Rick's Daily Tips

Rick’s Daily Pick: Jackery HomePower 3000 Portable Power Station

Posted on August 31, 2026

Note: The links in this post are affiliate links.

My “Pick” for today is this fantastic Jackery HomePower 3000 Portable Power Station.

Have you ever lost a refrigerator full of food and had your portable devices go dead due to an extended power outage? If so, you know what an expensive hassle that can be.

This will keep your fridge and CPAP machine running for up to two days while also keeping your phone and other essentials charged up and powered up. In short, it’ll be your own personal power company the next time your local power grid goes down.

Click here to check out the Jackery HomePower 3000 Portable Power Station at Amazon.

Did you miss (or want to revisit) one of my earlier picks? You might find it right here.

Picture of the Day: “Morning Light”

Posted on August 31, 2026

Today’s POTD features the rising sun casting a beautiful glow over the countryside in rural Washington County, VA. I hope you like it.

Have lots of treasured photos of your own that you’d love to display in your home but you have limited wall space? A digital picture frame (#ad) is an excellent solution. Check them out!

Enjoy these Pictures of the Day? Sign up for my free Rick’s Tech Tips Newsletter and you’ll never miss one (or any of my tech tips either)!

Monthly Tech Giveaway – August 2026

Posted on July 31, 2026

Note: The links on this page are affiliate links.

August’s winner will receive a fantastic Ambient Weather WS-2000 Smart Weather Station with Wi-Fi Remote Monitoring and Alerts.

If you’re a weather buff like I am you’ll love this personal weather station. It’ll keep you up-to-date on what’s happening outside your own home in real time.

All subscribers to the Standard edition of my Rick’s Tech Tips Newsletter have an equal chance to win.

Premium subscribers have two chances to win (their email addresses are added to the “pot” twice).

Not a subscriber? Just enter your email address in the sign-up form on this page.

Once subscribed you’ll be eligible to win each month’s drawing – starting with this month. Better yet, opt for a Premium subscription for double the chance to win!

The drawing for this month’s prize will be held on August 31 and the winner will be notified by email. The winner will be selected at random.

Good luck!

Why you shouldn’t leave your backup drive plugged into your computer

Posted on August 30, 2026

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Regular readers of this blog know I’m always mentioning how important it is to create regular backups of your computer’s hard drive or SSD.

After all, always having a recent backup on hand is the very best “insurance” you can have against a catastrophic drive failure or a crippling virus infection.

But there’s one important point that I probably don’t stress nearly as much as I should…

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Q&A: If I remove a computer’s hard drive will any data be left behind?

Posted on August 29, 2026

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Question from Karen: I have several old computers in my basement that I want to recycle.

I’ve always heard that you need to destroy a computer’s hard drive before you recycle it to prevent someone else from maybe getting your files.

My question is will removing the hard drive from a PC completely eliminate any possibility of someone finding my old files.

[Read more…]