Podcast

PCM22: Everything You Need to Know About Getting Windows 10 for Free

Microsoft’s big plan to have Windows 10 on a billion devices in just a few years starts at the end of this month, when – on July 29 – it becomes available for free, zip, zero, zilch.

But if you’re like us here at PC Mike, the soon-to-be available free operating system raised more questions than answers.

So we dug into it and bring you what we learned about Windows 10 in this episode of the PC Mike podcast.

Among other things, we discuss:

  • What are you supposed to do with that “Get Windows 10” app icon that probably appeared recently in your toolbar?
  • Why do you need to “reserve” a free download? Are they going to run out?
  • What happens if you don’t reserve a download of Windows 10? Are you out of luck?
  • If Windows 10 is really free
  • If it will work with all previous versions of Windows, from XP to 8.1
  • How to tell if the programs you have on your computer now will work with Windows 10
  • If you will lose all your important files when you upgrade
  • What is new and different about Windows 10 compared with previous versions

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More shownotes from episode 21 of the PC Mike Techcast:

First Thoughts on Apple Watch: PC Mike Finally Gets His!

PC Mike finally got his hands on an Apple Watch: This episode kicks off with Mike providing his first impressions of Apple Watch. He talks about how he’s using it and tells you if the battery is performing as well or worse than everyone expected.

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Apps of the Week: Summer Safety Apps to Avoid Overheating, Sunburn, Dehydration

In PC Mike’s report for NBC-TV this week – and just in time for big summer events and travel – he takes a look at three great location sharing apps to make sure you can always keep track of your friends and family.

Glympse lets users share their location in real-time with other Glympse users through GPS. Set it up with friends, family, co-workers, or anyone and they’ll know exactly where you are and when you’ll be meeting with them. Users can set Glympse to work for a specific time period, too, so you don’t have to worry about others tracking your every move all the time, either. Glympse is free for Android, iOS, and Windows Phone.

Life360 is built around location sharing for families, setting up what it calls small circles to automatically share information such as location and safe arrival. Users can create custom circles, too, such as if a group of friends or family are going on a trip and want to keep track of each other for a short time. Life360 also allows for chatting and sending private messages to other users. It’s free for Android, iOS, and Windows Phone.

PlaceUs aims to set itself apart several ways, including working in a way that isn’t a battery drain. It, too, allows users to set up circles of people to share info with, but only does so when others try to check another user’s location. PlaceUs claims to not only share locations with approved other users, but learn frequent destinations, such as the gym. It can be set up to send reminders, too, say, for example, if you haven’t been to that gym in a long time. PlaceUs is for iOS only.

Be sure to check out PC Mike’s report on location-sharing apps for NBC-TV here: https://youtu.be/SwfZhRc1Mak

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Online Learning – Free Trial for PC Mike Listeners

I get asked a lot about finding online courses for learning how to use photography software such as Adobe Photoshop and Lightroom CC, which are both on my recently updated list of tech gear. I talk about how I benefited from taking online courses as well as a special deal available only to PC Mike Techcast listeners at pcmike.com/lynda, where you can even try it free for 10 days and see if online learning works as well for you as it has for me. By the way, they have more than 3,300 courses to pick from – including more than 100,000 video tutorials – in subjects ranging from photography, video and audio to graphic design and web development. With Lynda, you can get:

– Unlimited access to all 3,314 courses – more than 100,000 video tutorials
– Learn new software and stay up to date

Listeners of the PC Mike podcast can get a free 10-day trial. Try any course. Start your trial now and see what you can learn. Just go to https://pcmike.com/lynda to get the free 10 day trial.

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We Need Your Help!

As we begin a new podcast like this, it’s very important to get a bunch of reviews to be able to show well in the iTunes listings. So if you can, I’d sure appreciate it if you’d subscribe and leave me your rating and review.

Here’s how:

First, open up the iTunes app on your computer or mobile device. Click on Podcasts on top
> From the iTunes Podcasts page, use the “Search Store” field up at the top right corner of the page. Type in PC Mike Techcast under the Podcasts category.
> Click on the logo image of the PC Mike Techcast on the search return page
> From there, you can:

1) Subscribe

2) Choose and Click on a star (1-5) that reflects your rating. Five stars means you really like it, one star not so much.

3) Leave a written review.

Thanks to all for the kind reviews we’ve received so far. I read and appreciate every review! If you haven’t left a review please do so. I will be so grateful!

And remember, you can appear in future episodes. Ask a question or voice your comments by clicking the Leave Voicemail tab on the right side of this page here at pcmike.com. You can then use the microphone on your computer to record your question.

Thank you!

Mike is a veteran journalist whose video "PC Mike" reports have been distributed weekly to all 215 NBC-TV stations since 1994, making him one of the most experienced tech reporters in the country. His tech stories and videos have appeared on MSNBC, CNBC, the Today Show, The New York Times, USA Today and in numerous national newspapers and magazines. In addition to the PC Mike tech blog, he also publishes the Roadtreking.com RV Travel Blog in which he travels North America in an RV reporting about interesting people and places.