Laptop

Perhaps you've heard of Tommy Jordan. He's the North Carolina dad who recently recorded a video of himself reading and responding to a Facebook post composed by his 15-year-old daughter, Hannah, after which he shot her computer nine times with a .45 pistol. Hannah had done what 15-year-olds have been doing since time immemorial: She complained to her friends, in this case in rather foul-mouthed terms, about household chores and the overall lameness of her parents. Her dad, in turn, did what parents do: He lost his temper and took away something she held dear - in this case, the laptop.

Michelle Reiter lost $4,000 in cash, a 32-inch TV and a laptop computer when her Glendale home was burglarized. But also stolen that day was something far more valuable — her 11-year-old teacup Yorkshire terrier, Sophie. Since that time, she has been frantically searching for Sophie, not only because the dog is her greatest love, but because Sophie needs periodic medication for her bowels. Sophie was reported stolen after burglars entered Reiter's home on May 7 in the 600 block of Beulah Street through a rear bathroom window and ransacked the inside, according to Glendale Police Department reports.

Parents may be applauding Tommy Jordan, the dad from North Carolina who famously shot his 15-year-old daughter's laptop with a .45 and made a YouTube video to prove it, but parenting expert Larry Winget says he should have skipped the gunfire and turned to duct tape instead. "To me it would have made more sense to take duct tape and wrap it up and show it to her," said Winget, the tough talking author of "Your Kids are Your Own Fault" and "You're Broke Because You Want to Be. " "And I would say look at what you can't have.

Forget new car, percolating java or even newborn baby. I realize it now: I love the smell of fresh MacBook in the morning. "A distinctive scent can be observed when unwrapping a newly purchased Apple product from its packaging," according to Air Aroma's blog post .  "Apple fans will certainly recognize this smell. " Although I do distinctly remember the smell of my most recent MacBook's unwrapping in November, I think I mistook that for excitement and elation -- and the smell of $1,100 leaving my account.

For many airline passengers, carrying a laptop or smartphone through security is as familiar a part of the travel ritual as removing their shoes. But for travelers arriving in the United States from other countries, the process is not always so simple; thousands have had their electronic devices not just screened but confiscated, and sometimes not returned for months. Given the wealth of personal information contained in such devices, a search of their contents is infinitely more intrusive than a luggage search.

I'm glad for Verified Identity Pass Inc. that it found its missing laptop. That's a relief. ("Laptop with fliers' data found," Aug. 6.) And the laptop was missing for only a week, and found in the same office in which it had gone missing. What luck! Surely no one could have copied any of the registered travelers' unencrypted data in a week, right? Never mind about everyone in the Clear program whose identification information was on the laptop. And never mind about all other travelers who are exposed to phony Clear travelers using stolen identity data.

Computer makers are recalling 100,000 laptop battery packs made by Sony Corp. after 40 reports of overheating, according to the Consumer Product Safety Commission. The recall applies to Sony 2.15Ah lithium-ion cell batteries made in Japan and sold in laptops made by Hewlett-Packard Co., Dell Inc. and Toshiba Corp. Some incidents involved smoke or flames, according to Sony. Details, including laptop model numbers, are posted on the commission's website at www.cpsc.gov.

An encrypted government disc has been found hidden in a computer sold on EBay -- another loss of sensitive data in a string of such missteps that is alarming privacy advocates as Britain inches closer to requiring all citizens to carry identity cards. A customer brought the laptop to Leapfrog Computers in the northern English city of Bolton for repairs, sales manager Jonathan Parry said. The disc had been wedged inside the laptop, apparently deliberately, he said. He added that the laptop might have been stolen before being put up for sale on EBay.

Good posture used to be about standing up straight, but now it’s about how you use computers and laptops -- and whether they’re giving you a pain in the neck. The McKinley Health Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, which provides a "Posture and Study Habits Guide" to students, says good posture is important for computer users to keep neck pain at bay. Among the tips: Put your laptop at eye level and use an external keyboard and mouse positioned at elbow height.

A U.S. Customs inspection of a laptop computer that yielded child pornography does not constitute an unreasonable search and seizure, a U.S. federal appeals court ruled Monday. Michael Arnold argued that the U.S. Constitution's protections against searches without reasonable suspicion should have barred a 2005 search of his laptop at Los Angeles International Airport after he had returned from the Philippines. He was later charged with possession of child pornography and related crimes.

MINNEAPOLIS - There are a lot of screens on which to watch new movies: TV, laptop, tablet or smartphone. But until now you needed a TV signal, a disc or a movie-streaming Internet connection. Not for long. This week marks the debut of airport vending kiosks that rent or sell movies that can be watched in-flight on a Windows PC. The rental service, from Santa Monica-based Digiboo, is being introduced at a time when consumers are shifting away from movie rentals to online movie streaming.

Perhaps you've heard of Tommy Jordan. He's the North Carolina dad who recently recorded a video of himself reading and responding to a Facebook post composed by his 15-year-old daughter, Hannah, after which he shot her computer nine times with a .45 pistol. Hannah had done what 15-year-olds have been doing since time immemorial: She complained to her friends, in this case in rather foul-mouthed terms, about household chores and the overall lameness of her parents. Her dad, in turn, did what parents do: He lost his temper and took away something she held dear - in this case, the laptop.

Parents may be applauding Tommy Jordan, the dad from North Carolina who famously shot his 15-year-old daughter's laptop with a .45 and made a YouTube video to prove it, but parenting expert Larry Winget says he should have skipped the gunfire and turned to duct tape instead. "To me it would have made more sense to take duct tape and wrap it up and show it to her," said Winget, the tough talking author of "Your Kids are Your Own Fault" and "You're Broke Because You Want to Be. " "And I would say look at what you can't have.

Here's a welcome way to make use of your wheel-aboard bag while you're waiting at the airport gate: Attach the Tripad Traveler “desk” to the bag's extended pull arms. Now you have a handy little work space or eating surface. The slim 15-by-12 3/4-inch plastic desk has two slide-out extensions (one with a cup holder) and fits in most standard-size laptop bags. It's designed to hold up to 10 pounds and costs $59.95. Info: Tripad

When: 8. Where: Sports Arena. On the air: TV: Prime Ticket; Radio: 570. Records: UCLA 0-1, Middle Tennessee State 2-0. Update: UCLA senior guard Jerime Anderson will make his season debut after sitting out the opener while completing his suspension in connection with the theft of a laptop computer. Middle Tennessee State held Austin Peay and Loyola Marymount to a combined 36.3% shooting while playing a variety of defenses, including a trapping 1-3-1 zone and man to man. --Ben Bolch

Discount giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc. is going mini for the holiday season. The world's biggest retailer has opened two temporary Walmart.com shops in Southern California aimed at steering shoppers to its website. The so-called pop-up stores feature a curated assortment of toys and electronics, many of which are for display only. Shoppers can browse the items, then order them directly from Wal-Mart's website on laptops and tablet computers provided on tables at each store. "The goal was to give our local customers easier access to the range of products on Walmart.com," spokesman Lorenzo Lopez said.

I usually carry a laptop computer when I travel on business. But working with a portable personal computer never has been as easy or as pleasant as using my desktop system. In addition to being a lot faster than my laptop, my desktop PC has a high-capacity hard disk, an excellent display screen, plenty of memory and a fast central processing chip. The laptop that I've used for the past couple of years, although adequate, lacks a hard disk, has a screen that is hard to read under some conditions and runs a lot slower than my desktop machine.

Trips to an electronics repair store sometimes turn into an exercise in debate: "Yes, I'm sure I didn't spill water on it!" Apple Inc. is looking to put those arguments to rest by using a technology that detects when a laptop has been exposed to liquid. The Cupertino, Calif.-based company's new MacBook and MacBook Pro computers include two liquid submersion indicators, which are small sensors located under the keyboard and near the trackpad that change color when exposed to a liquid.

Jerime Anderson is ready for the mean-spirited props that are sure to follow him this season wherever UCLA goes. "I anticipate everything — laptops in the crowd, a MacBook," the senior guard said Wednesday during the Bruins' media day. "I'm ready for anything. " Whatever taunts fans direct his way, they won't be nearly as bothersome as the uncertainty surrounding his future this summer. Anderson said he didn't know what to expect after he was arrested in July on suspicion of stealing a laptop from a building on campus.

It seems you can surf the Internet and check your email from virtually anywhere these days — in coffee shops, hotel lobbies, airport terminals and airplane cabins. More places are making it easier to turn on your laptop or tablet computer and connect to the Internet through free public WiFi hot spots. But much like leaving your diary on a park bench, connecting to the Internet using a public WiFi allows anyone with the right software to see what you are doing. Worse, you risk being hit with malware and other virulent programs that can turn your computer into botnets controlled by hackers to attack websites.