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Over 50 US electric companies have joined the National Electric Highway Coalition (NEHC) to build a nationwide EV charging grid. The Edison Electric Institute estimates there will be almost 22 million EVs on US roads by the end of the decade. To charge them, the country will need 100,000 EV fast charging ports. And that’s the job of the NEHC: achieving this goal “using any approach they see fit.” “A realistic timeframe for replacing gas stations would be within the next 10 to 15 years....

Apple’s first round of M1-based Macs was designed to show off the incredible power and efficiency of Apple’s own chip designs, without scaring anybody off. Externally, the M1 MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and Mac mini are all but identical to the preceding Intel versions, providing a sense of continuity. But now that Apple has proven that these Silicon Macs are more than capable, what can it do with these ultra-efficient, ultra-powerful computers?...

Yesterday, to beat the other passengers on the plane, as soon as I got out of the airport, I rushed to the car rental location, leaving my wife to deal with the luggage. That’s a pro tip. One person deals with luggage the other gets the car. Go team Baldwin. While I was able to get our vehicle quicker than most (another pro tip: use car rental company apps and sign up to be a preferred member, the line is shorter), it still took too long....

What Is Xbox Game Pass Ultimate? Game Pass Ultimate is an unlimited gaming subscription service for Xbox One consoles and PCs. It will also work with the new Xbox Series X and Series S consoles. There are no limitations on how many games you can play each month and there are no restrictions. The games are the full titles, just like if you’d paid the full price for them. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate also bundles in Xbox Live Gold so you can play these games online too and enjoy the multiplayer features available through them....

Thanks to Xbox Cloud streaming, any PC or phone can play Xbox games. And now, with an update to the Xbox Game Pass app, it also runs on Android devices, including Microsoft’s little fold-up Surface Duo, a dual-screen tablet/phone thingy. The Surface Duo uses one screen to show the game, and one screen to display the touch-screen controls. In this way it’s a kind of combination of gaming on the iPhone, and on the Nintendo DS....

In a recent Twitter thread, Twitter Support revealed the social media company’s upcoming changes for DMs. The stated intention is to improve navigation for conversations and make tweet sharing within messages easier, among other adjustments. Unfortunately none of these involves the (very) often-requested Edit button. First on the list is the option to share a single tweet through up to 20 separate DM conversations. The hope is that this will lessen the chances of someone accidentally creating group chats when trying to send a tweet to multiple people....

Micro USB has been around longer and is on more devices such as digital cameras and smart home devices. Technically, Micro USB can mean one of three shapes: Micro USB-A, Micro USB-B, and USB 3.0 Micro-B. USB-C is used mainly on newer smartphones and computers, and it, too, has different specs as it has evolved over the years. What could be more confusing is that despite USB-C’s evolution, the shape has remained the same....

Here’s what else you need to know. Overall Findings (Main Differences) The easiest way to understand the differences between USB-C vs USB 3 is that one describes the connector (USB-C), and the other is the data transfer technology (USB 3). USB-C is the latest generation of USB connectors that provide a reversible plug you can insert into the device without inserting it wrong. USB-C is also capable of providing more power to devices....

While it’s still possible to create an exact copy (a clone) of any drive connected directly to your Mac, changes to Disk Utility have created extra steps when you use Disk Utility’s Restore function to clone your startup drive. But don’t let the idea of extra steps get in the way, the process is still pretty simple, and the added steps actually help ensure a more accurate clone of the startup drive....

About the Mac OS and Multiple RAID Types Since its early days, the Mac operating system has supported multiple RAID types using AppleRAID software that is part of diskutil, the command-line tool used for formatting, partitioning, and repairing storage devices on a Mac. Until OS X El Capitan, RAID support was built into the Disk Utility app, which you could use to create and manage RAID arrays. Apple dropped the RAID support in the El Capitan version of the Disk Utility app but kept AppleRAID available for users who were willing to use Terminal and the command line....

VR lets you voyage anywhere from Mount Everest to Machu Picchu from the comfort of your couch. All you need is a headset, an internet connection, and the right VR software. “With an ongoing global pandemic preventing most people from traveling, we’re all increasingly seeking new ways to visit our favorite places and see the sights without leaving home,” Meaghan Fitzgerald, head of experiences product marketing at Facebook Reality Labs, which makes the Oculus headsets, said in an email interview....

According to Apple rumormonger Luke Miani, Apple’s replacement for the MacBook Pro will include a high-speed SD card reader. We’ve already seen plenty of rumors that the SD card reader was making a comeback, including leaked schematics from Apple. It makes sense that Apple would put the fastest reader in its pro machines, but what are the advantages for users? “While it’s also possible to carry around an SD card reader that connects to USB or lightning ports, built-in readers are one less thing to carry around, they work more reliably, and they’re much, much faster than dongles,” Devon Fata, CEO of design company Pixoul, told Lifewire via email....

5G, primarily when used in manufacturing, blurs the line and strengthens the relationship between physical production and digital technology. 5G’s real-time data capabilities allow for next-gen applications, coupled with smart tech, cloud computing, and enhanced automation. It’s a driving force behind the Fourth Industrial Revolution. What Is a Private Network? Sometimes called NPNs (Non-Public Networks), private 5G networks are similar to the 5G that’s available worldwide—the same tech is used, and they deliver some of the same benefits....

The Game Boy (Also Known as Game Boy Classic or GB): The enormous success of the first Game Boy sent shockwaves throughout the home video game industry that secured the handheld as a standard. Never before had a system combined high-quality cartridge-based games with, for its time, high tech Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) graphics delivered in glorious black & green. GB was also the first handheld system to feature multi-link gaming via a port that connects multiple systems for multiplayer battles....

According to a reliable rumor source, Apple is weighing up the pros and cons of a giant iPad. Many folks might laugh and call such a thing ridiculous. Others—those who love the large 12.9-inch iPad Pro—are thinking a 16-incher can’t come soon enough. But what are the upsides and downsides of such a huge, thin tablet? “Large-scale computing—the type you’d normally get from a desktop—could become more of a reality on a big iPad display....

How Is My Google Data Gathered? Understanding how Google gathers information about you is a great way to demonstrate just how much the company knows about you. The truth is that there isn’t any cloak and dagger spying going on with Google. They simply store the information you give them while using their services. But they store almost everything, and they keep a historical record of it, so the data can go back years....

The main use of a CHF is to verify the authenticity of a piece of data. Two files can be assumed to be identical only if the checksums generated from each file, using the same cryptographic hash function, are identical. Some commonly used cryptographic hash functions include MD5 and SHA-1, although many others also exist. These are often referred to as “hash functions,” but that’s not technically correct. A hash function is a generic term that encompasses CHFs along with other sorts of algorithms like cyclic redundancy checks....

What Is a DJVU File? Developed by AT&T Labs, a DJVU file (pronounced like déjà vu) is a graphics file format intended for scanned images, kind of like the PDF format, which you’re probably more familiar with. Since a DJVU file can contain compressed yet high-quality color images, photographs, text, and drawings, it’s used as the format for some eBooks, as well as manuals, newspapers, ancient documents, etc. that have been scanned into a computer....

Finding Your Network Security Key The fastest, easiest way to find your network security key is through your router directly. Find the Network Security Key on Your Phone You also can view the stored network security key on your Android or iPhone. Here’s how. On an Android Device On an Android, the best option if you don’t have root access is to install and connect Minimal ADB and Fastboot on your PC....

No software program is perfect and so patches are common, even years after a program has been released. The more popular a program is, the more likely rare problems occur, and so some of the most popular programs in existence are some of the most patched. A collection of usually already-released patches is often called a service pack. Do I Need to Install Patches? Software patches normally fix bugs, but they can also be released to address security vulnerabilities and inconsistencies in a piece of software....