What are the advantages and disadvantages of investing in ULIPS?

A unit Linked Insurance Plan (ULIP) is nothing but an investment product that offers you the benefit of investment in the capital markets along with insurance. It's a combination that very few instruments can offer.

Take a look at some of the advantages and disadvantages of an ULIP.

Advantages of an ULIP

One of the advantages of the ULIP is that it can offer you superior returns depending on the fund that you invest in. For example, if the fund you have chosen has heavily invested in the capital markets, chances are that if the stock markets do well, your fund may also do well.

The other advantage of an ULIP is that it provides insurance cover as well. The insurance cover may not be as great as a term plan, but, it should be good enough. The above are the two major advantages of an ULIP.

Disadvantages of an ULIP

One of the biggest disadvantages of an ULIP is that the returns cannot be guaranteed. For example, if you have chosen an ULIP that invests bulk of the money in equities and the shares are not doing well, chances of losing money cannot be ruled out. This is one of the biggest risk and perhaps the only disadvantage that one can see from an ULIP.

Other features of an ULIP

In an ULIP one can make partial withdrawals. This means if you have invested a sum of Rs 10,000, it is possible to withdraw Rs 5000 from the same. Also, in case you are not satisfied with the policy you can ask for a withdrawal within 15 days from receipt of the policy. Another feature of the ULIP is that you can switch from one fund to another. However, the feature should be available for a successful switchover.

Conclusion

ULIPs offer you a combination of insurance and returns. If you have invested in an ULIP that parks a substantial money in equities, there is an element of risk in the product. Of course, if capital markets do well your fund could generate a superior return as well.

What Is The Minimum And Maximum Period For A Bank Fixed Deposit?

The minimum tenure for a bank deposit varies depending on the type of investor. For retail individuals including senior citizens the minimum tenure for a bank fixed deposit is 15 days.

The maximum period for which a bank deposit can be kept is for 20 years.

What Happens When An Individual Keeps a Bank Fixed Deposit For Such A Large Tenure?

The one thing that happens when you place an amount for such a large duration is that you lock interest rates for the period. Let's give you an example.

Say, if you place a deposit on March 19, 2015 for a period of 20 years at 8.5% interest rate. What happens if interest rates rise after 2 years and becomes 9.5%. You lose 1%.

But, there is a major benefit as well. After some years if the interest rate falls to 6%, you would benefit. In short locking money for large periods places you at a risk of rising and falling interest rates.

It's very rare that somebody would place deposits for such a large period, given the nature of risks that are involved these days.

Also remember there is TDS that would be cut on the deposit. Therefore, if you are investing small amounts, it would be best to invest in PPF, given that the interest on a PPF is tax free in the hands of investors.

How To Save TDS on Fixed Deposits?

It's always important to remember that as you invest for long periods you should take a few steps that would help you to save taxes.

Among these steps include the submission of Form 15G and Form 15H to the bank. This has to be submitted only if your income does not exceed the Income Tax limit.

Also remember that if you wish to save TDS on bank fixed deposit, please split the fixed deposit in two names. For example, an investor can split the fixed deposit amount with his wife.

But, it's important to remember that if both husband and wife have an income, the best way would be to pay the applicable taxes.

Please note that the bank will cut a TDS if your interest income exceeds Rs 10,000. Only recently, the Union Budget has said that TDS would now also be applicable to recurring bank deposits.

Conclusion

In any case please look at the pros and cons of investing either for a short trem of 15 days or a term as high as 20 years.

Following the middle path maybe the best option.

What Happens If You File Your Income Tax Returns Late?

Each year, you need to file your Income Tax Returns on time. The last date for filing income tax returns is July 31. However, sometimes the government extends the same depending on the situation.

While it is a good idea to file returns on time many suggest that you should do so much earlier than the July 31, 2015 deadline as you could receive your refund early as well.

In any case if you file your tax returns after July 31, the consequences could be plenty.

Here is what could happen if you file your income tax late.

Interest on late filing of tax returns

If you file you tax returns beyond the stipulated time frame you are liable to pay an interest. The interest has to be paid at the rate of 1 per cent per month. For those who have paid advance tax the interest may not be applicable.

You cannot carry forward losses

You cannot carried forward losses if you pay your advance tax beyond the stipulated time frame of July 31. Let's say you buy shares worth Rs 2 lakhs and sell the same for a loss of Rs 1.5 lakhs.

You cannot carried forward the losses as you have not filed your returns on time.

Advance Tax

Did you know that you have to pay advance tax, if your TDS is not being deducted. Let's say if you have substantial incomes, then the government loses out by collecting income tax money only at the end of the year. For example, the tax payable on substantial income in April 2015 would fall due only by July 31, 2016.

The government thus loses out. Therefore, individuals whose TDS is not getting deducted have to pay an advance tax.

You have to calculate your income tax and pay 30 per cent as advance tax by Sept, 60 per cent by December and the entire 100 per cent by March.

Tax refund likely to be delayed

The longer you take to file your tax returns, the longer it would take for the Income Tax department to process your refund. You would lose on this count especially if you have a large refund that is due.

Ideally, you should meet up with your Chartered Accountant or one who files your tax returns to ensure that it is done on time.

Ability to rectify your returns

In case you have filed your tax returns very late, there is no opportunity to rectify your tax returns in case there was a mistake in the tax returns. This may or may not happen, but at least it given you an opportunity, just in case.

Conclusion

It's best to file your tax returns on time due to the numerous disadvantages of filing a delayed tax returns. Remember, the onus to file tax returns is on you and not on the income tax department.

Maybe if you are in the habit of preparing a yearly calendar of things to do, you could include this and keep the July 31 deadline in mind.

How to Know Whether Your ITR-V is Received by Income Tax Department?

After your dispatch your ITR- V it should take 4-5 days to reach the Income Tax department. After you file your return you have to send a hard or paper copy of the ITR V, which is actually an acknowledgement form of the IT returns filed by you online.

You have to send the ITRV by ordinary post or registered post to the central processing unit of the IT department in Bengaluru. Only post and speed post is allowed, no couriers.

Also make sure that the ITRV form should reach the department within 120 days from the date of filing of the tax return. The IT department takes about 4 weeks to acknowledge the ITRV. 

Steps to Know the status of ITR-V:

1. Visit Income Tax site
2. Click on Option ITR-V Receipt Status
3. Fill in your Pan Card details
4. Select Assessment year
5. Enter the number in the image
6. You will Know your status

The address to send the ITRV form is as follows:

Post Bag No.1, Electronic City Post Office, Bengaluru-560100 (Karnataka)
Assessee can call 1800-425-2229 - Govt of India helpline from 9AM to 8PM.

Conclusion

It's extremely important to note whether your ITR-V is received by the Income Tax Department or else you would not receive your refund. In the past there have been many instances where individuals have files their tax returns but they have not been assessed because the Income Tax Department has not received the ITR copy.

Which Banks Can You Approach to Open the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account?

Last month Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the "Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana" a part of the "Beti Bachao Beti Padhao" campaign. Focus on gender equality and opportunities for the girl child are the main themes of the Yojana.

Where Can You Open The Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account? 

This account can be opened at post offices and commercial banks. Most of the commercial banks particularly the PSU banks will enable you to open this account.

While at the moment the list is not drawn and many government owned banks are still in the process of completing formalities to open the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account, you may visit any of the government banks for the purpose of opening the account. Some of these banks include:

1) State Bank of India

2) Bank of Baroda

3) Punjab National Bank

4) Bank of India

5) Canara Bank

6) UCO Bank

7) United Bank

8) Andhra Bank

9) Allahabad bank

10) Indian Bank

11) Corporation Bank

12) Central bank of India

13) IDBI Bank

14) Dena Bank

You may also open the account at the post offices in the country.

Features of the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account?

a) Who can open the account Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account?

The account can be opened in the name of the girl child who is 10 years or below. The girl child above this age is not eligible. Parents or guardians can open the account on behalf of the girl child.

b) What Are the documents that are needed to open Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account?

You would need the birth certificate of the child apart from the identity proof of the parent or guardian and their address proof.

c) Tax Benefits

Tax benefits are available under Sec 80C of the Income Tax Act. So, if you invest up to Rs 1.5 lakh each year, you would qualify for a tax rebate.  Interest earned from the investment is tax free as per Union Budget 2015-16 delivered by Finance Minister.

d) Early Withdrawal

Early withdrawal is allowed for marriage of the child or higher education It's important to note that only 50 per cent of the amount is allowed to be withdrawn early.

e) Is the account transferable?
You can move the account from banks to banks and post office to post office anywhere in the country.

f) Are NRIs allowed to invest in the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account?

It's not clear as yet. However, NRIs are not allowed to invest in post office schemes and the chances are bright that they may not be allowed to invest in this scheme as well.

One needs to wait for further clarification on the details.

g) Interest rate

You would earn an interest rate of 9.1 per cent per annum on the scheme

The Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account is a decent scheme that offers tax benefit and a good interest rate. It is not a bad idea to invest in the scheme if you have a girl child.

It gives you a great opportunity for long term investment.

How To Open Sukanya Samriddhi Account in a Post Office?

The government's move to encourage girl education and save funds for them has got a tremendous response through the Sukanya Samriddhi. However, the pick up from banks and post office is slow.

There are many post office and banks which are not yet aware of the Sukanya Samriddhi Yojana Account. But with time we can expect most of the banks and post offices to follow guidelines for opening accounts under the same.

How to open Sukanya Samriddhi Account in Post office?

One needs to download the form and fill in the necessary details, carry all mentioned document along with photograph and submit at the post office.

There are chances that some of the post offices may not be still aware of the scheme. So, have patience and wait for them.

Download the Form
From RBI

• Fill the application form
• Carry ID and Address proof
• Good if you have Aadhaar card.
• Birth certificate of the girl child.
• Photographs of parent and girl child

Find the list of authorize banks where you can open Sukanya samriddi account.

Maximum and Minimum deposit	Rs 1000- Rs 1,50,000
Interest rates	9.1%
Withdrawal	Partial Withdrawal at the age of 18 Full amount at the age of 21
Age Eligibility	0-10 years
Tax Benefit	Tax Free under Sec 80C (Rs 1.5 lakhs per year)
Loan facility	No
Online facility	No

The minimum deposit is Rs. 1000 and maximum deposit permissible per year is Rs. 1,50,000. One can deposit any number of times in a financial year i.e. April-March.

In the latest Union Budget of 2015-16, the Finance Minister made the instrument tax free even on the interest income earned.

What this means is that not only dies the instrument give you tax benefit under Sec 80C of Income Tax Act, but the interest amount is also exempted from tax. This is on par with the PPF, but, the interest rate on the PPF is low at the moment.

Rate of interest at the moment is 9.1 per cent, per annum for this particular year. This will be calculated on yearly basis and compounded yearly.

If one misses a deposit for that particular year, they need to pay a penalty of Rs 50 each year.

Partial withdrawal of a maximum upto 50 per cent of the balance standing can be taken after the girl attains the age of 18 years. Total amount can be withdrawn and account can be closed after completion of 21 years.

If the girl is married at the age of 18, a pre-mature withdrawal is possible. A single guardian can maximum open two account for two different girls. If an individual has three girls he can open two accounts.

Conclusion

The major disadvantage of the account is the lock in period. However, it is done to make people stay invested in. As of now there is no loan facility and online facility.

This is a initial step by the government, we can expect some major benefits and features in future.

How To Reduce Interest Rate And Charges On Your Loans?

All you need to do to reduce interest rates on your loans is to do a little effort in terms of research and inquiries. There are several ways you could reduce your interest rates on loans as well as overall costs.

Here a few steps to reduce your interest costs on loans.

a) Personal Loans Vs Gold Loans Vs Loans Against Shares

The type of loans you take would make a difference in terms of interest rates. Personal loans could come slightly cheaper than gold loans depending on your own credit worthiness. You could still end-up with personal loan interest rate of around 12 per cent, while gold loans could come slightly more expensive. But, the 12 per cent mentioned above is the best you could get, while personal loans can go as high as 24 per cent interest rate per annum.

Loans against shares is another good option, but, here you would have to have a specified category of good quality stocks, if you wish to avail a loan.

b) Different Interest Rate From Different Banks 

You would also have to do a little more research, if you want to get a competitive interest rate for loans. For example, for home loans at the moment State Bank of India is the best. There are portals that offer you a comparison of interest rates, but those need to be updated at regular intervals.

c) Cheaper Education Loans For Girls 

Remember that education loans are cheaper for girls. Most of the government banks charge reduced rate for education loan for girls. So, if you are looking to raise money for the study of a girl, it's best to look at education loans and not opt for personal loans to raise the required resources.

d) Avoid Personal Loans As There is A Huge pre-payment Charge 

Try and avoid personal loans as they come with huge pre-payment charges. For example, a leading private sector bank charges as much as 4 per cent on the outstanding loan amount as pre-paid charges. Therefore, try and shift to another loan like a loan against shares.

e) Home Loans Comparison A Must 

Since home loans are big ticket loans a small difference of 0.10 per cent can mean a lot. It is best to compare loans before you go in for a home loan. At the moment, HDFC and State Bank of India would be the best around.

f) Do Not Prepay A Loan In Advanced Stage of Completion

In the initial part of the loan the servicing of the interest rate is far higher. So, in the latter part only a small portion of interest and majority of principle amount remains.

Let's give you an example. If your personal loan is for 5 years and you have already completed 4 years, it does not make sense to repay the loan, because bulk of it would now be principle amount. What's the use of paying it back, when your interest component in the loan would almost be negligible. You would hardly save on interest by paying early.

Conclusion

Remember to do adequate research before you go in for a loan. A small saving in interest can actually mean a lot. Use all of the above measures to reduce your loan liability.

What The Windows Event Viewer Is and How You Can Use It

The Windows Event Viewer shows a log of application and system messages – errors, information messages, and warnings. Scammers have used the Event Viewer to deceive people – event a properly functioning system will have error messages here.

In one infamous scam, a person claiming to be from Microsoft phones someone up and instructs them to open the Event Viewer. The person is sure to see error messages here, and the scammer will ask for the person’s credit card number to fix them.

As a rule of thumb, you can generally ignore all of the errors and warnings that appear in the Event Viewer – assuming your computer is working properly.

Launching the Event Viewer

To launch the Event Viewer, just type Event Viewer into your Start menu and press Enter. You can also launch the Event Viewer from the Administrative Tools folder.

Events are placed in different categories. For example, the Application log contains a log of application events and the System log contains a log of Windows system events.

Don’t Panic!

You’re sure to see some errors and warnings in the Event Viewer, even if your computer is working fine.

The Event Viewer is designed to help system administrators keep tabs on their computers and troubleshoot problems. If there isn’t a problem with your computer, the errors in here are unlikely to be important. For example, you’ll often see errors that indicate a program crashed at a specific time, which may have been weeks ago.

Even warnings are often unimportant to the average user. If you’re trying to troubleshoot a problem with your server, these warnings may be helpful. If you’re not, they’re not particularly useful.

In theory, other applications are also supposed to log events to these logs. However, many applications don’t offer very useful event information.

Uses for the Event Viewer

At this point, you’re probably wondering why you should care about the Event Viewer. The Event Viewer can actually be helpful if you’re having a problem with your computer – for example, if your computer is blue-screening or randomly rebooting, the Event Viewer may provide more information about the cause. For example, an error event in the System log section may inform you which hardware driver crashed, which can help you pin down a buggy driver or a faulty hardware component. Just look for the error message associated with the time your computer froze or restarted – an error message about a computer freeze will be marked Critical.

You can also look up specific event IDs online – if you’re having a problem, they may help you find more information.

There are other cool uses for the Event Viewer, too. For example, Windows keeps track of your computer’s boot time and logs it to an event, so you can use the Event Viewer to find your PC’s exact boot time. If you’re running a server or other computer that should rarely shut down, you can enable shutdown event tracking – whenever someone shuts down or restarts the computer, they’ll have to provide a reason. You can view each shut down or system restart and its reason in the Event Viewer.

You can also use the Event Viewer in combination with the Task Scheduler – right-click any event and select Attach Task to This Event to associate a task with the event. Whenever the event occurs, you can have Windows automatically perform an action in response.

How To Create a Full Android Phone or Tablet Backup Without Rooting or Unlocking Your Device

Android includes a built-in way to back up and restore the contents of your phone or tablet. All you need is a computer and a device running Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) or newer.

Installing the Android SDK

We’ll need to use the adb (Android Debug Bridge) command to perform a backup or restore. This command is included with Google’s Android SDK, which you can download for free.

First, you’ll need to install Oracle’s Java Development Kit, which the Android SDK requires.Download and install the 32-bit version – the Android SDK wants the 32-bit version, even if you’re using a 64-bit version of Windows.

Next, download and install the Android SDK from Google. If the SDK informs you that it can’t find Java, you may have installed the 64-bit version of the JDK – ensure you install the 32-bit version.

After the SDK is installed, open the Android SDK Manager from your Start menu (search for “SDK Manager”).

Enable the Android SDK Platform-tools checkbox and click the Install button to install the platform tools package, which contains adb. If you see an error, you may need to run the SDK Manager as Administrator. (Right-click the SDK Manager shortcut in your Start menu and select Run as Administrator.)

Device Setup

You’ll need to enable USB Debugging on your Android device – you can do this from the Developer Options screen in Android’s settings.

You can now connect your Android smartphone or tablet to your computer using a USB cable. You’ll need drivers for your device installed on your computer to communicate with it – you can often find these drivers on your device manufacturer’s website. Installing the Google USB Driver from the Android SDK Manager window (look for it under Extras) may also work.

Testing ADB

Note the path where you installed the Android SDK. It’s displayed at the top of the Android SDK Manager window, next to SDK Path.

You’ll find the adb.exe file in the platform-tools folder. With the default installation settings, the location is: C:\Users\NAME\AppData\Local\Android\Android-sdk\platform-tools

Navigate to this folder, hold Shift and right-click inside it, and select Open command window here.

To test whether adb can communicate with your device, run the following command:

adb devices

You should see a device in the list – if you see no devices, adb can’t communicate with your device because its driver isn’t installed properly.

Backing Up Your Device

You can now use the adb backup command to back up your device. To back up everything, run the following command:

adb backup -apk -shared -all -f C:\Users\NAME\backup.ab

This backs up all your installed apps (APK files) and shared storage (SD card) data to the C:\Users\NAME\backup.ab file on your computer. Replace NAME in the command with your Windows username or provide another location for the backup file.

After running this command, you’ll have to agree to the backup on your device. You can also encrypt the backup with a password here, if you like.

Depending on how much data there is to back up, the process may take some time.

Restoring a Backup

To restore your backup in the future, run the following command:

adb restore C:\Users\NAME\backup.ab

You’ll be asked if you want to do a full restore – this will replace the data and apps on the device with the ones from your backup. If you encrypted the backup with a password, you’ll have to enter the password to restore it.

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This is a useful feature, but the complexity of using the Android SDK to create and restore backups is a bit much for the average user. Hopefully this feature will be given a convenient button in Android’s interface in the future.

The Best Tools to Easily Perform Remote Tech Support

“Help, my computer is broken!” comes the phone call yet again. If you’re stuck playing tech support for family or friends, there are many free tools that allow you to remotely access the other person’s computer and fix it.

There are a million and one remote tech support options out there. We’ll look at the best ones here, whether you need to walk them through downloading one over the phone or want to set up remote access ahead of time.

TeamViewer

TeamViewer is the remote support tool of choice for many geeks. It can be used in several different ways. You can direct your partner to download the TeamViewer QuickSupport application, which can run without administrator access or any system configuration. It will give them a session ID and password that they can give to you, allowing you to easily remotely connect from your TeamViewer program. There’s no setup process here — just download the appropriate program and double-click it to launch it.

You could also opt to set up unattended access after installing the full TeamViewer client, giving you permanent remote access to the computer without the remote user having to give you any passwords or confirm anything. As long as their computer is on, you’ll be able to access it remotely. If you want to do preventative maintenance or fix their computer while they’re not around, this is a convenient option.

TeamViewer is also cross-platform, so you can use it to troubleshoot a Mac or troubleshoot your parents’ Windows computer from your Linux PC. You can even remotely connect from an Android or iOS device. 

Windows Remote Assistance

Windows has a built-in remote assistance feature designed for just this situation. While only Professional editions of Windows can use the remote desktop server software, every version of Windows can send a remote assistance invitation and invite someone else to assist with their computers. This can be a convenient option because it’s already installed on the remote Windows computer, so you don’t have to walk the person through installing anything.

To use this feature, tell the other person to launch Windows Remote Assistance — either by opening the Start menu, typing Windows Remote, and pressing Enter or navigating to Start -> All Programs -> Maintenance -> Windows Remote Assistance.

They’ll need to use the Invite someone you trust to help you option and then select Easy Connect, which will give them a password.

Note that Easy Connect won’t always be available — if it isn’t, the remote user will have to create an invitation file using the Windows Remote Assistance app and send it to you.

You’ll need to open the Windows Remote Assistance application on your computer, choose Help someone who has invited you, select Easy Connect, and enter the password. If Easy Connect isn’t available, you’ll have to provide the invitation file.

After they approve your connection, you’ll be able to see and control their desktop remotely so you can begin cleaning it of viruses, removing toolbars, or dealing with whatever other problems are there. 

Windows Remote Assistance can help in a pinch, but it’s not the ideal permanent solution. If you find yourself needing to connect regularly, there’s no way to connect without having the other person open the Remote Assistance app and tell you the password. If a solution that allows you to remotely log in without pestering the other person is ideal, set up TeamViewer or a similar program instead.

Chrome Remote Desktop

There’s a good chance both you and your recipient already have Google’s Chrome browser installed on your computers. If you do, you can use Chrome Remote Desktop app to connect to them remotely.

To do this, both you and the other person will need to have the Chrome Remote Desktop app installed. The other person will need to open the Chrome Remote Desktop app from their new tab page and click Enable remote connections.

They’ll then need to click the Share button to share their computer with someone, which will give them an access code.

Once they provide you with the access code, you’ll be able to open the Chrome Remote Desktop app, click the Access button, and enter the access code. You’ll then be connected to their computer.

You could also try setting up a PIN for permanent remote access. Like TeamViewer, this tool is cross-platform and also works on Mac, Linux, and Chrome OS. It will also likely be more robust than Windows Remote Assistance, as it shouldn’t fail — unlike the Easy Connect option in Windows Remote Assistance.

More Options

Sure, there are more options, but they’re not all ideal. Skype has a screen-sharing feature, which is convenient because so many people have Skype installed — but Skype’s screen sharing feature doesn’t allow you to control the PC remotely, so you’d have to walk the person through clicking on the correct things.

LogMeIn is another remote desktop solution that’s occasionally used, but it’s much more focused on paid solutions for businesses. TeamViewer seems to be a better option for the average geek.

You could try enabling Remote Desktop in Windows for permanent remote access, but that would require the other person have a Professional version of Windows or better — not too common with average users. This would also require port forwarding to make the machine accessible from the Internet.

You could also set up a VNC server, which is the manual way of doing this. A VNC server is essentially a free alternative to Windows Remote Desktop, so you could install it on any edition of Windows. However, VNC servers are just a server — you have to manually forward ports and ensure it’s remotely accessible yourself. This is much more painful than just using one of the above solutions, which handles the connection setup itself without any messy port-forwarding.

Ultimately, you’re probably better off with TeamViewer. It’s easy to use, whether you’re trying to get the other person to download the QuickSupport application — no administrator access needed — and give you a password or configure remote, unattended access so you can always access their PC. The remote assistance features built into Windows and Chrome could also be useful as they should be quick to set up if you’re already using Windows or Chrome.

How To Boot Your Android Phone or Tablet Into Safe Mode

On your Windows PC, you can boot into safe mode to load Windows without any third-party software. You can do the same on Android with Android’s safe mode. In safe mode, Android won’t load any third-party applications.

This allows you to troubleshoot your device – if you’re experiencing crashes, freezes, or battery life issues, you can boot into safe mode and see if the issues still happen there. From safe mode, you can uninstall misbehaving third-party apps.

Booting Into Safe Mode

To reboot into safe mode on Android 4.1 or later, long-press the power button until the power options menu appears.

Long-press the Power Off option and you’ll be asked if you want to reboot your Android device into safe mode. Tap the OK button.

On older versions of Android, long-press the power button and then tap Power Off to turn off your device. Turn on the phone or tablet by long-pressing the power button again. Release the power button and, when you see a logo appear during boot-up, hold down both the Volume Up and Volume Down buttons. Continue holding the two buttons until the device boots up with a Safe mode indicator at the bottom-left corner of its screen.

Troubleshooting in Safe Mode

While in safe mode, the words “Safe Mode” will appear at the bottom of your screen.

In safe mode, you’ll only have access to the apps that came with your device. Apps you’ve installed will be disabled and any widgets you’ve added to your home screens won’t be present. Try using your device normally after booting into safe mode. If your issue – freezing, rebooting, crashes, battery life issues, or bad performance – is solved in Safe Mode, the problem is with a third-party app you’ve installed.

While apps are disabled, you can uninstall them normally. Open the Settings screen, tap Apps, locate the app you want to install, tap it, and tap the Uninstall button. if you’ve installed any apps recently, you should probably try uninstalling those apps first.

After uninstalling the apps, you can try installing them one at a time to identify which app is causing you problems.

If you’re experiencing major problems with your device, you may want to skip all the troubleshooting and restore your device to its factory default settings. You’ll lose all the data on your device – so make sure you have everything backed up – and you’ll have to reinstall any apps you’ve installed. To do this, open the Settings screen, tap Backup & reset, tap Factory data reset, and follow the instructions on your screen.

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To exit safe mode, restart your device normally. (Long-press the power button, select Power Off, and then long-press the power button again to turn it back on.) Your Android phone or tablet will boot and load third-party software as normal.

10 Must Know Things When Using ATM

Automated Teller Machine known as ATM which despenses cash 24/7 and can be operated within minutes.

With the help of PIN which is the numeric password one can withdraw an amount from the ATM.

It is suggested to customers to change the PIN on the first use. Customer should not disclose PIN to anybody, including to bank officials. Customers should change the PIN at regular intervals.

It is also said that typing Reverse Pin number will automatically alarm to the nearest police station.

Here are new safety measures one should follows:

1. When inside the ATM, make sure you are alone at your kiosk. Some banks have multiple kiosk in a ATM room.
2. Never handover your card to any unknown person, in case o doubts go to nearest bank or seek help from your family members.
3. It is never advised to make a not of PIN. It is always better to memorize
4. Never share PIN with anyone or seek help from anybody by handing over the card and revealing the PIN.
5. Never let anyone see the PIN while it is being entered at the ATM
6. Never use a PIN which can be guessed easily. Say for example avoid using birthday of spouse or telephone number or vehicle number.
7. Crosscheck before leaving whether you are kept your card back.
8. Register your mobile number with the card issuing bank for getting alerts for ATM /WLA transactions. Any unauthorized card transaction in the account, if observed, should be immediately reported to the card issuing bank.
9. Beware of any extra devices attached to the ATMs/WLAs. These may be put to capture customer's data fraudulently. If any such device is found, inform the security guard / bank/ white label ATM entity maintaining it immediately.
10. Keep an eye on suspicious movements of people around. Individuals should be beware of strangers trying to engaging him/her in conversation or offering help.

Finally, remember that bank officials will never ask for card details or PIN over telephone or email.

Be smart, do not respond to any vishing or phishing mails from people indicating that they represent your bank.

Guide to Buying the Right Printer

Even though computer printers are relatively ubiquitous, you can’t just go pull one off the shelf and be guaranteed a good fit for your needs. Read on as we detail the ins and outs of buying a home printer.

Know Your Printing Needs

There are printers for every need under the sun but rare is the printer that can fulfill many needs well. The challenge consumers face when shopping for a home printer is finding a printer that meets most of their needs and does so economically.

The first step in printer-shopping nirvana is to start your search with a very clear picture of what your printing needs are. Think back over what you’ve printed lately and what you plan to print in the future. Do you print mostly black and white text copies? Color photos? Color proposal drafts for your home business? What kind of printing you do is the biggest factor in what kind of printer you should shop for. The key is to buy a printer for the work you’re doing, not the work you think you might be doing in the future (in other words: buy the printer for the business reports you print now, not the colorful scrap book pages you wish you had time to work on).

Understanding Printer Technology

The core of any printer is the technology driving the actual print process. The mechanics of printing can involve blasts of ink, powder toner, electrostatic charges, or any other number of combinations to produce an image. We’re going to detail the major technologies on the market with their benefits and short comings.

Ink Jet: Ink jet printers are everywhere. Consumers frequently get them free with desktop computer packages, you’ll find basic models all over big box computer and office stores at dirt cheap prices, and they’ve enjoyed a fairly strong home-user market saturation.

At its most basic, ink jet printer technology is based on tiny little nozzles squirting a fine mist of ink onto paper. There are microchips in the print cartridges and an elaborate electro-mechanical framework supporting that process, mind you, but it’s still akin to tiny little cans of spray paint working down the page.

The popularity of ink jet printers can be largely attributed to their versatility. Although low-end ink jet printers aren’t the best at any specific type of printing they are great at doing a good-enough job for many types of printing (currently high-end ink jets and desktop photo printers based on ink jet technology dominate the consumer photo market).

They can print plain black and white documents, color photos, and print on a variety of media that other printers simply can’t match. Since the ink is sprayed down on the surface, isn’t heated, and (using the pass-through tray) it isn’t bent or rolled, it’s possible to use all sorts of media in most ink jet printers ranging from photo paper to specialty stocks like canvas and T-shirt transfers.

On the downside: ink jet printers are notoriously slow and the quality varies wildly. If you routinely print off multi-page reports and you want them hot off the press, you’ll be waiting awhile as your ink jet printer labors through them. The quality of the print is also dependent on what kind of ink and paper you’re using. Business-oriented ink jet printers tend to use pigment-based inks which are superior for crisp lines and graphics (like the fonts and company logos you find in most business printing). Ink jets that advertise superior photo printing usually use dye-based ink that blends much smoother—thus your photos look more realistic with better colors. With many brands it is possible to buy ink cartridges for both purposes but it’s less than ideal to swap out cartridges for different printing tasks.

The biggest downside of inkjet printing, by far, is the cost. You can easily pick up an inkjet printer for under $100 but consider that a company-subsidized bargain. They know you’ll be back for expensive cartridge-after-cartridge. Yes you can buy third-party cartridges and yes you can buy home-refill kits. A casual search online will show there are many people happy with such options—unfortunately it voids your warranty and refilling old cartridges is a hassle.

The Final Verdict for Ink Jet Printers: If you need to print on a wide variety of materials (labels, transfer paper, glossy paper, regular printer paper, etc.) and you’re not afraid of the higher supply cost incurred by frequently replacing ink cartridges, ink jet printers are a versatile addition to a home office.

Laser/LED: Laser printers, unlike ink jet printers, do not rely on a supply of ink and a small spray nozzle to deposit it onto the page. Lasers printers function much more closely to photo copiers than they do to ink jet printers. An electrostatic charge is applied to the paper which is then passed over a toner drum (toner is an ultra-fine powdered carbon and polymer blend) which is then fused onto the paper with heat. This is why a drop of water doesn’t ruin a laser printer printout the way it does a page from an inkjet printer—the toner is fused right onto the paper.

Speed and economical operation are the strongest selling points for laser printers. While ink jets can print on a variety of media with different inks in different colors, laser printers are monochromatic and limited to a much smaller range of media that can withstand the heat of the fusing process. (There are now color laser printers in the consumer price range but the color toner refills remain prohibitively expensive and keep color laser printing out of reach for most home users.)

An additional benefit of laser printing: the toner is dry and you can go months (if not years) without printing and the next print off the printer will look just as good as the first. In that same time span ink jet cartridges can dry up, the nozzles can get gummed up/crusted over, and you may find yourself hastily shopping for new cartridges. We’ve pulled old laser jet printers out of office storage and fired them up after years of neglect and they’ve printed like they were brand new.

A recent addition to the market, LED printers are essentially super-charged laser printers. Whereas a laser printer relies on an elaborate array of moving mirrors and focusing lenses (all of which must be in alignment) to generate the image on the toner drum, LED-based printers have a solid-state array in place of the laser array (thus there are no moving lasers, lenses, or mirrors to keep in alignment).

Currently you’ll pay a small premium for an LED-based printer over a laser-based one but in return you’ll get a potentially faster printer (LED units render the whole width of the drum image at the same time instead of scanning across with the laser) that’s less prone to breakdown because the LED array is solid-state. That said, we have laser printers around the office that have been going strong since the 1990s—even with the scanning laser/moving mirrors they are still much more reliable than ink jet printers.

The Final Verdict on Laser/LED Printers: If your primary printing needs are black and white text prints with occasional supplemental images, print-for-print you can’t beat a laser/LED printer. Your printer will last longer, spool up faster, and cost you less per-print than an ink jet by a wide, wide margin. How wide of a margin? We’ve replaced the toner cartridge in our HP Laserjet only twice since 1999—that’s 12 years of printing for about $100 worth of toner.

Printer Features, Terms, and Jargon

For the home user the two printing types we outlined above, ink jet and monochrome laser/LED, are the two best things going—color laser printing is still too expensive for casual home use. Once you’ve narrowed down which type of printer you’re interested in, however, you’ve still got a mountain of features and terms to wade through. We’ll do our best to help hack down the dictionary of terminology to a manageable list.

One note before we dig into the terms, just like we highlighted in our HDTV buying guide, manufacturers can (and often do) play fast and loose with the marketing terms they use. When in doubt, read consumer reviews about your printer before purchasing.

Resolution/DPI: You’ll see references to DPI all over the place while printer shopping. DPI stands for Dots-Per-Inch and it indicates how many individual dots of ink or toner are deposited within one square inch of printable area. Please note that the Dots-Per-Inch nomenclature for printing is completely different than the Pixels-Per-Inch nomenclature used with monitors—a computer monitor can produce radically more detail/vibrant color with fewer pixels because of the nature of monitor construction and the superior color rendering of pixels versus printed ink.

While historically the DPI was worth paying attention to, printing technology has improved so much in recent years that the DPI number largely irrelevant. 150 DPI is an acceptable level for simple draft prints (like grocery lists), 300 DPI is more than fine for sharp fonts and logos, and as you creep into higher DPI you get an even better print. Low-end ink jet printers typically have 300-600 DPI printing capabilities and higher-end inkjets easily climb past 1,000 DPI. Laser/LED printers range anywhere from 600-2,000+ DPI. Unless you’re specifically buying a printer for printing photos at home you can safely ignore the DPI rating all together as even the lowest end printer on the market will put out more than enough DPI for your letter/brochure/report printing needs.

Printing Speed: Although almost always expressed as PPM (pages per minute) you may also see printing speed notes as CPM (characters per minute) or, if you’re shopping for photo printers, IPM (images per minute). If you’re comparing ink jets with laser printers you’ll see a vast difference between PPM ratings. Ink jet printers are significantly slower than laser printers and manufacturers try to inflate the low PPM of ink jet printers by putting the draft-pages-per-minute on the box and in the printer specs–be aware of this and half the PPM rating to get a better idea of the rate for high-quality prints.

Regard the printing speed as a ball park figure. Your real-world PPM will vary widely from the manufacturer’s numbers based on what kind of printing you do (book report type prints on a laser printer, for example, will practically fly into the print tray where photos on on inkjet might well be dry by the time they finish).

Connection Types: Long gone are printers that connect via serial or parallel ports; the current standard for wired connections is USB. Some printers, especially laser/led printers, come with a network jack for network-based printing. More and more printers are shipping with built-in Wi-Fi functionality. If you’re interested in putting your printer somewhere else besides directly next to your primary computer, network and/or Wi-Fi printing can be invaluable. It makes it super simple to put your printer out of the way and still be able to shuttle prints to it from your desktop, laptop, and mobile devices without the need for print-sharing service on your primary desktop.

Mobile Printing: One of the newer features you’ll find on printers is support for mobile/cloud printing. Unheard of even five years ago,  it’s now increasingly common for people to want to print from their phones, tablets, and other mobile devices. Printing from mobile devices is still in its infancy and you should be prepared for some hiccups and hassles.

That said there are two primary solutions on the market. For iOS users who want to print from their iPhones and iPads, there are entire lines of AirPlay compatible printers from major manufactures. For Android and other mobile platforms (including iOS and BlackBerry—with a little tweaking) Google’s Cloud Print connects mobile devices with both Cloud Print-enabled computers and classic stand-alone machines.

Internal Memory: Depending on the type of printer you buy it can have anywhere from a tiny amount to half a GB or so. Single function consumer inkjet printers usually have negligible amount of  internal memory (multi-function ink jet printers will have more internal memory to support the print process and secondary functions like scanning). Laser printers generally have larger amounts of  internal memory (ranging from 128-512MB). Generally speaking networked/Wi-Fi enabled printers will have the most memory as it allows them to handle the extra print jobs coming in from across the network. Unless you plan on printing a large volume of material in a small time frame and/or to have a lot of material come in over the network, you don’t need a large memory bank in the printer. If you’re worried about it, check to see if the printer has an upgrade slot for future memory upgrades. Such upgrade slots are next to non-existent on low-end ink jets but quite common on laser printers.

Multi-Function/All-In-One: Multi-function printers combine additional features into the body of the printer. Many models combine a scanner and printer, to create a tiny home copy machine. Others also include fax capability and even phone handsets. The upside is that it’s usually way cheaper to buy a multi-function printer than it is to buy a printer, scanner, and fax machine. The downside is that if any component fails the whole unit can fail (or at minimum, need to be sent in for service).

When they work well, they’re great and they save a lot of space. When they fail, they take out a whole chunk of your home office functionality with them. We tend to avoid multi-function units but if you find a great deal on one and you’re willing to accept the risk of putting all your eggs in one electronic basket, it might be worth the trade offs. If you’re leaning towards an All-In-One model make sure to read as many reviews as you can before purchasing it—you want to be sure to get one few people have had issues with.

Stand-Alone Printing: Whether they call it Stand-Alone, Walk-Up, PC-less, or another term, many printer companies now include functionality that allows for printing without a computer. Essentially you can walk up with a USB drive, SD card, or other type of removable media, plug it into the printer, and print from the flash memory instead of by sending the file from a computer. All things considered it’s kind of a one-trick pony. We certainly wouldn’t buy a printer just for this feature. Where the feature does shine, however, is for stand-alone photo printers. It’s quite convenient to stick the SD card or link the camera via cable to the printer for pick-and-print photo printing.

OS Compatibility: Although this becomes less of an issue as time goes by, OS-to-Printer communication is still an issue. Windows users will have little to no troubles, Mac users will have fewer troubles, and Linux users will–as they’ve certainly come to expect–have the most hassles setting up printers. We’d highly suggest Linux (and even Mac) users do some cursory product searches related to the particular brand they’re considering. Linux users, for example, will definitely want to hit the up printer/scanner resources at Linux-Drivers.org. Conversely,

Monthly Duty Cycle: The duty cycle is an often over looked stat on the printer spec sheet. The duty cycle is essentially a pages-per-month rating. If the stats for the printer you’re looking at indicate that the duty cycle is 1,000 pages per month, the manufacturer is essentially saying that you can expect to print up to that volume per month without any issues. You want to purchase a printer with a monthly duty cycle well beyond your needs to ensure trouble free operation. Printers with higher duty cycle ratings are build sturdier to survive the wear and tear of heavy printing.

By purchasing a printer with  a duty cycle beyond what you actually need you decrease the chances of prematurely wearing the printer out. Remember that laser jet printer that has been going strong since 1999 that we mentioned earlier in the guide? It has a duty cycle rating of 10,000 pages per month—we’re pretty sure we’ve put less than a quarter of that through it a year. It will fall prey to antiquated cable formats and interfaces long before it gives up the printing ghost.

Duplexing: Duplexing is a fancy word for prints-on-both-sides. Printers without duplexing are stuck with manual duplex—which in turn is a fancy way of saying that you’ll need to take the one-sided sheets and feed them back into the printer in the right order for a proper two-sided printout. Manually duplexing is an enormous pain and not something you want to do with any regularity. Whether you want to save paper or like a thinner stack of print outs, make sure you get a printer that can properly duplex without you having to do the print-out shuffle every time you want two-sided prints.

Manual Feed/Multi-Purpose Tray: If you print a lot of card stock, envelopes, or (for ink jet printers) any kind of non-traditional stock like thick scrap book pages or T-shirt transfers, make sure you purchase a printer with a manual feed tray and/or multi-purpose tray. This allows you to by-pass whatever paper-manipulation the printer normally performs and send the media straight through the printer without any bending or excessive rolling. Since a business envelope would never make it through the roller system of a laser printer, for example, it’s important to have a manual feed tray to send the envelope right in the front and out the back without any bending.

Consumables: Every printer consumers something—ink cartridges, toner cartridges, paper types, etc.—when shopping for a printer make sure to do a phantom shopping trip to restock it. That $50 ink jet printer isn’t much of a bargain if it uses tri-color cartridges that cost $40 each and need to be replaced as soon as one of the three colors has run dry.

When shopping for ink jet printers make sure to check out what kind of cartridge system it uses. Can you replace each color individually? Are the black cartridges economical? If you’re comfortable voiding the warranty with aftermarket cartridges and ink refills are they readily available and easy to use?

When shopping for laser/LED printers make sure you can replace just the toner drum. Some companies require that you replace the entire toner/fuser assembly when the drum runs dry—this will significantly up your consumables cost over the life of the printer.