I recently heard from a friend of mine that he had a horrible experience reinstalling windows recently. His computer was running slow, and he wanted to erase it all and start over from scratch. Someone had told him about some elite hacker program that securely erases your computer and he couldn’t wait to do it so that he could call me and tell me how awesome it was. In hindsight, I bet he wishes he would have known I was completely familiar with DBAN already.

Unfortunately for my friend, the person who told him about the program neglected to mention that it would erase every hard drive connected to the computer. I bet you all just gasped, for good reason too. As most of you already guessed, when he ran the program he still had his external usb drive connected which contained his one and only “secure” backup.

At this point, he’s lost everything on his computer, including the backup he just finished making. In addition to the obvious losses of priceless photos, and other personal documents, this person had managed to rack up user accounts on hundreds of websites. He foolishly saved all this vital information, in a text document hidden away where he thought it was safe (which, it wasn’t, but thats another story). That text file is now gone, and he has a LOT of work ahead of him

You’re probably thinking, wow, it would be awful if that happened to me, but I bet it would be a whole lot worse than you’re even imagining. Losing that one file is pretty much the same thing as losing your wallet, so let’s play a game. Get out a piece of paper, and write down everything that you carry in your wallet/purse, and who you would have to contact to replace each one. When you’re sure you’ve got it all, check your wallet. I’ll wait…

…

…

Ok, so how did you do? If you’re like most people the first things on your list were probably credit and debit cards. Somehow they are always on our minds, right? You’re next couple items might be your drivers license, and maybe a membership card or two… after that I bet everything got a bit fuzzy, right?. You start asking yourself questions like, did I have a discount card to AMC or Regal? CVS or Walgreens? Who do I call to get a new birth certificate? Will they need my drivers license before they give me my birth certificate? Will I need my birth certificate to get my drivers license? I’m sure you get the idea… It get’s messy quick!

The same thing happens with your online accounts… you always remember a few basics, like who your email provider is (gmail, hotmail, yahoo); what portal do you use as your home page (google, yahoo, msn); your favorite social networking site is (facebook, twitter, myspace); you might even get a few more. However, once you get past 5-10 sites, you start forgetting them completely. You ask yourself things like “when I had a problem with my car last year I found a forum that really helped and seemed very well informed, but what was the name” or, “My ex’s friend told me about this really cool site, but we don’t talk since the breakup… what was it called?” That is all forgetting the obvious fact that most people don’t even remember their login data if they manage to GET to the website they want.

So, what’s the solution? Well, Roboform itself is a great start. It remembers all your passwords securely… but it only goes so far if you wipe your hard drive like my friend did. SiberSystems makes another product, GoodSync, that works perfectly in this situation. GoodSync will backup sections of your hard drive to other locations that you choose. Most of the time this would be to an external drive. However, when you lose your main copy, AND the backup simultaniously… this STILL doesn’t help you, by itself.

What I neglected to mention, is that when you combine the two products, you can instead backup to RoboForm’s online backup service– FOR FREE! That way, if my friend ever suffers another a catastrophic loss… he will rest soundly with the knowledge that his login data will be safe. It also serves the dual purpose of easing multiple roboform installations. Mine is set up to automatically sync up login data between my desktop, laptop, and my android phone instantly over the internet. That way I always have the information I need on the go. Depending on what information you store, it might just help you with that wallet problem as well!

I’m not particularly fond of T-Mobile’s network, at least around my area; but that sure is one hell of a deal if you know of any happy customers in your region. They don’t have the HTC Incredible that I just upgraded to, but they DO have some other nice phones like the HD2 which you may want to check out. They also have a decent selection of android devices (like the incredible) because they have been carrying android phones longer than the other major carriers.

Details are obviously sketchy, and who knows if this materializes, but if you’re in the market for a new phone/contract, you might want to wait it out until this weekend before you pull the trigger.

Should you spend hours before you leave the house doing price comparisons on every item you might conceivably walk past during that day? Probably not… Are you going to look up half of those same items next week because you didn’t make it to the store on time? Even less likely… All the same, I can’t tell you how many times I’ve come home after impulsively buying something, only to find that I could have saved 20-30 dollars simply by crossing the street to the competitors. That lost money adds up fast. Think of all the other impulse buys you could have made with that money.

So, here’s what I do, and hopefully it can save you as much as it’s saved me!

Imagine you and a friend are shopping and something catches your eye. You stare at it for a second, you start thinking things like, “I really could use one of those” and “wouldn’t that look great next to my [whatever] .” You start to get that burning feeling in your wallet that just won’t go away. You quickly snatch it off the shelf, throw it in your cart and go merrily on your way.

But wait… Your friend tells you that Big Bobs Widget Bin (all the way on the other side of town) has the same thing for half off. “Great, now you tell me; we were just there!” you scold your friend. Even still, you would have to be crazy to pass up a deal like that.

Fortunately your friend, like me, carries their trusty smartphone. They power it up, zip over to Big Bobs website, and there it is- half off and everything. They flash the screen to the clerk; a few keystrokes later your friend saved you 50 bucks- all for 2 minutes worth of work.

Think about that for a second, if you were paid $50 for every 2 minutes of work you did… you would be making $1500 dollars an hour. When was the last time someone paid you $1500/hour? Personally, I can’t think of once. This will obviously help far less during your $3 – $5 purchases and much more on $50+ purchases. I be posting again in a few days some tips that work well on any items, large or small.

Some things to know

• Most stores will price match a competitors store.
• Some stores have different sales in-store and on their website. Most of them will adjust the price, but only if you tell them to.
  One place that comes to mind is Harbor Freight Tools. I save TONS of money every time I go there simply by checking their website first.
• There’s not many, but some stores will EVEN match internet prices!  The ones that do may have some limitations, and most will only match the after-shipping price… but what do you have to lose?

A few days ago I upgraded my aging HTC 6800 for a brand new HTC incredible. What makes this important to you, my readers, is that with this phone I now have much more portable access to post my shopping finds on the move.

I will no doubt be posting numerous times over the next few days about the various tools available to my frugal android brethren. So, if you haven’t picked up one of these awesome new android phones yet… don’t wait any more.

As if you thought I would leave you hanging… if you plan on getting an incredible justice mine I have a great code for you during checkout. Use the code SMART30 and you should save 30 dollars on your purchase. This should put Verizon price right around the lowest price at amazon and wirefly after you add the “activation fee” you get charged for activating a phone that doesn’t come from Verizon direct. In addition Verizon gives free overnight delivery which is very nice.