Tools

“Tools” are an important part of this site. As you browse you will come across many examples of my recommendations for technology tools and vendors.

Let me be clear: These recommendations are based on my own experience. You may or may not like, find useful, or get any value out of the same tools or vendors that I did. But of course I would not recommend them if I did not think there was a good chance you would like the result.

At least several of these recommendations involve “affiliate” relationships. This means, if you buy from the recommended vendor, then I will get a commission of some sort.

Specifically, here are some of the tools and vendors I recommend, along with some of the reasons I like them and in some cases an affiliate link to the product or service they sell.

  • 2BrightSparks - This vendor is kind of a one-off since I am including them based on just a single product offering called SyncBackSE. This is a backup tool which complements my preferred online backup solution by offering a super-simple way to keep a local backup of all of my hosted website files.
  • Amazon – One of my favorite places to find and buy books, gadgets, and some basic consumer electronics. Not the best prices on some items, but for certain types of products I would say this is the #1 vendor.
  • Best Buy – Any time I want to buy a consumer electronic but I really want to see it “live” first, I will head to Best Buy. Sometimes I will even mix-up the experience by making the purchase online so the item is waiting for me at the counter when I get to the store.
  • Dropbox – I’ve tried most of the big backup tools and services out there. To me, this one is by far the best – as long as your data needs are not more than 50 or 100 GB.
  • Evernote – It can be overwhelming at first, but once you get a handle on how exactly you want to use this online / offline note-taking service you will most likely find it invaluable.
  • Netflix – After a long day of tool-using, you can vegge-out with unlimited streaming movies.
  • Norton / Symantec – I used to love Norton. Then I hated it. Now I am on-board again – ever since Norton 360 was released I think the software is worth buying again.
  • Quicken – Similar to my experience with Norton, I have had a love/hate relationship with Quicken over the years. My final verdict is that it is big. You have to spend time with it. And it has some significant “warts”.
  • Radio Shack -This is an old-time favorite. In my opinion, the best place to go when you need to pick-up a random cable or small item.
  • Remember the Milk – My favorite for keeping track of tasks and projects. It took me a while to figure out how to fit it into my natural process, but now I doubt I could live without it! (Also great for grocery lists…)
  • Staples – Along with Best Buy, this is one of my favorite places to shop locally for consumer electronics.
  • Thesis Theme for WordPress - This premium WordPress theme is a bit pricey when you are just starting out with a new website, but it does take a lot of the complexity out of setting things up. And, you will find that it is very flexible as your needs become more complex.
  • TiVo - The original DVR service – I still think it blows away any DVR you can get from your cable company.
  • T-Mobile - I think they’ve always been the most innovative cellular service out there. They were the first to offer the “Google Phone”, and are still the only ones to support UMA calling over WiFi without any additional fee or equipment needed.
  • WordPress and various plugins – Too many to list right now, this will have to come in a separate post.

Note: I can see that this list is getting awfully long. I plan to divide it out into sections, including some or all of the following: tools, services, stores, products, plugins, free tools, software

Image credit: mi_brami from the Open Clip Art Library