It’s time to get busy again building, buying and selling houses in this exciting sequel!

There are new towns to explore, new Mayors to meet and lots of money to be made! Use your keen eye to pick the right locations to build parks and shops. Pick your paint colors, upgrades and landscaping to create the ultimate curb appeal and earn outstanding profits. How about a latte from the new coffee shop?

Some new flower boxes from the garden center? It’s all waiting for you in Build-a-lot 2!

[Download free trial of Build-A-Lot 2: Town Of The Year]
[Buy Build-A-Lot 2: Town Of The Year]

PingInfoView is a small utility that allows you to easily ping multiple host names and IP addresses and see the results in one table. It automatically pings to all hosts every number of seconds that you specify and displays the number of succeed and failed pings as well as the average ping time.

You can also save the ping result into a text/HTML/XML file, or copy it to the clipboard.

[35K] [Win2k/XP/Vista] [FREE]

I took guitar lessons for almost two years when I was ten-years-old, and even though it’s been quite some time since that happened, I still remember most of what I was taught. If I would have been left to figure out how to play the guitar on my own, I probably wouldn’t have made very much progress, but having a teacher really benefited me. I took the instruction that I received and made it work for me while I played in a band with some of my friends and continued to learn what I could about the guitar. While I may not play nearly as much as I used to, it’s nice to know that I could pick up one of my guitars and play some music if I wanted to. If you’re interested in signing up for some local lessons, check out TakeLessons.

You’ll find instructors for a number of different lessons, but the focus seems to be placed on music. You can search for what you want in your area, and if there’s not an instructor in your town, there’s probably one nearby. TakeLessons works with the instructors and verifies them for your protection, so if you find an instructor that has an open spot in their schedule for a lesson at a price that you can afford, go for it. Teachers who want to reach more students can look into working with TakeLessons in a couple of different ways.

Gnomie Andrew Norman writes:

Hello, Chris.

I just watched your video concerning Asus Eee PC vs PDAs, and I have a thought concerning the issue. I’m sure you get hundreds of responses, but all the same I thought I’d respond.

Of course, I don’t deny that PDAs are computers, but I think there’s a pretty important difference between PDAs and laptops like the Eee PC or MacBook Air.

I do not have an Eee PC, and ninety-nine times out of a hundred I would probably never use it for anything that my Palm T|X couldn’t do about as well, but I still think that there is plenty of merit in the Eee PC. That is, while PDAs can do all of the basic functions of a PC, there are still the non-basic yet common functions that cannot as of yet be done on a PDA.

For example, as of now there are no equivalents to Photoshop on any PDAs (or at least none that I’m aware of), but an Asus EeePC running Xubuntu can use GIMP (and, I suppose, in theory, an XP machine could use Photoshop, but I seriously doubt it would have the room). If I want to do some sound editing, I could boot up Audacity, which I can’t do on my Palm and I’m guessing you can’t do on your iPhone (though correct me if I’m wrong). Or maybe I need to do some vector graphic editing, in which case I could bring up OpenOffice Drawing, which is yet another thing that cannot be done on PDAs. There are so many examples of programs that can be used. A MacBook Air could probably even run some heavier programs like Mathematica or Adobe Premiere, but the Eee PC still has many, many programs that are unavailable (and for good reason) on mobile devices.

These are not especially common functions, but they are still functions that are very important to some people. While I think I personally would mainly use an Eee PC for the simpler things, many people would love the Eee PC for these reasons.

There are also examples of functions that an Asus Eee PC can do far better than a PDA. For example, the office suite OpenOffice is far superior to Documents-To-Go on my Palm. My personal opinion is that DTG is a fantastic program for Palm, but if I had an Eee PC running Xubuntu, I would much rather use OpenOffice with a full keyboard, full screen, and, most importantly, full features of a complete office suite. I like to do a little writing, and I would much rather have a full screen and full keyboard than a tiny Palm screen to do that on. I also think that web browsing is far better on a small laptop than a PDA. It doesn’t matter if you’re using Opera, Safari, or even Skyfire (if it’s EVER released to the public), you still have to manage with a small screen, and if you’re reading a big wall of text, it’s much easier to see it on a decent-sized screen so you don’t have to keep scrolling back and forth. For checking movie times or a quick check of email, then Safari, Opera Mini, or even Blazer will work just fine, but if I’m at LinuxQuestions.org trying to figure out why OpenSuSE keeps crashing on me, I would much rather have a small laptop for a little bit more serious surfing.

And let’s not forget that using a laptop has a pretty useful feature in sharing files. Say you’re at a university and you need to print something or you’re with a friend and you need to give him a file — It can be a pain transferring it from a PDA to a computer. You might have to email it to yourself, taking time to upload (and if you’re on a 2g network that can be annoying), then browse on a university computer to your email and download it. If you’re lucky, your university might have a computer with an SD slot, but not likely (at least not at my school). If you’re using an Eee PC, you can simply copy it to a thumb drive. I have to share files a lot. I don’t know what I’d do without my flash drive. I love being able to move files to and fro quickly and easily.

In the end, it really comes down to what you want to do with it. I can use my Palm to watch movies, listen to music, browse the web, edit documents (slowly), read pdf files, and I even have Linux running on it. But I can’t run GIMP, OpenOffice (for more serious editing), Firefox (for more serious browsing), Audacity, or any other such programs. Although I don’t plan on getting an Asus Eee PC anytime particularly soon, I can certainly see why someone would want or even need an especially portable device. I can also see why someone would not want such a device. It simply comes down to what you want to do with it. There are some people that don’t need PDAs at all (though I pity such people).

Gnomie Michael Riley (TopGearFordGt in our chat room) writes:

1. Look around. Don’t just buy the first computer you see. When I say this I am talking about going around to different computer stores, and tech stores. One big reason that you would do this is because if you are going to be buying a Dell laptop for $800 from the Dell store, there is a good chance that you can find that computer at Best Buy or in Canada FutureShop or even eBay. You can also look around for computers at stores that sell refurbished laptops/desktops. This doesn’t always mean that someone traded in the laptop for something different because it was bad — it just means that they fixed it because when it first shipped it might have had a washed out or broken screen.

2. Look for different companies for computers. If you are on a tight budget then don’t go and buy a really expensive Mac or Dell. Something that you could do is look for companies that will let you customize your own computer. Yes this can be expensive, but if you are smart with buying what you need then you can benefit from it. Say that the computer that you really want to buy has 2 TB of storage, and you know that you are never going to use that in your life. Then buy the optional 250 GB one that might only cost $100 instead of $400. Another thing is buying RAM. RAM is something that the more you have the faster the computer will run. Generally, if you are going to buy a Mac or Dell computer then don’t buy the RAM from their Web site. Buy RAM from a Best Buy or FutureShop — you could save up to half the amount of money or more, Like Chris did.
3. Buy a computer second hand. I have a lot of friends who have done this and they have never had any problems with them. When my friends buy computers second hand they are saving up to $1000 or more with gaming rigs. When buying second hand, go with someone you trust. Buy from a friend or family member, or when buying on eBay go with someone that has a good rating for what they sell. This can be very important, because when buying second hand you generally can’t take it back — especially with eBay.
4. Consider the machine’s lifespan. When you are buying a computer, you are going to be dishing out a lot of money. So buy a computer that has a long lifespan, even if it means spending a little more money. This can be good and bad. The good thing about this is you only have to buy a computer once every three years. But the bad thing is, if you are a gamer or graphic designer, then the technology is going to go out of date within six months.
5. Last tip I have for buying a computer is to go with the computer that is right for you. Don’t buy a computer that has three graphics cards when you are only in need of a word processor. You don’t need that 750 GB HD for emailing people, and you don’t need that 32 GB of RAM for playing pinball. And last, don’t go overboard with the display. Chris actually uses his screens, but most people won’t use that much space. Go with something that fits your desk and fits your needs.

The clock in the Vista System Tray can be configured to display the time in different formats. Some individuals may prefer or may even be required to use military time. If so, switching the time format is very simple to do.

To switch to military time in Vista:

1. Open the Control Panel and open Regional and Language Options. You can also type intl.cpl in the Start Menu Search field.
2. From the Regional and Language Options window, click the Customize this format button.
3. Click the Time tab.
4. Use the drop down arrow to change the time format to :HH:mm:ss.
5. Click OK.

If you’ve been thinking about adding a new appliance or two, here’s your chance! For a limited time, all major appliances are on sale in the categories below:

• Refrigerators
• Dishwashers
• Ranges & Ovens
• Over-the-Range Microwaves
• Washers & Dryers
• Home appliances

Excludes Outlet Center, clearance, demo items, and Electrolux major appliances.

Select major Best Buy appliances on sale until Saturday, May 3rd.