mainstream apps, you know, stick with apps from big companies like Google, Microsoft, and the like you know, HBO would be fine. Netflix would be fine. Be very careful where you get your apps only get apps from the Google play store. That's no guarantee we've seen malware in the Google play store. So you're gonna wanna keep your eye out. That's the number one way you get infected on Androids. So if you have a set of apps that you use and you know, they're good and they're fine, you're probably okay. You know, and updates will probably be okay, but again, it's risky because let's say the app was good, but it was made by some oddball company who then sold to another company.

Leo Laporte (01:25:07):
This does happen. That happens to be malicious. And you get an update suddenly that app, which was safe is no longer safe. That's problem. Number one, problem. Number two is clicks, clicking on websites, clicking on messages, clicking on Facebook or WhatsApp or Android messages with links that can always be risky. We know on mobile devices that there are multiple attacks that can happen in a message with a link. So, you know, again, only, you know, be very careful about clicking links and messages. You just have to be more cautious. I guess there is always the risk of something called a zero click attack. This was a big problem with iPhones, but it was only a problem. If you are a dissident, a journalist, somebody that a nation would want to attack, because they're way too expensive to use just to make a few bucks in Bitcoin or whatever. So I think honestly, in, in the real world, you're probably all right. Just, you have to be much more cautious than you were

Caller 6 (01:26:12):
Okay. If you don't use the, if you stop using it or you never used it for banking or anything serious, and you do get attacked, what

Leo Laporte (01:26:21):
Do you, what do yeah, yeah, exactly. Well, there are some, you know, you're right. I mean, what are they gonna get? Well, there are a couple of things they can do sometimes they'll, they'll put malware on there that watches all your key strokes, hoping that you're gonna enter a password to your bank or something. You've, you've eliminated that possibility cuz you're not using it for anything important. Then they might put, it's not, this is a common attack these days a cryptocurrency minor on your phone. That's not gonna hurt you. It's just gonna slow your phone down. And it's probably not, you know, even gonna work very well. So, and these days, because cryptocurrencies values dropped so much <laugh> that may be less of a problem than it was in order to make money doing that. You'd have to put it on hundreds of thousands of phones.

Leo Laporte (01:27:07):
You're only gonna make a penny once in a while. What else could they do? So that's pretty much it. I mean, your, your biggest threat is privacy invasion, security for bank accounts, things like that. And crypto miners. Other than that, I think you're fine. You know, now that I think about it, go ahead, keep using it. Listen to music. That's fine. I'd be a little careful about surfing the net because it is possible to, let's say here's the scenario you wanna watch out for? Your Android phone is now out of regular updates. Somebody finds a way to hack an Android phone through a website. Not at all uncommon. You go to that website, the website sees your phone, attempts, the attack, the attack exceeds. Now the guy's got something on your phone could be a Trojan horse. That's watching your keystrokes could turn on the camera. The microphone you'd know that though. There'd be a light that would come on. That kind of thing. It's you know, I think for most of us, you know, those of us are not working for three letter agencies in Virginia. It's probably not a real problem.

Caller 6 (01:28:11):
Okay. All right. Hope that you all right.

Leo Laporte (01:28:13):
Get a phone, get a new phone when you can.

Caller 6 (01:28:17):
Okay.

Leo Laporte (01:28:18):
That's that's would be my advice. And if you're doing that, then get it from a company like Samsung. Google's probably the best. LG just announced. It's interesting. They stopped making LG Android phones, but they did say which and kudos to them. They're gonna support those for three more years. That's great. Very few Android phones have updates for more than three years. It's not the update to the next version of Android. You care about, by the way, I don't care about Android 13, 14, 15, whatever that doesn't matter. It's the monthly security patches you want to get. And that those are the ones that are gonna stop when your phone goes outta date. If you have an Android phone now, right now, you can look at the about, in the about phone. What is your current security patch status? Let me look. I have a Samsung galaxy S 22 here. Oh, I have a software update. So that's good. I'm gonna run that, but I bet you, I don't have my, probably my latest update at this point is, is may and here we are in July. You, by the time you get about 10 days into a month, Google has pushed out an update. The real test of these companies is how long after Google puts out the update. Will it take for them to get that update on your phone?

Leo Laporte (01:29:32):
Let me see this. Oh goodness. Yep. The Google play system update May 1st on this S 22. But as I said, I have an update which will probably get me into June. At least. I'm gonna guess it's gonna be June 88, 88. Ask Leo. Good question. You know, a lot of times we talk about security and it's very black and white, like, oh, you're not secure, but what does that really mean? Does it mean you shouldn't use that device? I think you probably in most cases continue to use it with caution. Jimmy's on the line from wittier, California. Hi, Jimmy Leo. Leport the tech guy.

Caller 5 (01:30:06):
Hey Leo. I got a question for you. I've got a, I picked up a Samsung 75 Cher from Costco over Memorial day. Nice

Leo Laporte (01:30:14):
On it. Very nice. But

Caller 5 (01:30:15):
I'm afraid I'm gonna, I'm afraid I'm gonna lose my, my geek card here. I tried to get the remote to work on my smartphone with the app and oh my gosh, I can't get it to work right. Every time I try to connect it, it connects it, but it asks my TV. Do you allow this to work? What's the point of having the remote on my smartphone? If I lose the remote, if I can't tell the TV to allow the smartphone to

Leo Laporte (01:30:42):
Work <laugh> oh, so you've, you've already lost the remote on the new TV.

Caller 5 (01:30:46):
Well, I, I got five kids, so of course

Leo Laporte (01:30:48):
<Laugh> the, remote's under the couch somewhere. And so you're trying to, and rightly so, you're trying to use it. So the TV, normally what would happen in a lot of cases? A lot of TVs. What would happen is you would get on the remote on your phone. Okay. The number is six one twenty five. And you'd say 6, 1 25 on your screen, on your TV. And you'd say, yeah, that's match or TV screen is showing a number and then you enter it on the phone, but it's not doing that. It's something else. It wants you to do it with it remote.

Caller 5 (01:31:14):
Yeah. It doesn't seem to be storing. Like, I don't know the IP address of my phone. Like it's on the same wifi network, all of that stuff. But every time I, it quote, connects my phone to the TV. It asks, do you allow, I've even gone in?

Leo Laporte (01:31:30):
And there's no point at that point where the TV says allow,

Caller 5 (01:31:35):
Well, the TV asks allow, but it doesn't like save a profile or,

Leo Laporte (01:31:40):
Oh, you does it every single time is what you're saying. Correct. Ah, so you can use it. You just have to allow each and every time.

Caller 5 (01:31:47):
Yeah. But, but then that means if I lost my remote, I can't train

Leo Laporte (01:31:51):
You <laugh> oh, oh, you still have your remote. You're just worried about future reasonably. So with five kids,

Caller 5 (01:31:57):
I've I've, it's now happened twice where

Leo Laporte (01:32:02):
I don't I'm running time. You hear the sound, I'm gonna take a break, but let me look and see if I can find out what the answer is from Samsung, Leo. Yeah. It's not. It's like, that's like, it's not saving the cookie that says yeah. Allow it make any sense. Allow it. It shouldn't have to keep asking. It does seem weird that it doesn't

Caller 5 (01:32:29):
Well, and I, and I went on the apple iOS store to, I mean, to, and there's seems like two, three, four dozen different smartphone, universal remote apps and

Leo Laporte (01:32:41):
Oh, well use the Samsung one. The smart things app. Oh yeah. That could be one issue if you're not using the official Samsung.

Caller 5 (01:32:49):
Well, the smart things app sounds more like a home automation thing. There's not, I couldn't even find the official Samsung TV remote.

Leo Laporte (01:32:58):
No. Yeah. That Samsung watch use everything. Everything. Samsung is a smart thing. <Laugh> so you have to add your TV to smart things as a device, then you can open the smart things app on your phone and under the devices, you'll see your TV. This will, by the way, this will fix this whole thing. Then you will get a remote on the screen in the smart things app. That is your TV remote.

Caller 5 (01:33:25):
Oh, so it is that I was like, I don't have, you know,

Leo Laporte (01:33:29):
I don't have it's smart. No it's yeah. This is Samsung. So they bought a company called smart things and they've decided to label everything smart things. But the, but the trick is

Caller 5 (01:33:40):
The manual. Doesn't say anything about that. <Laugh> 200 pages,

Leo Laporte (01:33:44):
Hey, at least you gotta manual. So the trick is you gotta, you gotta add your TV to the app as a device, kind of like your Amazon, you know, when you get the Alexa app and you say, add the Alexa. So I think you go into the app you tap the devices button and then you can add the device that some, some TVs will use Bluetooth. Sometimes they'll use ultrasonic sound that you can't hear. But, but what you'll wanna do is scan to see if it's and stand next to the TV and scan it. And at some point the TV will show up and you go, yes. That's you that's you let me see you're on an iPhone. You said?

Caller 5 (01:34:26):
Yeah. Okay.

Leo Laporte (01:34:27):
In fact, I'm gonna put a link to the Samsung instructions for adding the TV.

Caller 5 (01:34:32):
Oh, perfect.

Leo Laporte (01:34:33):
Into the show notes. And once you've added the TV, then you go into the smart things app and you should be able, you actually, they give you a kind of a nice little screen interface for remote access.

Caller 5 (01:34:49):
Oh, that would be cool. Yep. Cause the other thing on the TV, that's a huge frustration is it does have like a quasi internet browser on there. Right. If you're gonna know, I know stream something it's it's terrible. It's terrible. First problem.

Leo Laporte (01:35:01):
It's

Caller 5 (01:35:01):
Terrible. You try to make it nice. Oh, by making it easy to add a space a re a go like a return enter or a delete, but it forces you to have to move away from that. Every time you enter a keystroke.

Leo Laporte (01:35:19):
Oh God.

Caller 5 (01:35:20):
Does, does that make sense?

Leo Laporte (01:35:21):
Yes. It's <laugh> it's the worst.

Caller 5 (01:35:23):
I'm sure someone thought it was more convenient. Yeah. But it's the worst thing. If you're trying to actually enter a

Leo Laporte (01:35:28):
URL, I'll be honest with you. I have a Samsung TV. I never use the apps on it ever. Okay. I wish I could buy a TV that wasn't smart and, and just use a Roku or an apple TV or something to do that.

Caller 5 (01:35:43):
You know, we, we considered that and we have, you know, all the kids and all the different apps and

Leo Laporte (01:35:48):
It's so much easier. I know

Caller 5 (01:35:51):
They mine's on Hulu. Mine's on apple.

Leo Laporte (01:35:54):
I know

Caller 5 (01:35:55):
Mine's

Leo Laporte (01:35:55):
On. Well, if you get, but if you get a Roku or an apple TV then you have Hulu, then you have Amazon prime, then you have all of the channels on it. And so they just use that.

Caller 5 (01:36:06):
You use that

Leo Laporte (01:36:07):
It's a little more complicated now though, cuz you have to turn that on. But the Samsung apps are not, especially the browser, Samsung made a tea, it made a refrigerator with a browser in it and then, and then they didn't update the browser. So these poor people who have this refrigerator, which is perfectly good. It's only a few years old, but they have a big screen on it. They can't do anything with,

Caller 5 (01:36:31):
They can't do anything. Oh,

Leo Laporte (01:36:32):
That's funny. So silly. That's funny. So silly.

Caller 5 (01:36:35):
I don't know if you have a split second for another question. I do the, I got the Samsung from Costco, the sound bar. Nice. I forget what model, but it kind of pairs with it. It runs over E arc. It kind of like it. Perfect. Yeah. but I got the hanging Mount bars to hang it underneath the TV on the nice articulating Mount off the wall. Nice. it kind of, the sound feels, it just doesn't have that sharp definition. Is, is there some way to fix that? I tried the DTS and all the different,

Leo Laporte (01:37:11):
So it sounds a little like muddy.

Caller 5 (01:37:13):
Yes.

Leo Laporte (01:37:14):
Well, I'm not sure how much did you pay for the sound bar?

Caller 5 (01:37:19):
I wanna say I paid a hundred, 180 or something. It was Costco's

Leo Laporte (01:37:24):
Should sound better than that, but maybe, yeah, it shouldn't sound muddy. A cheap sound bar. Mostly you just won't have the base that you want and that kind of thing. It

Caller 5 (01:37:34):
Should be. It's got the sound bar and the, the sub woofer down on the floor. No, the two piece.

Leo Laporte (01:37:39):
Oh, huh. I don't know. Maybe it's just not functional. The good thing about, about those stores is you can usually say, Hey, this sounds like crap. Gimme another one.

Caller 5 (01:37:51):
Okay. Okay. I'll

Leo Laporte (01:37:52):
Try it. It shouldn't sound muddy. It, you, it might not sound, it might sound tinny <laugh> but it shouldn't sound muddy. <Laugh> you're using the ER. That's good. It could be that you want to check the settings on the TV to make sure you're sending the best output, not PCM, but Doby audio or whatever. Yeah.

Caller 5 (01:38:16):
Hmm. I mean I'm letting the TV manage all of it and I'm, you

Leo Laporte (01:38:18):
Know, I, yeah. But look at the audio menu and the TV and place play with it a little bit. You might be able to find it better setting. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Cause I mean you're setting it out the E arc, that's the best way to do it. So yeah.

Caller 5 (01:38:32):
Figure

Leo Laporte (01:38:32):
Good letting it. And it is a Samsung. Yeah. And it's a Samsung device, so it should yep. Should work perfectly. But there may well be settings with others that you can to improve it, get it improved. Is it just the dialogue that sounds muddy or is it all everything music sounds bad.

Caller 5 (01:38:46):
You know, I feel like it's it's and I, you know, I'm no expert on this, but you know, depending on what channels of audio, whoever made the, the source or the,

Leo Laporte (01:38:58):
The, well that may be yeah.

Caller 5 (01:39:00):
You know, may have mixed things weird.

Leo Laporte (01:39:02):
Yeah. That may be

Caller 5 (01:39:03):
The surround, you know, it's almost like someone tried to cheat it with phasing rather than two.

Leo Laporte (01:39:10):
Yeah. You know what? Make sure you make sure try different encodings on the TV. Okay. I bet you that's what'll that'll help it. Okay. You don't want just stereo out. You want Doby?

Caller 5 (01:39:21):
Yeah. I, I mean, I put it to the Doby DTS,

Leo Laporte (01:39:25):
Play, play with it, then try something else. Okay. Yeah. It shouldn't sound bad.

Caller 5 (01:39:28):
Could just be a bad source I was playing with.

Leo Laporte (01:39:30):
Could be, yeah.

Caller 5 (01:39:32):
Awesome. Hey,

Leo Laporte (01:39:33):
A pleasure talking to you, Jimmy. Thank you very much. What are you doing for the 4th of July with the kids? You going to the fireworks?

Caller 5 (01:39:39):
Oh, you know what? My neighborhood does this really cool thing. They do a little bit of a block party and our local fire department little fire station. They come out and at 10 o'clock the kids, they all decorate their bicycles and scooters.

Leo Laporte (01:39:51):
Oh, how

Caller 5 (01:39:52):
Fun? We just do this little tour around the neighborhood.

Leo Laporte (01:39:54):
Oh, how fun?

Caller 5 (01:39:56):
You know, and then, you know, some kid gets a prize. We're having the best decorated scooter and the best decorated dog and the best decorated stroller and you know, that kind of thing.

Leo Laporte (01:40:04):
That sounds fun. It's really fun. Sounds really fun. Yeah. Yeah. And we we will put an article on setting up EER with the Samsung TV. Thank you, Joe. He just put it in the chat room. We'll put that up in the show notes.

Caller 5 (01:40:17):
I will look, I will look for that. Thank you very much.

Leo Laporte (01:40:19):
Have a great time, Jimmy.

Caller 5 (01:40:21):
Okay. Appreciate it. Bye.

Leo Laporte (01:40:23):
Well, why? Hey, Hey. How are you today? Leo Laporte here. The tech guy, time to talk computers, the internet, home theater, digital tech smartphones, my watches <laugh> television sets, everything, anything with a chip in it. Eighty eight eighty eight. Ask Leo the phone number eighty eight eighty eight. Ask Leo, give me a ring. Let's talk high tech. You and me. I did run the Samsung galaxy S 22 ultra update through the break and low and behold Android security patch level June. That's pretty good. That's good. No, you know what? That's really good. I would've been nice to see July, but I don't think probably here we are only on the third day of July. I Google probably hasn't put that out yet. So June, June is good. That's as good as it can get. So that's but that's the advantage of getting the latest phone, right? I I think probably it, the sweet spot for new phones is probably every three years.

Leo Laporte (01:41:27):
You wanna keep it long enough so that, you know, you get the value of the purchase, but these things get beat up. They get banged up. They, they need updates. I think it's probably, and I think they're designed. It's interesting because in the us, at least when they subsidized phones, the phone companies would subsidize 'em for two years. You remember that you you'd buy, they stopped doing it, but you'd buy a phone for 50 bucks, but you'd have to sign up for a two year contract. So that kind of predisposed people to think, oh, I'm gonna get a new phone every two years. Cause it'll be paid off by then in other countries it's longer. I think Canada's three years. I think there are some countries in the EU. There are four years. So, you know, if you're still paying for the phone after year four, <laugh> you're not gonna buy a new phone.

Leo Laporte (01:42:19):
That's crazy. You wanna pay it off before you buy a new one. So I think that that sort of conditions you to how long you're gonna own it. Canada's two years. Okay. Well we're somebody told me it was three. Maybe not in Canada, maybe in another country, three or four years. And it doesn't matter anymore because phone companies no longer, you know, for the most part do that, they don't subsidize the phones anymore. You could spread the, it's not a subsidy it's you could spread payments out. You could pay on time, over time, but that's not the same thing. 88 88. Ask Leo Julian on the line. Oh, Julian. Hello, Julian.

Caller 6 (01:43:00):
Hello? Hello, Leo.

Leo Laporte (01:43:01):
Your ears were burning. We were talking about you last hour. Julian Vargas. I,

Caller 6 (01:43:06):
I, I heard and I fought the busys and I made it through <laugh>

Leo Laporte (01:43:09):
Fought through the busy signals. <Laugh> tech jv.com. Julian is a blind user who helps other blind users get the most out of their technology. And we are very grateful for all you do. Now you heard Kelvin's question and I think you found it have an answer.

Caller 6 (01:43:25):
My, my answer generally is if it ain't broke, don't fix it. If you are running windows 10, which is still very much being supported and you rely on that computer for important things, as he seems to, I don't see the hurry in going to windows 11. I mean, you know, unless there's something specific about that, that would enhance what he is doing. But I think in general, especially when you're relying on access software, that's not provided by Microsoft. You gotta give those developers time to bang on that version of windows a little bit and work out the kinks a little bit, unless, you know, if you got a spare computer laying around or you like to tinker, you know, some of us do <laugh>, I'm running iOS 16 and having some fun with it. Yeah.

Leo Laporte (01:44:10):
Well now that's not even out yet. You're using the developer beta, I think.

Caller 6 (01:44:14):
Yeah. So, you know, you're you know, you, you, you just, it depends on your willingness to tinker and by the way, thank you apple for listening to what a lot of blind people wanted and giving us the eloquence voice <laugh>

Leo Laporte (01:44:26):
Oh, what's the eloquence voice.

Caller 6 (01:44:28):
It's a voice that has been used for years on access software, such as jaws and others. And we've been wanting that for years. It's, it's a very robotic sounding voice. So the average person isn't gonna care for it, but it's nice because you can speed it up and it's still very understandable, ah, way. It's, it's just great. So I, I thank apple for that. Wanted to do that on the air. The other thing I wanted to say to the deaf blind Potter, there's, I'm intrigued by that cane that he's talking about.

Leo Laporte (01:44:56):
Oh yeah. The sea me cane. I would like

Caller 6 (01:44:57):
To talk, I'd like to talk to him about that a little bit, cuz I have some thoughts about canes and good in general. I'm I've tried all kinds of 'em and in general, I'm not a big fan of putting technology. You know, you'd say things with a chip in it. Sometimes I don't think that a cane needs a chip in it, but the idea of lighting the cane is intriguing, but it's just, it's gotta be made to withstand wear and tear. Sure. the, the cane that I use is pretty beat up and sometimes people ask me, you know, don't you bump into things all the time or how do you stay safe? And I say, look at this cane, see how this

Leo Laporte (01:45:29):
Looks, it bumps into things for me. <Laugh> yeah. It's were bumps

Caller 6 (01:45:33):
That I did not have to take

Leo Laporte (01:45:34):
<Laugh> I love it. You

Caller 6 (01:45:35):
Know what I love it has to be able to withstand the, the wear and tear. Yeah.

Leo Laporte (01:45:39):
They have all kinds of high tech canes. I know they vibrate and buzz and, and make sounds and so

Caller 6 (01:45:43):
Forth. Yeah. I tried 'em all and there's fun toys, but in general, at the end of the day, I, I don't know. I just think that the long white cane they also try to get fancy with the designs now putting all these colors in them. And I think that you gotta stick with what's universally recognized the long white cane, if you're a tall person and you walk fast, the tall, the longer, the better, because it gives you time to react to something that you come across. And it does also make you a lot visible, especially when crossing streets

Leo Laporte (01:46:12):
That, you know what, in, in a interesting way, the two things you said are linked. There are two kinds of people in the world are people who, early adopters like me, who just want to, and you, I guess, who always want to use the latest and greatest and see, and, and in order to do that you know, we put ourselves on the line, we get canes that are too high tech and break easily, or we get operating systems that aren't ready for prime time, but that's kind of the deal, right? Well, but I wanna try the latest and then the why smart people <laugh> learn. I think probably that simplicity is better. There's no rush stick with the tried and true. And sometimes, you know, getting too fancy can make for problems. So that's, I think they're related now, how I'm looking on my iPhone, where is the eloquence voice? Is it only in iOS 16 now

Caller 6 (01:47:02):
It's 16. It's a, it's under voiceover and under speech.

Leo Laporte (01:47:06):
And I'm, I see, I have Samantha in my voice over right now. That's the default,

Caller 6 (01:47:10):
That's the standard. That's always been the standard. And until now it was the best in terms of the things I look for, but I never really liked her sound. And it's, I'm happy to say that Samantha's out of my life. Finally,

Leo Laporte (01:47:23):
She's out of my life. She, geez, I'm gonna download the enhancement, but that's a good point is that you have a different need. So you're not looking for it to sound human at all. No, you're looking for, to work well with screen readers, to adjust to speeds without being less int intelligible, things like that,

Caller 6 (01:47:40):
Right? The, the human voices are great. If you're gonna run them slower. And what's nice is you can, you can customize things to, for example, if you're reading an ebook, you can have the other voice that sounds nicer and more human, like for that purpose. Right. But for everyday browsing, you know, when you're having to move through a lot of emails, as I do and, and, and read a lot of stuff on the web, like I do, you, you don't wanna, you know, you want to get, you wanna maximize. So just like cited people skim real fast and speed

Leo Laporte (01:48:09):
Read. That

Caller 6 (01:48:09):
Makes sense. We do the same with our ears and, and a voice like eloquence really makes that a lot easier.

Leo Laporte (01:48:14):
Hey, good, good to know. And this is why you tried iOS 16, cuz you've got advice people. So I will take a look at that when I, I get iOS 16, cuz I'm not in a rush, nice to talk to you. We're

Caller 6 (01:48:23):
Giving them a lot of feedback, which is the other important thing. Very

Leo Laporte (01:48:27):
Important

Caller 6 (01:48:27):
For blind people do the absolutely so far so far, they've fixed a few things I've reported so that that's nice thing.

Leo Laporte (01:48:33):
Tech jv.com is phone number. There is emails there and Kel, if you're listening, you might want to contact him. Of course Julian, you can also go to Kel site, Def blind potter.com. And I think he has an email. I'll do that address there. Good to talk to you as always. I appreciate all you do for all of us. W S P a C E FM. <Affirmative> I don't hear rod. I don't hear rod. Rod is speaking. Rod is speaking. Sorry. That was me. I had it on mute. Oh, bad me. Bad rod, bad, bad rod. Are you getting your haircut or are you grad going to a graduation? Oh, wait, I, I see the logo on the, on the shirt now. So I know. Oh yeah. I just thought you were wearing a, a, a gown of some coming a bib. Yeah.

Leo Laporte (01:49:25):
A nothing that fancy that's only when I eat. You sound so good on that. Sure. SM is that an SM seven? B? Is that what that is? Yeah. Sounds so good. Oh, good. Good. Yeah. Yeah. I agonized over it. And did you, when did you get it? Oh gosh, just before we started, so, oh, okay. And a half ago or something. Oh, okay. Yeah. You sound great. I got that. I got a little focus, right. And a cloud lifter and everything, but a cough button, you know, you need, you need the big bottom. <Laugh>. Is that a thing? That's a thing. Is that a, I think it's from DBX. Yeah. You push a button and all of a sudden you sound like this.

Leo Laporte (01:50:03):
Daddy's got a big bottom. Yeah. All the DJs. All the DJs use it. Oh, mama. Big bottom. I don't have a, I have no DJ. Mister. Yeah. Mister, I I'm great. I went to see my mom. It was so much fun. Go back east. Oh. So beautiful. Wore my mask at every place and I felt safe and I didn't get, you know, I tested every day before I went to see mom. So, oh, I am fine. And it's reassuring a dear friend. I have a dear friend that just went back to Pittsburgh for his daughter's wedding mashed up, you know, it's coming here. You know, he, he was wearing it in 95 on the plane. Didn't take it off. The whole thing got there. Infected about five people. They had to call the wedding off. Oh no. Yeah. He got them sick out his quarantine to come back.

Leo Laporte (01:50:48):
Yeah. How does he know? It was him and not some other guy. Well, he works for the county. He's been working the county's health bill for the last three years. So he's pretty well tuned into things. And he said I did tracing and it was me. Oh my God. Oh my God. Is that a nightmare? Oh, see, that's not a good thing to know. Cuz normally you have plausible D deniability. You could see right. It wasn't me. I got it from the groom or whatever. No, I I'm an expert. I get to decide from me. That's kind of heartbreaking. So he didn't get it on the plane. Did he bring it? Was he, did he have it already? He doesn't know. He doesn't know. He thinks he might have gotten it on the plane. Cause not many people were masked except him, but I, well I think if you have, I was hoping, see I was taking the moral of this lesson cuz I was, you know, one of a handful of mask people.

Leo Laporte (01:51:35):
Yeah. And my daughter, the moral of my lesson was we wear a good N 95 mask all the time. It doesn't matter if other people aren't masking, but maybe that's not the case. Cause I, you know, I don't wanna get, I we're doing a cruise in two weeks. Yeah. And don't eat and drink. Oh God. Is it two week? I guess it is. Yeah. It's two weeks. Wow. Okay. I'll come back to you, my friend. All right. Stay there a little John Phillips Suza on this 4th of July weekend. Leo Laporte the tech guy, 88 88. Ask Leo. We used to, when I was a kid every summer we would drive up to Cooperstown, New York and I mean really old school. Beautiful. Well, it was also a long time ago. Beautiful town. They have a a beautiful park in the center of town. Yes. The baseball hall of fame.

Leo Laporte (01:52:22):
Is there beautiful park in the center of town with a big gazebo? Well, it was, it wasn't, it wasn't just a gaze. It was a band stage and they'd have the band come and they'd play John Phillips Suza, marching music, waved the flags set up that great fireworks over the lake lake O Seago was such a good time. That's my memory of, of a, kind of a classic old school. 4Th of July. Now we have drones and laser shows. What can I say? And probably the band shell has gone to 88, 88 ask Leo. It's not the best music. John Phillips, Susan music. I understand the young people probably go, eh, do you have any lot of Del Ray? I maybe some Billy Eilish. I don't know something cool. Something hip, but it, it certainly feels, you know, when you play that, it feels patriotic. Laura. You're a young person. When you hear that. I love I wasn't band. You love it. Oh, you wearing band? Oh, you're band nerd. Now I understand. What did you play in the band? Saxophone Alto. Saxophone. You can't March with a saxophone. I wasn't in marching band. Oh, you were in a sit down band. I get it. Okay. I do like it. Da, da. All right. Let's <laugh>. Let's go on with a show. G Scott, my good friend. An audio file from Finland, Michigan. Hello? G Scott.

Rod Pyle (01:53:44):
Yeah. Hey Lee, how you doing?

Leo Laporte (01:53:47):
I'm great. You're you're in you're in Minnesota for the summer. I bet it's beautiful

Rod Pyle (01:53:53):
Up here working. Yep. Beautiful. And yeah, it's pretty wet. So the mosquitoes sure. Busted loose, but yeah, we're doing okay.

Leo Laporte (01:54:00):
Yeah. How big are those? Are those mosquitoes? A size of Robins. They

Rod Pyle (01:54:06):
Big, well, they get there. Geez. What they make, what they lack in size. They make up in quantity. <Laugh>

Leo Laporte (01:54:14):
Oh, who invented the mosquito. And and why is the question?

Rod Pyle (01:54:19):
Yeah. Yeah. That's the question of the age of months. Yeah.

Leo Laporte (01:54:23):
What can I do for you G Scott?

Rod Pyle (01:54:26):
Well a couple things first, couple comments. I'm gonna defend Micah yesterday. You said he was too nice. I'm going back.

Leo Laporte (01:54:34):
You don't think he's too nice. That's <laugh>

Rod Pyle (01:54:38):
You were, you were equally nice to me. You and you and Patrick Norton back screensavers days gave me a it was some registry hack and I can't even remember what it was. Oh, wow. I couldn't do anything. And so I emailed you and you did email me back the fix, so,

Leo Laporte (01:54:54):
Oh yeah. So I was, I was mocking, not, not seriously, but I was mocking Micah because he, from time to time on this show when he is on the show on Saturdays will say, all right, gimme your email address. And I'll send we'll, we'll help you on offline. Yeah. And and apparently I've done that in the past once with you,

Rod Pyle (01:55:17):
At least once

Leo Laporte (01:55:19):
<Laugh> with you. Yeah. But that way can lead to to disaster. I, part of the reason I don't do that is I just don't want people to think that I I'm the help desk 24 7.

Rod Pyle (01:55:33):
Exactly. Yep. No, I'm the same in my business. I'm kind of equally, you know, I do septic system design and install and people have a problem with their septic system. It's

Leo Laporte (01:55:43):
Actually, I'm glad you're on because I have a que no, I won't do that to you. <Laugh> I won't, but I completely understand you go to a party and you are the center of attention. So let me ask you a question. We yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know that feeling.

Rod Pyle (01:55:58):
So, so my, my question of the day though so I've, I, I had the surface studio one still have, and because I do Minnesota, California, that thing was traveling back and forth.

Leo Laporte (01:56:09):
Wait a minute, the desktop one. Yes. That's a big, old thing to carry around. Okay. All

Rod Pyle (01:56:15):
Right. Well, I kept the box and it had that nice handle on it and it was kind of like a big, giant,

Leo Laporte (01:56:19):
I loved my surface studio. It was, I was underpowered, but boy, what a nice device that was,

Rod Pyle (01:56:24):
Yeah, I did the Padre upgrade and so I, oh, you did SD. Oh, good. So it's I still love the thing. The display is great. But

Leo Laporte (01:56:34):
I gave mine to an Pruitt and he wouldn't, he would <laugh> it later he posted somewhere. Yeah. I was stuck with that surface studio for six months. Oh man. <Laugh> he hated it. He hated

Rod Pyle (01:56:47):
It.

Leo Laporte (01:56:47):
Oh, I thought I was doing something nice for him.

Rod Pyle (01:56:50):
I love mine. And I'm surface all the way, you know, surface book, surface book two surface pro. Now I got the surface laptop studio, which is a nice, real nice laptop. Cause it holds down and all. Yep. I'm waiting for the surface studio three.

Leo Laporte (01:57:04):
Yeah. Don't you don't hold your breath. I don't think they're gonna do it.

Rod Pyle (01:57:08):
So, so then that's my question. I, I, I like that big monitor. I actually bought a big monitor and

Leo Laporte (01:57:14):
32 inches and it's on an arm, which means you can tilt it down to as little as five degrees, like a drafting table or up. It's a very nice all in one, but for some reason, Microsoft, I think to keep the cost down, they spent so much on the monitor that they didn't put a lot of horsepower in the computer. It's like a slow laptop and it's disappointing cuz you've got this great monitor, but you can't, you know, really use the design software you'd like to and S a photographer. And I think it just was a pig with Photoshop and light room. And he, that's probably why I

Rod Pyle (01:57:44):
Didn't like, and for me, see, I'm not doing what ants doing. I, you know, I, I'm making 2d drawings for my project layouts and whatnot. Perfect

Leo Laporte (01:57:52):
For that. What, what tool do you use software? Do you use

Rod Pyle (01:57:57):
Well right now I just tried this new one review it's from blue dream, I think, or something like that. Is

Leo Laporte (01:58:03):
This specifically for for septic systems or is it just a design tool? Well

Rod Pyle (01:58:09):
Excel, I use for the, for the numbers Uhhuh, and then for the drawings you know, I I've been using actually home plan pro for nice some years.

Leo Laporte (01:58:18):
Yeah. There's no need to do more. Yeah. You can lay it out. Yeah.

Rod Pyle (01:58:23):
So I'm wondering about the monitor. Can I get an equal, equally nice monitor and maybe just a desktop? You know, I haven't had a desktop computer since my registry is the old gateway windows 98.

Leo Laporte (01:58:38):
We ask Paul and Mary Jo ask Microsoft regularly, where is the next surface studio? They did two versions and they stopped. And I don't think they're gonna do another one. I think that's pretty much the consensus. Can you get a monitor that good? I wished Microsoft would've just sold that monitor. Let us attach a computer to it. They never did that. There are reasons probably apple does the same thing with its beautiful 5k iMac because in order to drive those monitors with such high resolutions, you need special hardware more than just a monitor. Plus it had some nice features. Remember you probably got that dial that you could put on the monitor and yep. Yeah. And it, so, and it was a great touch device. It, those displays, I think, were the per pixel perfect displays. Microsoft bought a company called pixel. Perfect. And I I'm wondering if there are gonna be, I would imagine that there are third party displays touch displays that are as good, but I don't

Rod Pyle (01:59:37):
Know I'm windows and I like touch. So

Leo Laporte (01:59:40):
Yeah. You want, well, that's the whole point of that display. Yeah. Yeah. I don't, I don't think Microsoft's selling them. <Laugh> maybe we, maybe somebody listening will have a recommendation. I mean, I, the problem is touch. You want a high resolution, high quality monitor with excellent color reproduction that also does very high resolution touch the knob you can live with that. I'm sure.

Rod Pyle (02:00:06):
Yeah. Yeah. That was kind of a, a little gimmicky, but you know, I've used it every now and then, but mostly it's pen mostly it's you know, it's that touchability

Leo Laporte (02:00:14):
Normally I recommend Dell. I, I have a Samsung in front of me. I mean, all the monitors are pretty good these days, the ultra fine from LG, but touch is the trick. Let me do some research G Scott and I will get back to you. Leo Laport, the tech guy, as Gumby says, most windows users are starved for touch. <Laugh> <laugh> let me think. That's a really good question. You know, that especially now, do you also need it to be able to tilt to five degrees?

Rod Pyle (02:00:51):
You know, I do like that yeah. Capability, you know, a lot of times I'm using the pen and then that really comes in handy to be able to be on top of it. And

Leo Laporte (02:01:01):
That's, that was the thing that I thought was really great about that studio. So Dell does make now touch. They have, I'm looking at a Dell 24 touch monitor that tilts back to five degrees. So it does have that tilt stand, which is really, really cool. Let me, let me see if they make a bigger one. Cuz that's, that is part of the, the feature of it and Dell's higher end monitors I think are, are quite good, but this isn't, you know, yours is ours is what? 32 inches. It's

Rod Pyle (02:01:35):
Big, I think 29 inches.

Leo Laporte (02:01:36):
29. Okay.

Rod Pyle (02:01:37):
It's nice. Yeah, cuz it's that two by three, but it's a nice big monitor in, see if we can get it. I can open three windows and, and you know, so that's handy. Yeah. It's really, you know, part of, part of the reason I'm holding out for the three, if it ever came was they said that the two would not support windows 11. And so

Leo Laporte (02:01:59):
I, oh, Microsoft drives me crazy. They drive me crazy. The only one I see that tilts back is this it's and it's only 24 inches was really is too small I think. But that's called the Dell touch screen.

Leo Laporte (02:02:17):
Okay. Let me see. If there's any, let's see if U Sonic has something touch screen. I always buy Dell. I like Dell monitors. I'm I'm, I'm a fond of those. If you Sonic does make more touch monitors, but they don't make them that big. There must be something let's see optical touch. Now we want, we want capacitive touch. Well, that's interesting. So they of Yonic makes 'em for a variety of uses cuz they have a variety of different kinds of touch. Yeah, they don't, they don't go so big. The biggest is looks like 24 inches must be something about the, you know, I think that's, that explains a lot about the studio. Yeah. that, that monitor was so big and so expensive. That's why they script on the body and it's why they're not making it anymore.

Rod Pyle (02:03:12):
Yeah. And, and like I say, for me, I mean, I'm not, you know, video editing. I'm not, you know, I'm, I'm not, you know, super power user or anything where I needed, you know, I'm just upgrading those SSDs for me.

Leo Laporte (02:03:23):
That was huge. No, I was so glad that Padre did that for us. Yeah. He loved that was a good project. He loved that project. Yeah,

Rod Pyle (02:03:31):
No, I looked through it a few times to get yeah. Dialed in, but boy, definitely. Yeah.

Leo Laporte (02:03:37):
I miss having Padre around. I gotta tell you he was oh yeah. I, I don't, you know, it looks like everything we can find they're small 24 is the biggest. Yeah. let's see if I can find a 31 inch touch screen monitor. Let's see what we can find here. It looks like Asus may make

Rod Pyle (02:04:00):
One

Leo Laporte (02:04:03):
I'm on new egg now and new egg will let me narrow it down to yeah, no, forget it. Still forget it. Yeah. I think that's what was unusual about this. It was a big touch screen, high quality. It was very high quality monitor.

Rod Pyle (02:04:22):
Yeah.

Leo Laporte (02:04:23):
And for a long time, I, I asked Paul, I said, when is, when is Microsoft gonna sell this standalone, this monitor's great. And they never did. They bought a company to do this. Is it pixel perfect. I can't remember. I might have said the wrong name anyway. I gotta run. Cuz I got a, I have a little guy called rocket man.

Rod Pyle (02:04:47):
Yep. I, I hear him in the back there

Leo Laporte (02:04:49):
<Laugh>

Rod Pyle (02:04:50):
Flu is really good. I got it. Both Minnesota, California homes and it is a good speaker.

Leo Laporte (02:04:54):
Oh good to know that was Scott recommending that yesterday. Yeah. Good to know. Very good. Yep. Thank you. G Scott, take

Rod Pyle (02:05:01):
Care. Bye

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:05:03):
Rocket man. Rod pile is here. He's the editor in chief of ad Astra magazine, the international national spaces organization. <Laugh> society. S thank you. Dot org. There we go. Thank you. The national space society he's also the author of so many great books. My I'm gonna plug my favorite though, cuz I'm a big fan of Neil Armstrong and Apollo and 11. And I was just, you know, was visiting my old family home in Providence. A friend of mine lives there now, which is fascinating, which is coincidental. And I was standing out front, Alex came out and said, Alex, take me inside. Let's see. And I pointed, I said, see that alcove right there in 1969. That's where I watched Neil Armstrong step on the moon. And I will never forget that. Of course you can kind of relive it with his book first on the moon, the Apollo 11 50th anniversary experience.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:06:03):
Really beautiful pictures and images. What a story to thank you. Yeah. Thank you Rob. We were, we were so fortunate to be alive to see that. I agree. Those were magic times. Yeah. Maybe they're coming back though. That's why we have rod do a show called this week in space because space is back baby <laugh> and speaking of this week in space. Yes, we had a really great episode Friday. Had our Jeff Jeff kin was our, our guest host cuz tarkes in Singapore for a few weeks from space.com. Yeah. From space.com. We were able to get mark Clain who's the former project scientist for the web. Now he's the chief of the science and exploration director at NASA headquarters, which means he's overseeing everything, but he's still of course very focused on web. And as you probably know, the first science images are gonna be coming out from NASA on July 12th.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:06:53):
The web is not only is operational, but one scientist was brought to tier yeah. By the images. I mean this is, well, I think a lot works exciting will be it's it's a big, big deal. And the fact that it worked, I mean, I'm still stuck on the fact that everything deployed properly unbelievable. But we asked him, you know, they're not talking about exactly. What's gonna come, come down on those first, those first images that we said, can you just give us kind of a preview of what you expect for the first year? Cuz there's gonna be a lot of incredible stuff. And he said, well, we'll have at least one quote time travel image. I'm paraphrasing here. But basically looking because one of the big things about web is it's in, it operates in infrared so it can see past the dust. So the things, the beautiful images the Hubble has given us over the years, a lot of those are big dust clouds and they're very pretty, but it obscures what's beyond them.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:07:43):
And the only way we've been able to see past some of those is with what's called gravitational lens where galaxies will bend lighter out them and magnify something further away. But the Hubble is gonna punch through all that and see that the web to sorry, the web. Thank you. See back to the formation of the first galaxy. We think that that is one of the images they're going to show us. Yeah. will be the farthest space photograph ever taken. Right. And we're talking about one to 200 million years after the big bang, which you, you call it time travel because it takes so long. The light to get here that the light we're seeing is a, is hundreds of billions of years old. Right? How old is it? Oh my God. Rod just froze solid. He's so excited. Third it 13 billion. Okay. So it's not as old as I thought, but still that's pretty amazing. And to, to get, to see Starlight from 120 million years after the big bang, which of course is when we think the universe began, we've lost rod. I see him on the hotline. Let me pick 'em up on the, on the phone. Yeah. Sorry. I guess we, we lost you, but we'll keep that frozen picture of you up on <laugh> up on the screen for those of you watching video. So the

Rod Pyle (02:09:01):
Never

Leo Laporte (02:09:01):
Look in my back, John, who is our expert says the universe is estimated be 13 billion years old. So they, they would be seeing back 2.7, 13.7. So they'd be seeing back to a, to within 120 million years of the big bang. That's, that's pretty close to the beginning.

Rod Pyle (02:09:17):
That's like a couple of seconds after, after the big flash, you know? And that do

Leo Laporte (02:09:22):
They, is it accepted widely that there was a big bang? I know that that was a theory for a long time.

Rod Pyle (02:09:27):
Yeah. Yeah. It's it's pretty much a done deal. I mean, there was talk about this sort of steady state theory that I think it was Fred Hoyle was

Leo Laporte (02:09:35):
Fred Hoyle said the universe does not expand and contract. I do not believe it. He was proven wrong.

Rod Pyle (02:09:40):
Right, right. So it it's, we're pretty certain. So we're seeing things back in the earliest days and that gives them ideas of how planets formed and so forth. There's all.

Leo Laporte (02:09:49):
Is there a chance we will learn something that will blow our minds? Oh, there I see you. You've UN frozen. Yeah. Yeah.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:09:57):
I'll go back. I'll okay. Yeah. I'll turn off the phone. So is there a chance that we will see something that will just blow our minds that we will go well, I don't think we're gonna see anybody flashing a more no, no, no, no. That's no, I don't think aliens in terms of, of very cool stuff. Yeah. Because everything from huble was, was in the visual wavelength and there's just a lot of limits plus Hubble orbited the earth and, and low orbit. So it would go in and out of sunlight every 45 minutes. And of course when you're on the sunlight side, you can't observe. Right. And the, the telescope was constantly heating up and cooling off. So web is at the LaGrange point. It's a million kilometers out. Right. Right. More than that. Yeah. So the fact I'm sorry, the LA car point and it's, it's got shielding on it so it can work 24 7.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:10:46):
Wow. So yeah, I think we're gonna be just gobsmacked and let's not forget Hubble technology is, is it's been up there 32 years working. So that tech is about 40, 45 years old. So this is all newer stuff. And these instruments are so much more sensitive and capable. They're gonna be looking at some early comets, which are some of the oldest things in the solar system and looking at chemical signatures on those. And they're going to look at the Trappist one system, which is star system, I think 200 something light years away from us and getting spectro, spectrometer readings from the planet. So we'll be able to see what some of their atmospheres are composed of. Mm-Hmm <affirmative> that may be the mind lower, you know, it may not be so much the visuals of it, but it's seeing if we spot an exoplanet that has signatures in it, of biology.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:11:32):
Now this, this would really be, that would be a mindblower. Yeah, it will be, but there'll be, you know, it's science, right? So there's could be people saying, well, it could also be natural causes and all that kind of thing could be geological and so forth. But this is definitely the killer app for astronomy. And he was really, clamping was really a great interview, you know, no matter what I asked him, I said, can we talk about exobiology a bit? And he said, sure, cuz you know, some people are a little queasy about that subject, but in, in the, the long short of it was, he said, this is really, you know, gonna be a whole new thing. They're trying to keep an open mind for everything. They've got a peer review system they've used for years to decide what targets to look at and how to look at them.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:12:12):
But there's so many modalities on this thing, you know, it's like adjusting your digital watch, right? There's 1700 different ways to set it up. So he said, you know, a lot of what they're looking for in these this first year projects is just discovering what modalities will work best, but they've anonymized the peer review process. So even if you and I snuck something in there, if it was good enough, they'd probably do it. Although I, I don't think that's that's on the, on the table, but <laugh>, it could be, we did this guy named Leo Laport who wants to see if there's hot dogs in space. We're not gonna do that. And it's interesting cuz part of how they do it is they look at the Hubble pictures and they start subtracting parts of the spec route until they get redder and redder. And when they disappear, that means it's exceeded the limits of what the Hubble can do.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:12:55):
And then that's some of what they're gonna look at particularly interesting. So it's just, you know, besides the fact it's a great project, it was just wonderful to talk to the top guy and get his take on it. And then as we move along, he's gonna come back in a couple of months, come back onto the podcast. So we'll be able to get more answers from, he's gonna be very busy for a few weeks. <Laugh> cause everybody and their mother's gonna be trying to get interviews. But we are very lucky mark clamping. He is NASA something or other and was he's the chief of science and exploration chief of science and exploration director and was in charge of the web and will be it's a, this week in space, episode, 18 twit.tv/t I S and it's July 12th, right. That we will yeah.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:13:42):
See these first images. Now seeing the image won't necessarily change your mind or blow your mind, but it's still very exciting to see an image. That's the, the deepest image we've ever taken of the universe, the farthest stars ever, and scientists I think are, are expecting to learn quite a bit. We just don't know what absolutely. Cuz we haven't learned it yet. And, and let's not forget this mirrors six times larger than hubs. So it's gonna be a real thing. Incredible. The first science quality images of our universe and we'll see 'em July 12th. Thank you rod pile. Thank you. The final frontier.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:14:23):
It's cool because they've already, it's already been hit by three different Microm meteorites, right? Yeah. Micro. Yeah. We asked them about that. Yeah. It's it's it's it's tough. I hope. Yeah. Well the thing about Lara, any Lara point is there's a lot of other junk that settles out there because it is a stable orbit. So they knew they were gonna encounter things. They didn't expect a couple of 'em be quite as big, but it's, it's pretty robust. And even if it took a hit on the mirror, it'd be okay. Now are you gonna be at sea by the 12th or not yet? I will be at no, I will not be at sea. I will be here. Are we, our flight is the 14th. Oh great. So do, what are we gonna do? What time is it? 10:00 AM.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:15:07):
What time is? What the reveal are they doing? A press conference? Let me see if I find 10:00 AM our time or their time, because it'd be kind of fun to do a live. Yeah. Is that a Wednesday? No, it's right. Yeah. July 12th. That would be really cool to do something with that. Yeah. I can find out. We John Tuesday of course. Is it Tuesday? The July 12th? Let me look. I have a calendar. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's Tuesday. So that's we have iOS today. I'm sorry. We, yeah, it's Tuesday. Yeah. we have iOS today in the morning and then Mac break weekly, but I am willing to take a chunk. It will be 10:30 AM Eastern. Oh 7:30 AM our time. Right before iOS today time delayed reveal. No, you must be here. Okay. I'll be in bed. Yeah, let's talk about it.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:16:01):
Cause maybe it's gonna be webcast. Yeah. I don't know how long it'll go on for, but I think it's very exciting. I think we should do something live. They'll have a press conference around it. So I, I think let's do it live an hour. Yeah. Okay. Let's do it live se what time does, what time does iOS today begin John nine. Perfect. So I'll be here. I'll come in. You can, we'll zoom you in. You can Tark can do it too. I can do it from home. Yeah. I think we should do that. Cool. good. Make it. So <laugh> tar Tark. Won't be here. He'll still be on the road, but I'll be here and I can bring in Jeff kin if we want, whoever you think is appropriate, I'll be Walter Cronkite. Oh yeah. I know.

Leo Laporte // Rod Pyle (02:16:46):
We're going to the, to the whole thing, right? Yeah. That'd be pretty funny. Let school to and see what they've learned or the world's oldest picture. The vibrations are coming. It's a 13 billion year old picture. Good. That'll be fun. Let's plan on that. 7:30 AM. Tuesday, July 12th. All right. I'm putting it on my camera and we'll stream that live. All right. Okay, good. Excellent. Excellent. I shall see you next week. And then the week after on a Tuesday and then you're so you're gonna, and then, so we are doing a rerun that Sunday. So you got that Sunday off. Okay. Which is the 17th, but the 24th I'm back. So you got the 17th off. Alrighty. That's where it is. Then I'll be gone for all of August. Will you? Yeah. Where are you going? That's that's my little Arctic excursion. So jealous. Lisa wants to do that too.

Leo Laporte (02:17:55):
She says, yeah. I said Lisa it's cold. It's I mean, it's, it's, you know, hundreds of miles from the nearest internet or power, anything else? And there's a slit latrine and no showers. Okay. So just let her know. We won't be going there. <Laugh> I can tell you, I don't care if she's going. I'm not going burgers and dogs. Yeah. Thank you, rod pile. All right, sir. See ya. Take care. Good. That'll be fun, John. You'll do that. That's great. We'll do a live. That's such a big deal. Huge, huge, great Woody Guthrie. Leo LaPorte tech guy, 88, 88. Ask Leo. Oh, I that's the last segment of the show. So we're gonna wrap it up. I do wanna thank our fabulous musical director, professor Laura for giving us some great 4th of July music. I lo I'm glad you ended it with that one. That's a great song. He had a sticker on his guitar that says this machine kills fascists. Great Woody Guthrie with a amazing song. Thanks also to Kim Shafer, the phone angel who got you all on the air today. Thank you, Kim. I hope both of you have a great 4th of July. All of you have a great 4th of July weekend. Continuing on with the calls Donna in San Diego. Hi Donna.

Caller 7 (02:19:13):
Hi. I guess believe this I've been waiting. I've been waiting to call you about this for about a year. And what I'm calling about is I was waiting for the surface studio freeWW. Oh no. <Laugh> and I finally gave up, oh

Leo Laporte (02:19:26):
No, you should give up. Yeah, I don't think of course watch Microsoft will announce it tomorrow, but

Caller 7 (02:19:31):
I, well, I'm not gonna, so I'm, I'm looking to, instead I'm waiting for my I have this Samsung all in one that's I think I bought it in 2015 and I know it's not gonna last that much longer. So I was just getting ready to replace it when it Coks out. And what I, what I really wanted was a large touch screen. Yeah. And, and, but what I so far, what I have for the

Leo Laporte (02:19:56):
It's so funny that you just, we just talked about this.

Caller 7 (02:19:59):
Yes. I

Leo Laporte (02:20:00):
Know. So funny. Yeah. With G Scott. Yeah.

Caller 7 (02:20:03):
Yeah. So my solution, what I was what I kind of settled on was Dell XPS desktop, and then get monitors monitor or monitors because I already searched for the touch screen and you can't get one large enough. I need, I need a,

Leo Laporte (02:20:20):
Well, that's what we was finding. That's where, what you were finding, you know, I thought there must be something bigger than 24 inches. There doesn't seem to be.

Caller 7 (02:20:28):
Yeah. That's smaller than what I have now. And I, and I have I'm I'm in my mid seventies, I need to, I need to be able to see the screen and I, and I have arthritis. So I, I use, I use a touchscreen. I use, I, I want an optical drive and I, I, I think I'm gonna end up getting that X PS anyway. But and it, it come, you can get one with an optical drive, but you said, don't get the core. I seven, but I already have a core I seven and I would be going down. I'd be going to step down.

Leo Laporte (02:21:00):
Well, this is okay. So that's a good question. First, let me say this. I may be wrong about the surface studio three it's been four years. Usually that means a company has given up on a product, but you never know with Microsoft, they might well release another one. I think there are a couple of reasons why it's reasonable to say there isn't gonna be a new surface studio. Not only that, they just haven't updated it in four years, but you know, the last one was 2018. But I think because of parts shortages, the supply chain issues, that's not the computer Microsoft's gonna release. 

Caller 7 (02:21:38):
No, I've, I've given up. I'm just left that behind the

Leo Laporte (02:21:41):
Desk. It's sensible to give it's sensible to give it up. Now, let me talk about this issue of Intel. What I was talking about is the newest generation. So, you know, every, every year or so, Intel does a TikTok with its processor. So an I seven, you bought today is not the I seven. You bought last year or the year before, the year before we're in the 12th generation of Intel core, I seven processors. And there has been a big change between the 11th and the 12th generation. The 12th generation now is much more Intel was influenced by what apple is doing, what arm has done, what Qualcomm's done. And so these new processors have power cores and efficiency, cores which means they are in theory, more efficient because when you're doing tasks that don't require a lot of horsepower, they will, they will use the efficiency course instead and save battery power in a laptop.

Leo Laporte (02:22:38):
That's pretty important, not just for battery power, but for heat. And this is the problem with the I seven S in heat situations, in a laptop, an I seven, almost never runs at full speed. It can only run at full speed for a few seconds, maybe a minute, because it, as soon as it gets hot, it throttles down all Intel chips, do this, all chips, do this. Throtles down BA early benchmarks of these new 12th generation chip. The older lake chips were very surprising. Now these are early benchmarks. They're not a lot of 12th generation computers out yet. I have one right in front of me, but they're not a lot of them. And the early benchmarks showed something very surprising because of heat issues. And because of these efficiency, cores, it looks like the I five actually outperforms the I seven in most situations.

Caller 7 (02:23:28):
Yeah. I heard you say that before. And so I, I'm kind of still debating and right now my main question is, do you think I could use like a, like two monitors? Sure. Or, or, or three? I, I just, I want something big that I can see, but what I do is I watch I'm watching like instructional VI videos or, or concerts, like, like Metallica and 

Leo Laporte (02:23:53):
Are you love Metallica? You love Metallica.

Caller 7 (02:23:56):
Yeah. So it, it has to be, I want really good video quality and I want yeah.

Leo Laporte (02:24:01):
So let me make a suggestion. I like to let me make a suggestion. So, so you say you're interested in a laptop or do you care if it's a laptop

Caller 7 (02:24:08):
Or desktop? No. No, not laptop. This is a desktop.

Leo Laporte (02:24:10):
Okay. And by the way, the I seven on desktop probably doesn't have those same issues. Cuz cooling is much more active on a desktop. Yeah. You have more space, you have more fans, you have coolers. I would SU I run on my desktop at home, a 55 inch, O L E D monitor.

Caller 7 (02:24:27):
Okay. Wait second. I lost my pencil. <Laugh>

Leo Laporte (02:24:29):
Well, it's expensive. It's several thousand bucks, but yeah, it's a TV. It's like a TV, but it's it. So it comes from Dell's alien wear division.

Caller 7 (02:24:38):
Oh, okay. And well, what's a step down from what's the next a lower, smaller size. Cause my desk isn't that big

Leo Laporte (02:24:44):
55 is huge, but I tell you it spoils you. Cause and you certainly wouldn't want it any less than arms length the way you'd probably want it more like three or four feet away because it is. Yeah.

Caller 7 (02:24:54):
But I was getting, yeah. So is there, I'm afraid you're gonna cut me off. Is there a smaller, I would think like at least the 30 something. Yeah. Is there something like that? That sure. And it has to be touchscreen though, touchscreen.

Leo Laporte (02:25:07):
Oh, this is not a touch screen and this is the problem. You will not get a monitor at that size. That's a touch screen. Just you won't.

Caller 7 (02:25:14):
So, so if I got a touch screen for the middle, can I use,

Leo Laporte (02:25:19):
Yeah. You could have one with a touch screen. You could have se all desktops will support multiple monitors. Yeah. so that's not a problem at all. So yeah. You could have a monitor. That's a 24 inch on the left. That's a touch screen. And when you wanna watch Metallica, you put it on the big screen. Oh yeah. Or you do both, you're doing your touch screen on the left and you got Metallica on your right.

Caller 7 (02:25:41):
That's what that's

Leo Laporte (02:25:43):
Or night eggs night. So that's a great way to go. You have multiple monitors. Okay. And with a desktop, even with a laptop nowadays, that's a good thing to do. I would look at depending on how fancy you want to get, you can get arms, you know, get these amount arms so that you can have these things off the desk and you can arrange them and orient them. Yeah.

Caller 7 (02:26:05):
That's a good idea. Yeah. Well, tell me what you do with that. I mean, what, what brand would you, when

Leo Laporte (02:26:09):
You get 'em all of these monitors are visa have V E S a mounts visa Mount is a standard across all manufacturers and then you'll get an arm and their variety of arms. You can search for the different, you know, you can have 15 monitors if you're a day trader, but there are a variety of arms out there. They will all work with a visa Mount monitor. So then you'll have you screw the monitor onto the arm. And now with one pole coming outta your desk, you're gonna have multiple monitors that you are very flexible in their arrangement. I think that's a very nice way to do it.

Caller 7 (02:26:42):
Okay. One little quick thing. Do you watch Simon's cat on, on YouTube? You should.

Leo Laporte (02:26:47):
I will. Simon's cat, huh? Yes. Is it a cat?

Caller 7 (02:26:51):
No, it's a cartoon

Leo Laporte (02:26:54):
Is Metallica in it. <Laugh>

Caller 7 (02:26:57):
No,

Leo Laporte (02:26:57):
I, I will watch it. Catman do Simon's cat they're shorts. Oh, that's cool. Yeah. Hey, it's a pleasure talking to you, Donna CA you know, we are out of time now, but call back. Thank you. No, no, you did great. I didn't mean to rush you some really good questions. I think. What do you do on your computer?

Caller 7 (02:27:14):
I watch 

Leo Laporte (02:27:15):
Besides watching Metallica and Simon's cat.

Caller 7 (02:27:18):
No, besides that. Well, I, I, I do. I use the word and PowerPoint, and

Leo Laporte (02:27:23):
So you're not doing any, you're not doing anything that needs a super high powered computer. I think an I five back

Caller 7 (02:27:27):
And forth. I like to do jump back and forth between like a zoom thing is on and it's something else is doing. I'm

Leo Laporte (02:27:32):
Watching. Yeah. So get a lot of memory. That's more important. Get 32 gigs of memory. Leo Laport, the tech guy have a great geek week. More memory gives you more capabilities. It's not how much processor you need so much as memory.

Caller 7 (02:27:46):
Well, yeah, I was just trying to future proof it because I, well, yeah, I don't expect to be, I, this is probably gonna be my last, your

Leo Laporte (02:27:52):
Last computer. I know the feeling

Caller 7 (02:27:54):
That needs to last about five years, at least.

Leo Laporte (02:27:56):
Oh, you're going for a lot longer than that. It's not your last computer. This is gonna be the first of a long line. I would say, especially if you keep watching Metallica, that keeps you young. I would say I, the nothing you're describing requires an I seven, especially in this new 12th generation.

Caller 7 (02:28:19):
So I didn't describe everything.

Leo Laporte (02:28:21):
Oh, there's more, what else?

Caller 7 (02:28:23):
I, well, I would like, like, I'd like to be able to watch two, have two videos on the screen at the same. Well, that's easy. Two screens,

Leo Laporte (02:28:30):
All that's easy. It's video editing, Photoshop, 3d design. Those are the things gaming.

Caller 7 (02:28:36):
Yeah. Well that's what I, that's what I would be.

Leo Laporte (02:28:39):
Oh, you wanna

Caller 7 (02:28:39):
Do something? I do some video editing, but not where you think of it. Cause it's for quilting and they have a, oh neat. They, they, there are photographers that it's an art. Oh yeah. You should look up Jill kurta K E R T U L L a. She's the photographer. Who's a quilt artist. And she edits the photography through fabric. Oh,

Leo Laporte (02:29:01):
How cool

Caller 7 (02:29:02):
It, it is really, it's beautiful. How

Leo Laporte (02:29:04):
Cool. Cool. But my mom is all into textile. She was a Weaver the whole time growing up. She does needle point. She does hooking. She hooked rugs my whole life. So very much into textiles lately. She's been making felted rats. <Laugh> <laugh> that's another story for another day. 

Caller 7 (02:29:25):
Yeah. That's what you get for Christmas, huh?

Leo Laporte (02:29:27):
Yeah. Ex I wish she won't give 'em to me. She says, no, I need them all. I said, mom, just one, just one. I think you're in pretty good shape. It's really gonna come down to budget. But touch is gonna be the issue

Caller 7 (02:29:40):
Matter the budget. I mean, surface studio is pretty darn expensive. Yeah,

Leo Laporte (02:29:43):
No kidding. No kidding. These, this will be less than that. Get a, get a 24 inch touch that you can use for all your touch screen stuff. You could even tilt it back, have it, you know, like, oh

Caller 7 (02:29:54):
Yeah. I went tilted.

Leo Laporte (02:29:55):
Yeah. And then have a nice, you could even honestly get a TV monitor, get a, get a bigger, a 4k TV that you hook up to the computer. And that would be perfect for watching videos. It's it's even fine for word and stuff like that because nowadays the resolution's so good. So that's another way to do

Caller 7 (02:30:12):
That. I edit the, I I'm watching the instructional video and then I, yeah, pause it. And then I use the sniping tool to yeah. Cut out as part of it and then make notes on it with a, with a draw tool. Brilliant. But you have to do it really fast and it slows down and

Leo Laporte (02:30:28):
No, no, these modern computers, you're not gonna have any problems and yeah. Get an I seven if you want. You know, my gaming machine actually is AMD. The it's a horizon. Those are very powerful. Multi-Core computers designed for that kind of thing. And you might, even if you're gonna do anything that requires heavy duty graphics, not playing back video, but Photoshop, things like that. Look at a, getting a, an Nvidia graphics card. That'll make a

Caller 7 (02:30:54):
Yeah. Oh, that I do. I absolutely want that. I have that now. And I do edit. I editing the things, but who knows what's gonna happen in, in three or four or five years? There might be some new thing.

Leo Laporte (02:31:04):
That's why it's not your last computer. Exactly. You can only future proof so far. <Laugh> right. Well, enjoy Donna. I have to run, but thank you so much. It's a real pleasure talking to you. Bye byebye. Well, that's it for the Tech Guy show for today. Thank you so much for being here and don't forget twit T W I T it stands for this week@techandyoufinditattwit.tv, including the podcasts for this show. We talk about windows and windows weekly, Macintosh on Mac break, weekly iPads, iPhones, apple watches on iOS today. Security and security. Now, I mean, I can go on and on and on. And of course the big show every Sunday afternoon, this week in tech, you'll find it all at twit TV and I'll be back next week with another great tech guy show. Thanks for joining me. We'll see you next time.