Month: March 2015

Every nation has to face a lot of challenges nowadays, especially when it comes to security. If a nation is doing something right, there will be someone somewhere attempting to take that away from them in order to succeed as well. In our modern day society, the biggest threats a nation such as the United Kingdom faces are extremely serious. These threats include terrorism, espionage and weapons of mass destruction. These are all threats that, if given the chance, will certainly terminate the nation as we know it.

As such, and pretty much like every government out there in the world, the United Kingdom needs to have government agencies protecting it against threats. Its citizens are not completely aware of these threats which means that they are not able to defeat them on their own – without some form of organized defensive method. In the movies, we see these agencies a lot, since they are represented while defending their nation and protecting the citizens against outside threats.

In the United Kingdom, the two most famous agencies protecting the nation are basically the MI5 and the MI6. Again, if we look at the movies, the famous spy James Bond belongs to the MI6. MI5 is the Security Service, also known as the UK’s security intelligence agency, responsible for protecting the nation and its citizens against foreign threats. They focus mainly on the British economic interest as well as anti-terrorism and counter-espionage operations.

Commonly, the MI5 is worried about internal and domestic issues, with overseas support on its mission (but this doesn’t happen very often). The service MI5 provides the country is overseen by a security committee of members of the parliament that are directly chosen by the Prime Minister himself. One can compare MI5 to a very famous American agency known as the FBI.

On the other hand, MI6 (Secret Intelligence Service, SIS) operates all over the world, and is the agency chosen to gather data and intelligence outside the United Kingdom in order to support the defense and security of the government, the economy and of foreign policies. This is the agency that provides the British government with foreign intelligence, which helps the government know all about what is happening in the world outside of the regular mainstream media.

The actions that MI5 has to perform are of extreme importance because threats might enter the nation without MI6 detecting them. For example, let’s take a look at the current terrorist threat there is out there. A lot of Muslim citizens enter the United Kingdom coming from nations in the Middle East on a daily basis and it is simply impossible to monitor every citizen that tries to enter the nation, regardless of origin. People are able to enter the nation through a whole variety of methods and as such, MI6 isn’t able to keep track of all of them.

Once inside the nation, the MI5 needs to detect these threats and prevent them from causing any damage to the nation itself or its citizens. Furthermore, a lot of threats might arise within the nation itself if a firm grip isn’t kept on its citizens. For example, radicalist groups and parties emerge all the time and if they are allowed free propaganda, a civil war might break out within the United Kingdom itself. These are obviously extreme examples, but they are also very real threats.

Even though the work of MI5 is extremely important, the work of MI6 doesn’t fall behind. There are literally over 200 nations in the world other than the United Kingdom, and although a lot of nations are allied to the UK itself, a lot of nations don’t like the British a lot. The actions of the MI6 not only help the government prevent wars from breaking out and attacks to be done on the nation itself, but also help the nation solve problems through political and economic actions due to the intelligence gathered about foreign nations. Solving problems this way ultimately allows the nation to avoid the use of force, which ends up saving lives.

When international threats seem to arise, both MI5 and MI6 work closely in order to counter the threat and guarantee the security of the nation. Both these agencies run covert operations. MI6 organizes covert operations all over the world with the use of human and technical resources, allowing them to gather intelligence of other nations. Mi5 on the other hand runs the same type of operations but instead of doing it all over the world, they do it within the nation itself, guaranteeing the security.

To summarize it all up: The MI5 is a government security agency charged with the protection of the nation’s economic, parliamentary interests as well as anti-terrorism and counter-espionage operations within the United Kingdom itself. These actions are of utmost important since they will allow the citizens of the nation to keep their integrity as well as their own nation. The MI6, on the other hand, is responsible for gathering foreign intelligence that the government will use to avoid international problems as well as to support other nations in their own struggles. Both foreign and internal security issues exist nowadays and the work of these agencies needs to keep on going, and if a concerning threat is detected, both of these agencies will work closely in order to protect the government and the citizens of the United Kingdom.

So you have decided you need a new smartphone, the old is pretty worn out and you need something that you can really rely on – a trusted sidekick. There are a lot of options out there but if you are going with Motorola, the Razr Maxx and the Razr Maxx HD are two of the most common choices there are.

Still, the first thing that meets the eye first is that the price (and the name) are different, so why is that? What is the difference between these two and is the price difference justifiable or should you just go with the cheaper option? Don0t worry, we’re going to look at the difference between the Razr Maxx and the Razr Maxx HD here so can know.

As far as the operative system goes, the Razr Maxx HD is a little bit in front of it, since it has the Android 4.4.2 while the Razr Maxx only has the Android 4.1.2. Nevertheless, this shouldn’t be a big factor in the difference between them since what really counts to the user is a lot more than this.

As far as the processor goes (remember, the processor is basically the brain your smartphone has) they are both well endowed. While Razr Maxx has a 1.2 GHz dual-core processor, the Razr Maxx HD outdoes it with a 1.5 GHz dual-core processor. That is quite the difference if you think about it in the long run.

When we talk about display, however, things get a little worst for Razr Maxx since the Razr Maxx HD (HD!) certainly does better, without a doubt. While the Razr Maxx has a 540 x 9660 screen display, the Razr Maxx HD outdoes it with a huge blow having a 4.7 inch multitouch screen with 1280 x 720 resolution. Quite the difference, as you can see.

The differences between these two do not end here, since the Maxx HD sets itself apart when it comes to storage as well. While Razr Maxx had a storage of only 8 GB with the possibility of a MicroSD card of up 32 GB being insert into it (this costs extra), the Maxx HD has internal storage of 32 GB with the same MicroSD card option.

All these functions, however, end up taking a toll on the battery life. While both phones have the same 3300 mAh lithium-ion battery, they have some difference when it comes to the life of their battery. The original Razr Maxx had a stand-by time of almost 16 days and an impressive 21.50 hours of talk time, which makes it quite impressive. The HD does take a toll on the Maxx HD as it lasts “only” 21 hours of talk time and has only 15.5 days of stand-by time.

Whether you have a business, have someone working under your wing, are self-employed or simply have to work and deal with taxes on a regular basis, you certainly know the frustration it can be. No one tells anyone how to deal with taxes the right way, it0s something people need to look up on their own. Schools don’t really teach us how to do our taxes, which isn’t really great.

Inuit Inc. came up with a solution for this by releasing software that is designed to manage taxes, payroll, inventory and a lot more. This software is called QuickBooks, and it certainly does its jobs perfectly. The software includes a wide variety of tolls such as marketing tools, merchant services and training solutions.

Since different companies have different needs, mostly according to their sizes, QuickBooks is available in a variety of formats. In this article, we will be looking at QuickBooks Pro and QuickBooks premier. Both of these have the ability to manage inventory, customers, vendors, employees and manage orders as well as monitor expenses, invoices and reports. There are other third-party tools that can be integrated with QuickBooks that will allow the enhancement of the functions this software already has, but that’s not what we’re here for.

The first difference is in the price. To a lot of companies QuickBooks pro just might be enough for their needs, while to some other companies QuickBooks pro won’t do a lot for them. The file format is the same for both of them and they are very similar but, as it should be, QuickBooks premier is more expensive due to the fact that it has a few more features that QuickBooks Pro does not have. As new versions keep on coming into the market, the amount of differences between them keep on increasing.

Right now, some of the features QuickBooks Premier has that QuickBooks Pro does not are a few. These features, as said before, might be worthless for very small businesses, but if a business aims to keep on growing, as it should, than it just might be better to purchase QuickBooks Premier by making a little bigger of an investment. It just might pay off – but we’ll leave that up to you. Here are the features that the Premier version has, and the Pro version doesn’t have.

Profitability by Product

It’s pretty self-explanatory. If you have multiple products in the system it might be a good idea to keep track of all of them. The reports come in a very easy-to-read report which makes it all worthwhile. This can be a very helpful tool when trying to identify why a product is making profit and why another product isn’t.

Balanced Sheet by Class

This tool allows you to track balanced sheet items such as account receivables, account payables by class and fixed assets. Added up to other tools, this can help you save tons of time at the end of the day.

Jobs by Vendor

A tool that easily allows you to keep track of your vendors to see what jobs they are working on and what jobs they have already done. Of course, in a small company, this tool might be completely useless since in some cases this can even be memorized. But as companies keep on growing things are going to be needed to keep track of everything, and if there is a tool already available for it, why not use it?

Expenses Not Assigned to Jobs

A little bit of money has to go here, a little bit has to go there, and after a while the money is all gone. This is something that happens a lot more than what you might think because since the money goes piece by piece people won’t realize it’s going, but it is, and soon enough it will all be gone if it goes on going away. With this tool, you can keep track of things piling up, and with its help you will surely realize that it is actually piling up.

Inventory Reorder Point by Vendor

For companies that have experience and know exactly what they’re doing, this tool can work wonders. It allows the user to track inventories as well as to set optimal inventory levels, in order to keep up with everything that is required. Furthermore, it runs reports on items that might need to be reordered.

Cost to Complete Report

This is an excellent tool to use while expanding since it allows the user to control the costs that were estimated to the actual costs. Not only will it help a company that is expanding for the first time by giving it experience and realistic data, it will also help companies that might be redefining themselves or performing any other type of large operation.

Forecast Sales and Expenses

The tool obviously allows you to do budgets and keep track of estimated budgets as well as actual reports. But as we all know, a company needs to look at the future in order to know what to expect and what it can actually count on. As such, this tool also allows the user to create forecasts and compare them with real reports of what actually happened. This will allow the company to do more realistic forecasts in the future as well as improve the experience they acquire with each and every circumstance that occurs during the process.

The Infinity G35 is a sports car that was available as a coupe from 2002 to 2006. In 2007 it became available as a sedan and in 2009 it was replaced by the G37. The G37 comes as a coupe, sedan, or convertible. So other than those basic features, what else is different about these two models?

The main difference between the two models is the engine. Both come with a V6 engine, which for most people might sound like they both have the same engine. But car enthusiasts know better. The G35 holds a 3.5 liter engine with 306 horsepower that puts out 268 pound-feet of torque. The G37, by comparison, has a 3.7 liter engine with 328 horsepower that is capable of 269 pound-feet of torque. This obviously gives the G37 a little more power, but not so much more as to completely blow to G35 out of the water.

Both cars are available with 5 speed automatic overdrive transmissions. If you want to go with a manual transmission, the G35 has a 6 speed with overdrive while the G37 offers a 7 speed with overdrive manual transmission. This difference can be seen in the fuel economy of these vehicles, though it isn’t a huge factor. Both get 18 mpg in the city. Out on the open road, the G35 gets 23 mpg and the G37 25 mpg. Again, not a huge difference, but a slight win on the G37’s side.

Where the real difference comes into play is in all the extra gadgets. The radio and CD player in the two cars are almost identical, but the G37 offers an optional DVD player, unlike the G35. The G37’s navigation screen is a touch screen with the radio integrated into it. You can rip CDs or load music from a card or iPod into your Music Box Hard Drive in the G37 as well. Another cool feature of the G37 is the steering wheel controls that allow you to browse through your iPod.

Other extra features offered by the G37 is a backup camera, perfect for tight parking, auto tilt headlights, and laser guided cruise control. There is a NavTraffic feature which is advertised to warn you of upcoming traffic, though reviews on its accuracy have been mixed.

Brand new, the G35 retailed for $32,000 to $34,000. The G37 goes for anywhere between $33,000 and $37,000. Used, the G35 is now available for around $27,000. So if you want a fun sports car that fits in the mid-range luxury car class, the G35 will meet all you needs and save you a little money. If you want all the latest gadgets and coolest toys, the G37 is the car for you.

If you own a computer you will surely need cable connectors in order to get your appliances working on your computer. Cable connectors are pretty much a big topic nowadays since, for example, if you are transferring huge amounts of data from an external source to your own computer, you certainly wouldn’t like to wait around 5 hours for it to finish.

The Role of Firewire

The speed at which this data is transferred varies based on a large amount of variables, such as the computer itself, cable length, and so on. The most commonly known type of connection was the USB, which was widely used throughout the world. But, with the coming of Apple, a new type appeared called Firewire. Firewire was developed by Apple itself and it is a little more expensive due to royalties that the company receives on every purchase.

The two most common types of Firewire connectors are Firewire 400 and Firewire 800. One might wonder what the difference between these two is but in fact, it is extremely simple. The difference between these two is simply the speed at which they are able to transfer data. The numbers are referring to Mbps, which means that a Firewire 400 can transfer at the approximate rate of 400 Mbps, and the Firewire 800 connector is twice as fast as this.

As said previously, the speed varies depending on a lot of factors, and the speed of the connectors is certainly not going to be enough to guarantee a speedy transfer. For example, if you computer’s hardware is incapable of handling what a Firewire 800 is, than you won’t be able to transfer at its full capacity.

As opposed to USB drives that need to be connected directly to your computer, Firewire connectors might be connected to one another providing them length whenever you need to the cables to stretch out for a little bit more than what they were supposed to stretch out.

Use of Firewire 400 or 800

Firewire 800 is compatible with peripherals of a Firewire 400, which means that you can connect those peripherals to a port and use your Firewire 800 on a port meant for Firewire 400. These will require adaptors, but they are pretty much inexpensive considering that they will be saving you the trouble of buying a whole brand new computer. For example, some of these adaptors can be found out there on the market for just above $ 10 from renowned brands.

If those brands prove to be too expensive, however, you can search hard for an adaptor that will be at a lower price. As far as we know, it is possible to acquire a Firewire 800 to 400 for just as little as $ 4, which is almost next to nothing.

When you’re buying a new TV, lots of factors come into play. You have the size of the screen, sound quality, high definition, plasma vs LCD…the list goes on. And tucked in there somewhere is the number of hertz that your TV is capable of, which is also called the refresh rate. The two most common refresh rates out there today are 120hz and 240hz.

Unique Differences Between 120hx and 240hz

To really understand what the difference is between 120hz and 240hz, you first have to understand how filming a video works. Every movie you watch, no matter how big the budget, is essentially a flip book. That’s right, when you drew a little stick figure turning a cartwheel at the corner of your notebook, you were doing the exact same thing as blockbuster directors.

What I mean is, every movie is just a collection of static pictures. When those pictures get displayed on your TV at the correct speed, they look like moving pictures (hence, movies). The faster the picture moves, the smoother the action in the film looks.

When movies are filmed, the film is capturing a set number of pictures, called frames, for every second of action. This is called the fps (frames per second). Almost all movies are filmed in either 24 or 30 fps. So that means that every time you watch a movie you are actually watching 24 or 30 pictures move across your screen every second, right?

The Role of Hertz in Television

Not quite. This is where we get to 120 vs 240hz. Hertz is what we use to measure how quickly your television can change from one picture to another. So if you are watching a film shot in 24 fps on a screen with only 1hz, you can only display one of those 24 frames every second, which isn’t very good. If you had a 24hz TV, everything would be perfect because your screen would be refreshing at the exact same rate as the frames.

Except what happens when you watch a movie filmed in 30 fps? Now your 24hz TV is missing 6 frames for every second of film. But upgrading to a 30hz TV isn’t going to solve your problems because then you won’t be able to watch 24 fps movies. To explain why not, we’re going to move past 30hz to 60hz TVs.

60hz is perfect for watching 30 fps movies. The screen is refreshing 60 times per second, meaning it is displaying each frame twice since 30 divides evenly into 60. But 24 doesn’t, it goes into 60 2.5 times. Interpolation is a process which fixes this problem by inserting copies of 6 frames into the film to bring it up to 30 fps. This kind of words, but the action gets funny when it is manipulated like this. It no longer looks natural.

The solution to this problem is 120 and 240 hertz TVs. The reason these two refresh rates are perfect is that both of them are evenly divisible by both 24 and 30. This means that with either a 120 or a 240 hertz TV, you can watch both 24 and 30 fps movies without a problem. Get it? Good, because now we’re ready to start actually comparing the two.

What it Boils Down to

The basic difference between 120 and 240hz is that once is refreshing 120 times per second and the other is refreshing 240 times. A faster refresh rate typically means a clearer picture, but in these ranges it doesn’t make nearly as large a difference. A true film connoisseur might be able to identify a 120hz TV just by watching a movie on it, but your average television owner isn’t going to notice the slight loss of clarity compared to a 240hz.

So when we’re talking about watching regular, flat movies, the difference between 120 and 240hz really comes down to your own personal preferences. If you’re willing to spend some extra money to get the absolute best picture quality available, you’ll want the 240. If you’re willing to cut some corner to save a little money, you’ll most likely be perfectly happy with your 120.

Why mention flat movies? Because the rules change once you start watching things in 3D. TVs add depth to the picture by only showing half of each image to each of your eyes. That’s why everything looks so blurry if you’re not wearing the 3D glasses.

Instead of saying you only see half of each image, perhaps it’s better to say you only see half of the frames displayed. So on a 120hz TV, each eye is actually seeing 60 frames per second. Do you know why that’s a problem?

For exactly the same reason that 60hz TVs had to be replaced by 120hz in the first place. Because 60 isn’t evenly divisible by 24, you won’t be able to watch a 3D movie shot in 24fps on your 120hz TV. Or, to be fair, you can watch it, but some of the action might look too smooth and come across as unnatural.

A 240hz TV doesn’t have this problem. That is because when you divide 240 in half, each of your eyes is still watching in 120hz. Because 120 is divisible by both 24 and 30, you can watch 3D movies shot at either speed with no loss of picture clarity or manipulations of the film.

The Perception with Televisions

With TVs, as with most things, people tend to naturally assume that bigger means better. In this case they are both right and wrong. More hertz does mean a faster refresh rate, so technically a 240hz TV will have a better picture than a 120hz TV. But for most people, this difference is so slight as to be unnoticeable. Going with a 120hz TV will save you some money without costing you any real quality.

The exception to this rule is 3D movies. Because they work by dividing the picture in half, a 240hz TV is going to stay truer to the original action caught on film than a 120hz TV. Only in this case will you truly notice the difference between a 120 and 240 hertz TV.