Author: Craig Lloyd

  • How to make a DIY smartphone stand for under $1

    Smartphone stands are a great way to watch content on your phone without having to hold the phone upright, and there are a ton of different DIY methods for making them. A lot of them are made so that they’ll hold your phone horizontally, but some users want stands that prop up their phones vertically,…

  • Build it on a budget: A $500 workhorse PC

    You may remember well over a year ago when we first introduced a budget build guide for DIY PC builders, and it’s long overdue for a refresh. Computer components have come a long way since then, and Intel recently launched their new 4th-generation Core Haswell chips. As I mentioned in last year’s guide, not everyone…

  • Thinking about getting a standing desk? Here are some tips

    You may have heard of a new trend called standing desks. They’re certainly not new by any means – Winston Churchhill used a standing desk, and so did Leonardo da Vinci and Ernest Hemmingway – but they’ve been gaining in popularity recently. It’s becoming more well known that sitting down all day is bad for…

  • How to install a SSD in a MacBook Pro

    Upgrading your computer with a solid-state hard drive is probably one of the most beneficial upgrades you could make. Boot-up times decrease tremendously and programs launch almost instantly. I finally made the plunge to an SSD recently and haven’t looked back. However, many of the how-to guides that I needed in order to properly install…

  • How to make a DIY laptop stand for $8

    A laptop stand is a great thing to have if you’re working at a desk. It not only allows your laptop to breath more easily and run cooler (since it’s propped up), but it also makes your setup more ergonomic by having your laptop’s display at eye level. You can buy laptop stands pretty much…

  • Game review: Hero Academy

    If you know me, you know I’m a picky gamer. I don’t play a lot of games, but that’s not because I don’t like gaming — I just can never find a game that I enjoy long enough to stick with it. Hero Academy, a turn-based strategy game on iOS and Windows, just made its…

  • iPhone app review: Checkmark

    iOS’s built-in Reminders app is pretty good, but not great. The location-based reminders are a bit time-consuming to set up and the whole app is pretty basic and doesn’t offer up a whole lot of features. Checkmark, on the other hand, is an extremely intuitive reminders app that takes location-based reminders to a completely new…

  • Are computer eyewear the way to go?

    I got to try out a pair of Gunnar Optiks glasses for a couple weeks. Essentially these glasses get rid of the harsh blue hue that monitors and displays emit by layering the lenses with a yellowish tint. So, theoretically, headaches and eye strain caused by looking at a monitor for long periods of time…

  • Buy a smartphone with a “bad ESN” for cheap entertainment

    When scouring Craigslist or eBay for a good deal on a used smartphone, a lot of people avoid listings that say “bad ESN.” In the simplest of terms, this means that the phone is banned from being activated with a carrier, so it wouldn’t be able to make calls or send and receive text messages.…

  • Gaming on a budget: An exhaustive guide

    Gaming is expensive, plain and simple. With the price of a new game being around $60, it’s hard to justify spending that kind of money on a new title that you really want when your budget can’t compete with it. However, with a few tips and simple methods that you can keep in mind, you’ll…