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Independent tech guides — Useful tools — Made in Canada

The everyday tech desk

A little less
tech trouble.

Keep your files in order. Understand the bill. Make the next small tech decision with a clearer head.

Find a useful tool Read the guides

12 free tools · No account needed.

THE DRIVE PLANNERSTART WITH WHAT YOU HAVE.

A useful place to startFree tool · No sign-up

How much backup space do you need?

Your files today

GB

Plan for2 TB

Illustrative plan: 3 years, 15% annual growth, 50% history allowance, 20% free space. Adjust everything in the full tool.

12Practical tools

14In-depth guides

Your files stay with you

A small independent tech desk.
Made in British Columbia, Canada.

01 / THE TOOLBOX

Find the tool for the job.

Explore the toolbox

Backup drive planner

Find a sensible drive size before you buy one.

Download time

Turn a file size and connection speed into a useful estimate.

Subscription check

See what those small monthly charges add up to.

Image compressor

Make an image easier to send. Keep it on your device.

Storage units

Find out what a storage number actually means.

Streaming data

Put viewing hours next to your monthly data allowance.

Internet plan costs

Compare the full bill after the promotion ends.

Image resizer

Get the dimensions right before you send a picture.

Aspect ratios

Keep a picture in proportion, down to the pixel.

File checksum

Check whether the file matches the bytes you expected.

Random password

Make a fresh password, then save it in your manager.

Text cleaner

Tidy pasted text without sending it to a server.

02 / WORTH KNOWING

A good place to get unstuck.

A little separation

Privacy4 min read

Check a file with SHA-256, and understand what a match means

Compare a file with a trusted SHA-256 checksum, recognise ordinary mismatches, and understand why a match is not a malware scan.

Small costs add up

Internet5 min read

Compare internet plans using the whole bill, not the opening price

Compare promotional and regular internet prices over the same period, account for fees, and choose capacity around actual household needs.

Less weight. Same story.

Everyday tech4 min read

Resize or compress an image? Change the thing that matters

Choose useful pixel dimensions, preserve proportions and export a smaller file without confusing quality settings with image resolution.

Buy the right size backup drive

Storage · 4 min read

Build a backup plan you can restore

Storage · 4 min read

Where did the rest of the terabyte go?

Storage · 4 min read

Read your internet speed correctly

Internet · 4 min read

Plan the first cloud backup

Internet · 4 min read

Choose an image format that fits

Everyday tech · 4 min read

A smaller image, kept on your device

Privacy · 4 min read

Find the real total of recurring costs

Everyday tech · 4 min read

A note from the desk

Useful first.
Everything else, second.

You shouldn't need a new account, a ten-minute video, or a sales pitch to answer a small tech question. We make the tools we'd want to find, explain the assumptions, and link to the original sources.

Meet DigitalMaple