Author: Paul Lilly

Do you use Gmail? Great, keep reading (and if you're not, go register and come back, we'll still be here). One of Gmail's many cool tricks is the ability to find out which sites have been sharing/selling your email address to third-parties.

The next time you register for a website, add that site's name to your Gmail account by using the "+" symbol (no quotes). For example, if your email address is BurnedInRocks@gmail.com and you're registering an account at ShadySales.com (that's your first mistake, homeslice), use BurnedInRocks+ShadySales@gmail.com. Any emails sent to that addy will still show up in your regular Inbox, but it will show the custom designation allowing you to see which sites are playing shenanigans with your email.

Not only that, custom addresses makes managing junk email a little bit easier. Just set up a rule to automatically torch any email that comes to that custom addy and you'll never be bothered by special announcements or third-parties again. Here's how:

1. Click on Settings
2. Click on the Filters tab
3. Click Create a new filter
4. In the To field, type YourEmail+Custom@gmail.com (for example, BurnedInRocks+ShadySales@gmail.com) and mash the Next button
5. Check the Delete it box and punch the Create Filter button

Easy cheesy, right?

How many times has this played out? - "Hey dude, is (insert web address here) loading for you? I don't know if it's down or just me!" The only problem is your onlne friends are weanies, taking coffee breaks that are far too long and leaving your IMs unanswered, or even worse, feeding you bogus info just to screw with your mind.

That's okay, beacuse with www.downforeveryoneorjustme.com you can figure things out on your own. Just plug in the web address you're trying to reach and the appropriately titled service will tell you if the site's down, or if it's just you homeslice.

Color us officially jealous of Chattanooga, Tennessee residents, who now have access to broadband speeds up to 1Gbps. That's 1,000Mbps folks, or put another way, really frakking fast.

It's also expensive, with 1Gpbs Internet-only service starting at $350 per month. Ouch.

One of the most common questions would-be PC builders ask is, "Should I build now or wait until product X comes out?" You can answer your own question by asking yourself another one: Do I need something faster now?

If the answer is yes, then build now and don't worry about what products are right around the corner. It's really that simple and you only complicate by playing the waiting game. Let's say you wait for an upcoming motherboard that adds USB 3.0 support to the fray. Once it ships, you then have to decide whether to build right away or wait for the new product to mature -- new drivers, new revisions, etc -- or come down in price. And then you have to decide what other components to surround it with. Should you buy a kick-ass videocard today or wait for AMD's upcoming HD 6xxx series? If you're going to wait, you might as well put off buying your other components too, because who knows what bigger/better/faster complimentary components are lurking next week/month/quarter.

Take it from us, once you start playing the waiting, you'll never stop. There will always be new products and new technologies on the horizon, and if you're always waiting for them, you'll end up stuck with your crusty old hardware indefinitely. If you're in need of an upgrade or an overhaul and there are products out there right now that will do what you need, then build/upgrade right now.

In case you ever have the urge to write on your hard drive with a permanent marker, don't. According to Consumerist reader "Scott," he was essentially told to go pound sand when attempting to RMA a defective Seagate SATA drive that had been written on with marker (see here). Seagate was a bit more tactful than that, but Scott's still stuck with a drive that doesn't work and no way to get it replaced.

There aren't a whole lot of instances where you'd want to mark up a hard drive in the first place, but if you do need to label them for any reason (perhaps you run a repair shop and don't want to mix them up), a strip of Scotch tape provides a convenient, removable easel with which to work with.

Times are tough, we get it. But while you think you might be saving yourself some scratch by picking up an ultra cheap power supply on a blue light special, you're really only setting yourself up for disaster down the line.

Here's the thing -- power supplies are one of the areas where you truly get what you pay for, and buying name brand counts. If you see a vendor charging $20 for a 700W no-name PSU, run in the other direction. Shady manufacturers inflate their PSU specs by driving most of the amps through the +5V rail, but it's the +12V rail(s) you need to pay attention to, as this is where modern systems draw most of their power.

When in doubt, pick the friggin' thing up. If it's light as a feather, treat it as a telltale sign that the manufacturer skimped during production. A quality power supply typically weighs a lot more than a generic unit.

Finally, do your research. Professional power supply testing equipment is ridiculously expensive, and since we're not setup to properly analyze PSUs, we don't review them. When reading an online PSU evaluation, make sure they're using high end equipment and doing more than just running a high system load and measuring the rails.

They say that cleanliness is next to Godliness, but holy hell, even if you've never set foot in a church, do yourself a huge favor and strut into your local electronics store and pick up a can of compressed air.

While you're at it, kick that smoking habit. Believe it or not, we've seen dirtier PCs than this, and they usually belong to smokers. If Marlboro makes your PC look this bad, can you imagine what cigarettes are doing to your lungs?

But we digress. Whether you choose to smoke or have the same irrational fear of vaccuum cleaners as our feline companions do, get in the habit of dusting out your PC every once in awhile. A series of short bursts on your PC's vents once a week will do wonders, just be extra careful to hold the can upright or you'll end up spraying liquid all over your system. And it's a good idea to pop open your case once a month and clean out the inside (shut down and unplug first).

Justin Bieber concert pictures. Detroit Lions tickets receipt. That ultra weird fetish video you downloaded. These are just some of the files you may have sitting on your hard drive but would rather no one know about. That's where TrueCrypt comes in.

TrueCrypt is free, open-source disk encryption software that allows you to easily create a virtual encrypted disk that mounts on your system like a real disk. But unlike those other partitions, the TrueCrypt container can only be accessed if you know the password, keeping those work documents or sordid love affair notes from prying eyes. There's even an option to encrypt an entire partition, whether it's your hard drive or a portable USB key you previously kept hidden in your rectum.

TrueCrypt works with a variety of OSes, including Windows 7, Vista, XP, Mac OS X, and Linux. You can download it here.