This is convenient if your work forbids you from downloading torrents.  I was once with some friends having dinner and one asks have I seen The Uninvited. I says no. Then I thought hey I can download that right now before I forget, so I broke out my iphone, opened safari, went to the bookmark I had set for thepiratebay.org, looked for the movie, copied the link, then opened a new page in safari and clicked on the bookmark I had set for my utorrent on my personal machine at home, then logged into it, pasted the url to the torrent in there and clicked go. It began to download. Everyone was amazed. About 25 minutes later as we were getting in the car, my phone churped and it was an email notifying me that the download was complete and ready to watch ( I still have not watched it yet).

Now I am going to show you how you can do exactly the same thing.

First we need to setup a http://www.dyndns.com/ account to turn your ip address into a name.

Your ip address is a number that your internet service provider or ISP for short assigns you to allow you internet access. Sometimes this number changes and it would be hard to remember so we need to turn this number into a name.

Here is a how to article from their website.

https://www.dyndns.com/services/dns/dyndns/howto.html

Register for a free account at  http://www.dyndns.com/.  Agree to the site’s terms, and use a legitimate email address to complete registration. Once in awhile, DynDNS will email you at that address asking you to confirm that it continue your service.

Log into your new account. Go to the “My Services” area on the left side. Under “Host  Services” click “Add New HostName.” There, fill in the name you want to use.  DynDNS will autofill your IP address (if you’re doing this from your home computer). Choose a domain and type in a custom subdomain, which can be anything from lifehacker.kicks-ass.org or john.is-a-geek.com or something, like below:

Set up your computer to update DynDNS.

Now that your computer is registered with DynDNS, each time your computer’s IP address changes, it has to let DynDNS know. This can be done either with free updater client software or through your router.

If your computer is connected directly to the Internet, download the DynDNS updater client for Mac or Windows here. Install and enter your DynDNS information so that your computer can update DynDNS’s database regularly.

If you are behind a router, you’re in luck. Most modern routers support dynamic DNS services. Here’s a screen shot from a routers configuration page for just such a setup.

You’re done. Give your new domain a spin!

Type your new domain name by entering it in your web browser’s address bar. It should resolve to your home server. From here you can publicize or bookmark your server’s new domain name no matter how often your IP address changes.

Now that you have your dyndns, and utorrent setup, and know how to use it, let me show you how to use your iphone or computer from a remote location to download torrents to home.

In order for this to work you must have a computer at home that is on all the time acting as a “server”. This computer will have utorrent with its web interface running on it and possibly a dyndns updater.

So this is typically what I do…

Launch Safari and choose my torrent book mark of choice which is thepiratebay.org

I zoom in and type in the show or movie I want to download.

I zoomed in and selected a torrent.

Where it says “DOWNLOAD THIS TORRENT” I press and hold over the word to bring up the following window.

I select COPY to copy the selected link.

I open a new tab and select my home address where utorrent is running over the web.

I log into it.

I am in my box at home.

I zoom in and select the BLUE folder.

Now I select the Torrent URL: box and paste the torrent location into there.

The Torrent URL is posted. I click done and OK

It is now downloading. I can do this from anywhere in the world.

At this point I am feeling better than Superman.

This is what the email notifications look like

And that’s it. That is how I download torrents to my home Media Center using the iphone remotely.

Pretty neat huh?

I absolutely love Skype and here is why…

Think about this for a second. The unfortunate part about checking our mailboxes is BILLS!

So I get a water bill and a light bill and (used to be) a phone bill.
What happens if I don’t use any water for the month? Water bill shows $0.00.
What happens if I don’t use any electricity for the month? Last I checked $0.00

What happens if I don’t use the phone for an entire month? That’s right, I still get charged like $60.00 or so for fees and the privilege of having a land line phone. At the very least you might be able to get it down to $26.00. This is ridiculous!

It all started when I was at Wal-Mart one day and noticed that they had a super clearance of electronic items. One of them happened to be a USB Skype phone and I thought to myself that for $2.00 I really couldn’t go wrong and should try it out.

Actually to be honest I have always been a lover of prank calling and thought this would be fun. I must admit that was my First thought. My second thought was more along the lines of business.

At that time I was beginning to start an online computer help website after just being laid off from work, and it would involve people calling me with computer problems and I would remote into their computer and help them.

I started to realize that since I didn’t have a house phone, that I would be using my cell phone for business and this would really eat up my minutes. I had an unlimited data plan but only 450 nationwide minutes per month and to this was already costing me $120 a month.

Now I could have purchased another plan to give me unlimited calling for another $50 a month, but this would be just added expense on a per month basis and cell phone service at my home is not the best.

I was thinking that Skype may be the answer to this.

One Saturday I decided to plug in the USB Skype phone and go to the Skype website and download the software onto my computer. It came with 100 free minutes and once I was all setup I decided to call my Dad and see how it sounded before committing to anything more. After all I only had $2.00 in this so far.

I connected with him over the phone and the conversation was flawless. I couldn’t believe my ears. It was crystal clear despite what others on the internet were saying about Skype’s voice quality. I figure this has got to be my solution to a business phone, so I began to look over their packages.

I ended up getting a Skype Out for a year for $23.00.

That would allow me to call anywhere in the USA and Canada anytime, unlimited calling.

Then I needed a number for people to call me, so I bought a number that was local to me since I plan on most of my customers being near. The number was $24.00 a year for unlimited calling.

This brings my total for the year to $47.00 for unlimited calling inbound and outbound with a number for me to give out so people can call me. Not bad at all.

Now I know what you are thinking… do I have to be tied to the computer all the time?

Well for me and with the purpose in mind, I will be in front of the computer all the time, but you don’t have to be.

There are lots of things you can use.

There is a Belkin Wi-Fi phone (Part # F1PP000GN-SK) http://www.belkin.com/skype/howitworks/ that you can use with your wireless network to go about through your home or take with you on the road and use in hotels, work office, airports, or wherever there is a wireless connection.

There is also a desktop internet phone for Skype (Part # F1PP010EN-SK) http://catalog.belkin.com/IWCatProductPage.process?Product_Id=404607 for those that do not have a computer, but do have an internet connection or simply just want the phone located somewhere in the home and not have it tied to the computer.

I ended up getting a skype headset and a cordless telephone, a cheap one, one of those v-tech cheap ones.

I also got this Zoom Phone Adapter for Skype – Model 5900 http://www.zoom.com/products/voip_products.html#skype_products

You can get more hard ware here

Buy Skype hardware now

I can now use my headset or the cordless handset and walk about the house and even into the yard.

There are a ton of things you can do with Skype!

Cheap calls
Call phones and cell phones anywhere at low rates.
Skype to Skype calls are 100% free.
Online number

Friends call you from a regular phone and reach you on Skype – anywhere.
You can pick a number that’s local to your area.
I know people that have parents that live in another state. Their parents do not have a computer so a Skype to Skype call is out of the question. Instead my friend gets a number that’s local to his parents so when the parents call, the number is local to them.

SMS
Send text messages directly from Skype.
Voicemail
Never miss a call.
Call forwarding
Get your calls on your cell phone when you’re offline.

There is an option where you can set it to send the call to your cell phone or any phone really after a certain time limit, like 15 seconds for example.

Pay as you go, Pay monthly, or do like I did and just pay for it by the year.
You get it at a discounted price of you do so.

You can find out more about skype here.

3 months for the price of 2 on all 3 or 12 month calling subscriptions from Skype.

Dont forget you can use it for you business too!
Skype for Business