With the holidays comes delicious pie, time with family…and a whole host of fancy new electronics that leave you in a frustrated pile of manuals and wasted time.
Some classics are best left behind. Instead of trying to figure out how to plug in this or that, look instead to some modern tips on making sense of all those wires. When the year wraps up everyone’s wanting the latest gizmos and gadgets. You have teenagers who want a phone upgrade, adults who want to beef up their entertainment center, even you’re wondering how you can save more money with a better phone charger. Put aside those outdated notions on electronics and check out the list below to finally make sense of the mystery.
Take out that notepad! We’re going to look at the USB 2.0 cable, Cat5 cables, and cell phone accessories.
Protect Your Investment With A Surge Protector
Electronics, to put things mildly, are very expensive. If you’re short on gift ideas, look not to the USB 2.0 cable yet and instead the surge protector. A single power surge can fry your equipment and put you hundreds, even thousands, of dollars out of pocket. The number of joules listed on your average surge protector represents the energy absorption rating. In other words, the more, the better. A computer room or home theater equipment room should have surge protectors with joule ratings of 2500 and higher.
Swap Out An Old Bundle For A USB 2.0 Cable
You’ve decided to change television sets or are curious how a new cable can affect the performance of already existing equipment. The USB cable is one of the most well-known additions to the modern bundle, coming in enough shapes and sizes to satisfy both the enthusiast and the casual buyer. The USB 2.0 cable and its compliant devices are able to reach a maximum transmission rate of 480 Mbps, while the USB 3.1 and its compliant devices can transfer data at 10 Gbps. It all depends on what you want out of the package and how long you want it to last.
Beef Up Your Internet With Ethernet Cables
What should you get alongside that USB 2.0 cable? You can’t go wrong with Ethernet cable types. Good Internet is reliant on both your devices and what you use to connect them. A constantly dropped network or erratic response can be the result of a faulty connection, easy to fix when you swap out your wires for something a little more up-to-date. The very first fiber optic cable, for those on the display end of things, was first used to connect the United States to both Britain and France. Since then it’s become a standard feature installed all over the globe.
Don’t Confuse HDMI With CAT5e Network Cables Or CAT6
Make sure you don’t confuse your CAT cables with your HDMI cables, either. That’ll just be another frustrating trip to the electronics store! The HDMI 2.0 hardware set-up can support bandwidth of up to 18Gb per second. Your CAT cables are perhaps even more varied, coming in the older CAT5 model and the modern CAT6. The latter contains four pairs of copper wire, using all pairs for signaling to obtain the highest level of performance possible. If it’s not highspeed HDMI cables you’re after, then you might just be interested in…
Use Cell Phone Accessories As Stocking Stuffers
Cell phones are so common we often don’t think about the ways we can use them better. Consider adding a cell phone charging cable to your shopping list. It’s recommended by most of today’s experts not to wait until a phone gets to 0% battery before recharging. Plugging it in at 40% or 50% will not just save you frustration next time you’re out on the town, but will help your battery last longer. The Apple iPhone 7 accounted for nearly 10% of all smartphone sales in the United States just the year prior.
Feeling a touch less confused about what to buy? Grab the holidays by the horns!
