20 Interesting Facts About Computers

Computers have become a very important part of our daily life. This awesome machine changed our lives in so many ways. There are lots of interesting interesting facts about computer that I thought you would be interested in.

Some of these computer facts might just blow your mind! so be prepared for that blast.

1. The first electronic computer ENIAC weighed more than 27 tons and took up 1800 square feet.

2.  Only about 10% of the world’s currency is physical money, the rest only exists on computers.

3. TYPEWRITER is the longest word that you can write using the letters only on one row of the keyboard of your computer.

4. Doug Engelbart invented the first computer mouse in around 1964 which was made of wood.

5. There are more than 5000 new computer viruses are released every month.

6. Around 50% of all Wikipedia vandalism is caught by a single computer program with more than 90% accuracy.

7. If there was a computer as powerful as the human brain, it would be able to do 38 thousand trillion operations per second and hold more than 3580 terabytes of memory.

8. The password for the computer controls of nuclear tipped missiles of the U.S was 00000000 for eight years.

9. Approximately 70% of virus writers are said to work under contract for organized crime syndicates.

10. HP, Microsoft and Apple have one very interesting thing in common – they were all started in a garage.

11. An average person normally blinks 20 times a minute, but when using a computer he/she blinks only 7 times a minute.

12. The house where Bill Gates lives, was designed using a Macintosh computer.

13. The first ever hard disk drive was made in 1979, and could hold only 5MB of data.

14. The first 1GB hard disk drive was announced in 1980 which weighed about 550 pounds, and had a price tag of $40,000.

15. More than 80% of the emails sent daily are spams.

16. A group of 12 engineers designed IBM PC and they were called as “The Dirty Dozen”.

17. The original name of windows was Interface Manager.

18. The first microprocessor created by Intel was the 4004. It was designed for a calculator, and in that time nobody imagined where it would lead.

19. IBM 5120 from 1980 was the heaviest desktop computer ever made. It weighed about 105 pounds, not including the 130 pounds external floppy drive.

20. Genesis Device demonstration video in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan was the the first entirely computer generated movie sequence in the history of cinema. That studio later become Pixar.

I hope you enjoyed those computer facts as much as I did. Share them with your friends so that they can enjoy them too

The best Surface yet is more than a tablet, less than a laptop

The Good:  The Surface Pro 3 is thinner and lighter than the previous two versions, despite having a larger 12-inch display and higher screen resolution. A new kickstand makes it easier to set up and use, and the keyboard cover remains a best-in-class example. The Surface Pro 3 is now optimized for a digital pen, which is included.

The Bad:  That excellent keyboard cover is not included in the base price, and its improved touchpad still doesn't measure up. The chassis lacks pen storage, and even with tweaked kickstand and keyboard hinges, the Surface Pro 3 still doesn't fit perfectly on the lap.

The Bottom Line:  While the new Surface Pro 3 is Microsoft's best PC to date, it's more successful as a tablet than a laptop replacement.

Tablets are great for consuming entertainment, while laptops and other full PCs are required to actually create those works, or so the conventional wisdom goes. Some substitute the charged word "productivity" for creation, but the pitch is the same. You need one device for A, B, and C, and another for X, Y, and Z.

That means there's a sizable group of people out there spending at least part of the time lugging around a laptop and a tablet simultaneously. I've been guilty of that, usually packing a 13-inch ultrabook or MacBook Air and an iPad into my carry-on bag for airline flights.

With the new Surface Pro 3 from Microsoft, the software powerhouse (and occasional hardware maker) says it finally has the single grand unified device that will satisfy both the creation and consumption instincts equally. You'll feel just as at home watching a movie or reading a book as you will editing video footage or writing your novel.

That's largely the same pitch, of course, we got for the Surface Pro and Surface Pro 2 tablets, which points to the difficulty in translating the full Windows 8.1experience freely between a laptop and tablet. Dozens of our hands-on reviews of devices ranging from 8-inch slates to 13-inch two-in-one hybrids back this up, as does the mixed reception to the first two generations of the Surface Pro.

Both of those devices, as well as the Surface Pro 3, at least begin with the right idea and smartly lean toward the laptop side of the tablet spectrum, including Intel Core i-series CPUs and keyboard covers designed to feel more like laptop keyboards.

With the Surface Pro 3, starting at $799 or £639 for an Intel Core i3 CPU and a 64GB SSD, we can see the thinking at Microsoft start to lean even more toward the laptop side, with a new kickstand and touch cover that allow you to work at almost any angle. Our review configuration is upgraded to a Core i5 CPU and 256GB SSD, which costs $1,299 or £1,109, while the type cover keyboard is an additional $129 or £110.

The new Surface Pro is thinner than its predecessors, with a larger, higher-resolution screen. On that mark alone, it outshines the Pro and Pro 2. The internal specs and performance are largely similar to the Pro 2, but that means it's still just as fast as any current-gen premium laptop.

With the generation-over-generation tweaks to the design, especially the hinge and keyboard, you can see a dedicated push towards advancing the cause of practical usability. It's not entirely there yet, and it's still a leap to say this will be a true laptop replacement for most people, but the Surface Pro 3 is the first Surface device I feel confident in saying I could get away with using as a primary PC.

	Microsoft Surface Pro 3	Lenovo IdeaPad Yoga 2 Pro	MacBook Air 13-inch (June 2013)
Price as reviewed	$1,299	$999	$1,099
Display size/resolution	12-inch, 2,160 x 1,440 touch screen	13.3-inch, 3,200 x 1,800 touch screen	13.3-inch, 1,440 x 900 screen
PC CPU	1.9GHz Intel Core i5 4300U	1.6GHz Intel Core i5 4200U	1.3GHz Intel Core i5 4250U
PC Memory	8GB DDR3 SDRAM 1,600MHz	4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1,600MHz	4GB DDR3 SDRAM 1,600MHz
Graphics	1,792MB (shared) Intel HD Graphics 4400	1,792MB (shared) Intel HD Graphics 4400	1,024MB Intel HD Graphics5000
Storage	256GB SSD hard drive	128GB SSD hard drive	128GB SSD hard drive
Optical drive	None	None	None
Networking	802.11a/c wireless, Bluetooth 4.0	802.11b/g/n wireless, Bluetooth 4.0	802.11a/c wireless, Bluetooth 4.0
Operating system	Windows 8.1 (64-bit)	Windows 8.1 (64-bit)	OSX Mountain Lion 10.8.4

Design and features

Despite the talk of this being the thinnest Intel Core i-series device to date, it still doesn't feel quite as thin and ethereal as, for example, the iPad Air. But its thinner body, coupled with a larger 12-inch screen, give it a more upscale feel than either the Pro or Pro 2, which were criticized for a certain boxiness.

Both of the previous Surface Pro models had 10.6-inch screens and were 13mm thick, with a footprint of 10.8 inches by 6.8 inches. This new 12-inch version is 11.5 inches by 7.9 inches, but its thickness drops to an impressive 9.1mm. The Pro 3 is also a tad lighter than its predecessor: 800 grams versus 900. Again, when you consider the larger screen, that's a worthy achievement.

With a wink and a nod, Microsoft says this new Surface Pro design isn't exactly fanless, but it might as well be. That's because the new system internals, designed in partnership with Intel, allow the system run run not only ultra-low-voltage Core i3 or i5 CPUs, but also Core i7 ones, with a slim, quiet fan moving air as needed, allegedly without that telltale whirring sound, or a fan exhaust blowing on your hands. Our Surface Pro 3, a midrange model with an Intel Core i5 CPU, certainly felt cool during our hands-on testing, but an audible fan also kicked in at times. To call the experience fanless-like would not be accurate.

One major difference in the new design is the kickstand, which can be adjusted to nearly any angle between 22 degrees and 150 degrees. That's especially useful for tilting the screen way back, as an artist using a drafting table might, but as the owner of normal-size legs for a 6-foot-tall man, I still had a hard time getting the Surface Pro 3 to sit comfortably on my lap. The kickstand either kept the screen angle too severe to see clearly while seated, or else the end of the kickstand was sliding off my knees when I tilted the screen further back.

Taking the type cover and kicking in its additional top-edge magnetic hinge, raising the back edge of the keyboard to a better angle, helped a bit, as the raised angle feels much more natural for typing (which is why nearly every PC keyboard has tiny feet at the back edge). It's a small change, but one that says Microsoft is thinking seriously about ergonomics.

Of portrait modes and pens

It may take a second to spot, but there's one major change to the Surface design ID this time around. The capacitive touch button Windows logo -- which brings you back to the Windows 8 tile interface -- has shifted from the bottom long edge of the chassis to one of the shorter edges.

There are two reasons for that, to my mind. First, the new keyboard covers cover the area where the original Windows button was located when you use the second tilt-up hinge. Second, moving the Windows logo button to the short edge points users toward using the device in portrait mode. I've found that most Windows tablets and hybrids are designed around use in a laptop-like landscape mode, which has the screen lying against its longest side, while the all-popular Apple iPad is primarily understood as a device to be held upright in portrait mode, much like a book or magazine.

This ties directly into Microsoft's strong pitch for the Surface Pro 3 as an educational device for note-taking, annotation, drawing, and sketching. The included battery-powered Bluetooth pen is metallic, and more substantial than versions I've tried with other Windows 8 tablets, such as the 8-inch Asus VivoTab 8.

Lenovo builds a projector into the Yoga Tablet 2 Pro (hands-on)

Lenovo has made some minor updates to its 8-inch and 10-inch Yoga 2 tablets , changing the kickstand design and adding a Windows 8 version, but it's another new Yoga tablet product that really stands out as different.

The new Yoga Tablet 2 Pro is a 13-inch Android tablet with the same cylindrical edge/kickstand design, but inside that bulging hinge is a built-in pico projector.

It's a surprising addition that makes this a unique product. The projector is activated by a physical button on the side of the chassis, or by a software button on the main interface screen. It projects a 16:9 image that Lenovo says will work up to 50 inches diagonally. A small focus slider is built into the rounded edge for adjusting the picture.

The speakers are a step above what we normally see in tablets, with 8 watts of output and a small built-in JBL-branded subwoofer. The tablet's 13-inch screen has a better-than-HD resolution of 2,560x1,440 pixels, but the projector throws its image at a lower resolution.

As an Android tablet, the 13-inch Yoga Tablet Pro 2 is bigger than most, and the big, rounded edge makes it less portable than many other tablets -- it'll take up more room in your bag than a simple, fully flat tablet. That said, the rounded edge gives you something to grip when holding the tablet in your hand, and the kickstand makes it easy to set up as a display. Like the smaller Yoga 2 tablets, this version has a cutout in the kickstand that can be used to hang the entire device from a hook.

Lenovo says the battery life should be about 3 hours if you're using the projector, or up to 15 hours without. The Yoga Tablet 2 Pro will go on sale around the end of October in the US and Europe, starting at $499 and €499, and £449 in the UK. In Australia, it'll be on sale from mid-October in JB Hi-Fi and Harvey Norman for AU$799.

How to upgrade your MacBook Pro with an SSD

You'll need:

• An SSD (I used last year's version of the Samsung 840 Evo)
• SATA-to-USB cable or dock
• Small screwdriver to open your laptop
• Torx head screwdriver for disassembling the hard drive
• SuperDuper (download it here)

Step 1: Prep the SSD

Start by connecting the SSD to your computer with a dock or cable. Once it's connected, launch Disk Utility (searchable through Spotlight), and select your drive from the left sidebar. Then, head to the Erase tab, and click Erase. No need to change any settings, unless you'd like to give it a new name. This will format the drive and prep it for the next step.

Launch SuperDuper, and set it to clone your Mac's hard drive to the SSD. If you gave it a new name in Disk Utility, it'll show up as such. Then choose Backup All Files, and click Copy Now.

This could take anywhere from 30 minutes to 3 hours depending on how much you have stored on your hard drive. When the process is complete, eject the SSD and shut down your computer.

Step 2: Remove the hard drive

In case you missed it in the previous step, shut down your computer.

Begin by removing your MacBook's back cover. There are 10 screws in total, including three longer ones. Put them in a small container as you remove them.

When the cover comes off, touch a metal part to release the static electricity. At this point, you might want to clean the inside of your Mac. I found that after years without cleaning, mine was full of dust. Use a soft brush or gentle bursts of compressed air to release the dust and grime.

To remove the hard drive, use the regular screwdriver to unscrew the two black screws belonging to the bracket securing the hard drive. Remove the bracket and set it aside.

Gently lift the hard drive. You'll see that a ribbon is attached to one end. Carefully wiggle the connector -- not the ribbon itself -- to disconnect it.

Remove the four torx screws attached to the hard drive and set aside. At this point, you can store your hard drive away or convert it to an external hard drive. You're done with it.

Step 3: Install the SSD

Grab the SSD and screw in the four torx screws you removed from the hard drive. Then, carefully attach the ribbon to the SSD, and insert the drive in the same configuration as the previous drive.

Re-attach the bracket. And finally, replace the back cover using the 10 screws.

If you made it this far without fumbling, congratulations! That was probably easier than you were expecting.

Now turn on your computer. It may take a couple of extra seconds as it gets acquainted with the new drive, but generally speaking, starting up your computer will be much faster than the past. You'll also notice that programs launch faster, saving files takes less time, and it feels less sluggish overall.