Chrome has been making some major inroads into the browser market share of both Internet Explorer and Firefox. It is now close to tied with Firefox and the trend seems to favor Chrome. This is no doubt due to Google leveraging its marketing power to push Chrome. The new Chromebooks will certainly help push the name recognition further.

I use both browsers regularly (8+ hours a day, side-by-side on dual monitors) and after a couple years I still find myself using Firefox first. I figured I would try and compile a mostly-objective list of the reasons why I prefer Firefox. This comparison is done for Chrome version 16 and Firefox version 9.

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I'm not the first to ask for or dream up a Steam PC game rental or rent-to-own service, but until they offer it, I don't see the harm in speculating. There is undoubtedly a huge market of untapped potential here. Other companies have offered rental services, but none come even close to the reach Valve has with Steam. Here is my idea for a Steam Rent-to-Own service:

Rent-to-Own Model

All game rentals cost a flat rate of $1 per day, and there is no limit to the number of concurrent rentals. The $1 is charged at the beginning of the day, adjusted for each time zone, and is good for that day. If the rental is started after noon, the $1 charge starts at the beginning of the next day.

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The Flash Player download from Adobe's main website is not a compete installer. After running it, the installer's first step is to download the rest of itself. This generally isn't a problem, but it is useful to have the full standalone installer if you need to install Flash Player on an offline computer. It can also bypass the Adobe Flash Player Failed to Initialize error that sometimes occurs with the normal installer.

You can find the current version of the full Adobe Flash Player installer for all operating systems at the following link:

http://www.adobe.com/products/flashplayer/fp_distribution3.html

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If you've downloaded the Adobe Reader installer from the main Adobe website, you've probably noticed that it is not a complete installer. After running it, the installer's first step is to download the rest of the installer. No, you're not the only one that finds this annoying.

Adobe does have full installers available, though they aren't easy to navigate to from Adobe's website. They are available on Adobe's FTP site, which you probably didn't know existed. The current version of Adobe Reader can be downloaded from the following directory:

ftp://ftp.adobe.com/pub/adobe/reader/

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By default Google Chrome disables your extensions for Incognito windows. This is in general a good practice since extensions can collect and store private data. But for me, it is particularly irritating to not have Adblock Plus enabled. Opening an Incognito window feels like I'm being transported back in time to 2006 or something. Full-screen popups, flashing banner ads, "fake" links littered throughout a text document, and other horrors.

Luckily, you can easily enable your extensions in Incognito mode by going to Tools -> Extensions, clicking the little arrow to the left of the extension in mind, and then clicking "Allow in incognito":

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Facebook's Timeline is a major overhaul to the Facebook profile. For me, the Cover Picture is the most welcome new "feature", since it allows you to make your profile "yours", almost as much as you used to be able to do on MySpace (custom overlays notwithstanding).

Beyond this, the Timeline allows you to go back in time and see your previous activity without clicking "Older Posts" countless times. You can fill in old data if you want, even from dates before joining Facebook --or should I say, especially from dates before joining Facebook. After all, Facebook wants your entire life, not just since you joined. It's already data-mined the crap out of the last few years, and now it wants more.

On that note, is Facebook getting too ahead of itself by listing "Born" as the start of the timeline? Do they really want you to go back and add pictures of that painting you made in 5th grade?

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This guide will show you how to connect your Playstation 2 to your computer monitor and easily switch between the two on the fly. This guide has been migrated from my old guides site to here.

HDMI is not covered, but there are now HDMI switch boxes you can get, which will be a little simpler as long as your monitor has an HDMI input.

Some things to know before you start

When talking about audio and video signals, it is best to get familiar with some common terminology:

• A/V: Audio and video.
• Source: Where the video or audio signal originates from. This can be the computer or the Playstation 2. These devices send A/V signals to the inputs of the VGA box, monitor, or sound system depending on how you setup your system (usually just to the VGA box).
• Input and output: The signal that a device receives is the input, and the signal that is sends out is the output. The VGA box has inputs to receive signals from the PC and PS2, and outputs to send signals to the monitor and sound system.

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Whenever possible, I always link to and embed HD versions of YouTube videos. I do this primarily for the better 152kbps audio quality. YouTube has made some changes recently that have made it more difficult to link to and embed HD videos, but it's still doable.

Link to HD YouTube Videos

Linking directly to a high definition (HD) version of a YouTube video used to be done by adding "&fmt=" and 35, 22, or 37 at the end of the link. This no longer works, but you can still use "&hd=1", which will link to the 720p version of a video, if available. Here is an example of a link with "&hd=1" added to the end of it:


The following will also work:

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For those that might be curious, here are the percentages of both operating system and internet browser usage share among visitors of this site for all of 2011. This is based on visits (not hits).

Operating system percentage share:


Internet browser percentage share:

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