Play Store Archives - The Silicon Underground

How I set up Asus parental controls

Dave Farquhar — Wed, 21 Jan 2015 11:00:02 +0000

I’ve mentioned Asus parental controls on its Android tablets such as the Memo Pad 7 HD, but never elaborated on them. Here’s how I set them up and why, so you can make your own decisions about how best to

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What to look for in a 2014 bargain Android tablet

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 01 Dec 2014 11:00:44 +0000

I guess I owe an apology for not writing and posting this last week, when $40 tablets were all the rage as doorbusters. Cheap Android tablets are back again, and people are going to buy them–so it pays to buy one worth

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The Asus Memo Pad HD 7 review: It’s a nice inexpensive tablet

Dave Farquhar — Sun, 24 Nov 2013 11:00:14 +0000

I’ve been messing with an Asus Memopad, the 7-inch version. I think it’s a well-built, good-performing tablet for $149, and when you can get it on sale for less than that–and this is the time of year for that–I think

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How to edit a hosts file in Android

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 31 Oct 2013 11:00:09 +0000

Someone asked me how to edit a hosts file in Android, which was a trick I used to recommend in Windows. Editing a hosts file is really two questions: Do you really want to edit it, or do you want

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How to disable wallpaper when you’re not running Cyanogenmod

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 03 Oct 2013 11:00:15 +0000

Unfortunately I can’t run Cyanogenmod on all of my Android devices (more on that tomorrow), but if you want to save some memory and CPU cycles and, depending on your device’s display, perhaps even increase your battery life by a

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Reports of the Droidpocalypse have been greatly exaggerated

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 19 Jul 2013 11:00:48 +0000

I was listening to the excellent Risky Business analysis of the Droidpocalypse this week, and I’m happy to report that the vulnerability that affects 90% of Android devices ever made, while serious, is vastly overstated. It’s overhyped because someone in

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B&N just made its Nook tablets much more compelling

Dave Farquhar — Mon, 06 May 2013 11:00:40 +0000

This past week, Barnes and Noble put the Google Play store on its Nook HD and Nook HD+ tablets. So while they’re still running a forked Android, they’ll run most Android apps without you having to do anything special. That,

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Speed up Android with Seeder Entropy Generator

Dave Farquhar — Sat, 05 Jan 2013 10:31:15 +0000

Seeder Entropy Generator, released on XDA Developers, became a sensation the last couple of days. There’s debate whether it works, and debate over why it works, but enough people reported an improvement that I gave it a whirl. The difference

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Mobile malware is coming. Get prepared.

Dave Farquhar — Fri, 28 Dec 2012 10:39:08 +0000

One thing I’m seeing in the predictions-for-2013 columns is that mobile malware is going to increase this year. While I can’t be certain it’s going to happen, all of the ingredients are there. The only thing stopping it is motive.

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Hot-rod Cyanogenmod 7.2

Dave Farquhar — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 10:55:13 +0000

Whatever you do, don’t call this post Optimizing Android 2.3 for Games, Graphics and Multimedia. I’ll kick your… nevermind. But of course the first thing I wanted after I installed Cyanogenmod 7.2–which is based on Android 2.3.7–on my Nook Color

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