We here at Cellular Outfitter have collected 10 easy tech tips you need to know now to make your life with technology easier. This list will give you the right tools and tricks to save you from the daily hassles we have to face when dealing with our electronics. These tips are so amazingly easy, you can start doing them today!
1. Clean Your Keyboard Using a Sticky Note
Do you know what constantly annoys us about keyboards? How quick they are to gather dust and how difficult it is to clean them. If you’ve never stopped to take a close look at the keyboard you’re typing on, do it now. See all that dust? Gross, we know.
Luckily, there is a trusted hack that you can do right now to clean up even the smallest corners on your keyboard. If you have sticky notes or even tape lying around, go ahead and grab some. Glide the adhesive side of your sticky note or tape in between each row of keys. Continue doing this until all the dust around your keys disappear.
2. Keep Headphones Organized Using a Spool
How often do your headphones get tangled on a daily basis? All the time? Yeah, us too.
Which is why we couldn’t believe how we didn’t try this wonderful tech tip before. All you’ll need is a spool. The material doesn’t matter- it could be wooden, plastic, or metal. If you or someone you know sews, finding one will be easy. If not, you can quickly find one at any general store.
To do this quick and easy trick, start by wrapping your headphones around the spool, making sure to distribute the wires evenly.
Make sure you tuck the headphone jack beneath one of the already spun wires, and do the same with the two ear pieces.
Within seconds you’ll have yourself a headphone carrier and a fix to one of life’s daily struggles.
3. Use Binder Clips to Replace Broken Keyboard Feet
Have you ever tried typing on a broken keyboard? It can be one of the most irritating things to deal with. If your keyboard has broken feet, there is a cheap and easy fix for it! All you need is one binder clip.
Isolate one of the metal ends of the binder clip and push the two ends together until it pops out. Do the same with the other metal piece. Once you have the two metal pieces, squeeze their ends again to attach them to the back of your keyboard. Make sure they are fitted to the small holes in the back of your keyboard so they don’t come off. Once you’re done, flip the keyboard back around and voila! You’re good to go!
4. Use an Old Tablet as a Digital Photo Frame
This tip may sound simple enough- but we’ve never thought of it before! This is a great way to upcycle and reuse some old technology. If you have an old Android, Windows, or Apple tablet lying around the house then you’re all set to take on this tech how-to.
Pick out some of your favorite digital photos, maybe from a recent family vacation or birthday. Upload them onto your tablet and then use a photo app to create a digital slideshow of photos.
Two apps I can recommend is the LiveFrame app on the App Store and the Dayframe app on Google Play. Both are simple to use and the results are worth all the effort. Once you have your slideshow created, all you have to do is hit play to bring your digital photo album to life.
5. Add a Gem to Charging Cables to Know Which Way Is "Up"
If you own anything Android or have a device that is charged using a micro USB cable, you can understand the struggle of trying to quickly figure out which way is “up.” This trick is most useful for those who charge their phone before going to bed and struggle in the dark to figure out which way the charging cable is meant to go in.
Go to your nearest Dollar Tree, Walmart, or even go online to find yourself a small pack of adhesive gems in your favorite color. Once you have this, start putting these gems on the “top” part of all your micro USB chargers. I would recommend putting it on the side of the cable that faces you when you plug in your device. Making this small change to your chargers will save you a lot of frustration in the long run.
6. Use Office Lens to Take Pictures of Receipts
Who else has a purse or drawer full of receipts? We’re definitely guilty of holding onto receipts- you know, just in case we need it later for whatever reason. Luckily there is a quick and easy fix: Office Lens. This app is available in the Apple App Store and Google Play. It is developed by Microsoft themselves, so you know you can trust it.
The app itself is easy to use. All you have to do is open up the application and hold your phone’s camera over the receipt. You’ll see it automatically begin to crop the photo to only include the receipt. When you’re happy with how the app is cropping the photo, take the picture.
You’ll get a perfect cropped image of your receipt that you can then save to your photos or send to yourself in an email. Say goodbye to receipt clutter forever.
7. Use Volume Up On Your Headphones to Take a Photo
Want to improve the way you take photos? Use the volume button on your headphones to instantly take a photo on your iPhone or iPad. All you have to do is open up the Camera app on your device and make sure that your headphones are plugged in.
The headphones you use for this need to have volume controls in order for it to work, but they can be wired or wireless. Aim your camera, press the volume up button, and watch as your device instantly takes the picture for you. Feel like a professional yet?
8. Use an Old Gift Card for Free Trials
Ever wanted to sign up for a free trial online? Using this next tech tip, you’ll never have to use your credit or debit card to sign up for those free trials again.
The next time you sign up for a free online trial use an old gift card instead of putting in your credit or debit card information. If you don’t have an old gift card, you can pick up a Visa gift card from any grocery store to use. You can now rest at ease in case you forget to cancel your subscription because none of your credit card information was shared.
9. Use Night Shift Before Bed for Better Sleep
Did you know that the blue light coming from your phone can make falling and staying asleep harder? While you shouldn’t be using a tablet or phone before bed, a lot of us just can’t help it. That’s why using the Night Shift option on your iPhone is another amazing technology hack.
In order to set up and enable Night Shift on your phone, just slide your finger upward from the bottom of your screen. You could also go into your settings, select Display and Brightness, and then select Night Shift. From there you can set your Night Shift start and end times.
For example, you can have it automatically turn on at 8pm and automatically shut off at 7am. You can then choose how ‘warm’ you would like the color on your phone to be. Your eyes will thank you later for making this small change in your nightly routine.
10. Turn Off an App’s Notifications in Notification Settings
Is there an app that is constantly sending you notifications? This next trick will make the apps you don’t love finally leave you alone.
Go into your settings and select Notifications. From there you will see a list of all your downloaded apps. Select an application that you would like to silence, and within there you will see at the top a tile that says “Allow Notifications”. On the right, select the green bar so that it turns off notifications from that app. After you do this, that app will no longer send you messages.
Those were our 10 easy tech tips to help make your life just a little bit easier! If you try out any of these tricks and tips, we want to know. Send us your Tech Tip stories on Facebook or Twitter so we know what has helped you out most.
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