• Bad Apple: Five Classic Apple Marketing Tactics That Lock You In

  
  When you buy an Apple device, you're often locked in to buying other Apple products that are compatible with it. Here are five examples, and some advice on what to do. Oh, wait--there's nothing you can do.

• Apple's Snow Leopard Update Zaps Bugs, Kills Hackintosh Netbooks

  
  Apple update will fix important flaws in the Snow Leopard operating system along with killing support Atom-based netbooks popular with hackers.
• Nokia Announces Charger Recall: What You Need To Know
• Microsoft Readies Super Tuesday of Patches
• Nokia's Charger Recall Just the Latest Tech Do-Over
• A Smartphone Owner's Bill of Rights
• Windows 7 64-bit Users Living in a 32-bit World?
• Verizon's Droid Launch: Your Complete Guide
• Windows 7: A Day 7 Scorecard
• HP Printer Connects Directly to the Web

Consumer Advice How-Tos

• Green Computing: The Good And The Bad It's easy being green, thanks to eco-friendly hardware and software.
• How to Buy an MP3 Player Get the right device for your lifestyle and music collection.
• Skeptical Shopper: Get the Most Out of Black Friday Bargains Scoring the best tech buys on the biggest shopping day of the year requires a little preparation and research.
• On Your Side: Is That Laptop Still Under Warranty? Proving a laptop's warranty status makes all the difference in who pays the repair and bank service charges.
• How To Set Up a Windows 7 Network Senior Editor Robert Strohmeyer shows guests at his Windows 7 launch party how to set up a Windows 7 network and share files.

Consumer Advice News

• Apple's Snow Leopard Update Zaps Bugs, Kills Hackintosh Netbooks Apple update will fix important flaws in the Snow Leopard operating system along with killing support Atom-based netbooks popular with hackers.
• Nokia's Charger Recall Just the Latest Tech Do-Over Analysis: Here's a recent brief history of electronics recalls and official oops experiences.
• Nokia Announces Charger Recall: What You Need To Know Nokia will replace for free millions of faulty cellphone chargers that pose a shock hazard to users.
• A Smartphone Owner's Bill of Rights In a wireless market featuring high prices, limited competition, and sparse regulation, it's time consumers got some protection.
• Microsoft Readies Super Tuesday of Patches Six security updates will post next week, addressing 15 separate vulnerabilities.

Consumer Advice Playing in PCW Video

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  HP Printer Connects Directly to the Web HP's Photosmart Premium TouchSmart Web All-in-One Printer can print news stories and directions directly from Web sites, but the execution could use more polish.
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  Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1: A Great DSLR Alternative The slimmest Micro Four-Thirds System camera yet, the industrial-looking Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1 is the most enticing non-DSLR we've seen to date.
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  How to Buy an MP3 Player Get the right device for your lifestyle and music collection.

Consumer Advice Slideshows

• Keyborgs! Check Out the Bizarre Keyboards A parade of quirky, imaginative and just plain weird keyboards that were actually developed, if not sold.

Consumer Advice Reviews

• HP Printer Connects Directly to the Web HP's Photosmart Premium TouchSmart Web All-in-One Printer can print news stories and directions directly from Web sites, but the execution could use more polish.
• Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1: A Great DSLR Alternative The slimmest Micro Four-Thirds System camera yet, the industrial-looking Panasonic Lumix DMC-GF1 is the most enticing non-DSLR we've seen to date.
• Get Prints in Minutes with the Fujifilm Instax Mini 7 Camera Lightweight and compact, Fujifilm's Instax Mini 7 is a modern version of a Polaroid camera.
• Beta Watch: Gist, TweetMixx, TwoFoods This month's betas: an e-mail analyzer, a tweet synthesizer, and a food-comparison engine.
• Macworld Releases AppGems for iPhone Too many iPhone apps to choose from? Having a hard time finding the good ones? Let the Macworld editors suggest great apps for you.