So the power's out, and you've broken out the candles to keep things well-lit—but your phone's about to die too, with no working wall outlet in sight! DIY weblog Tinkernut shows us how to power your phone with the heat of one of those candles.

This is one of those fun-but-only-mildly-practical projects perfect for a day off and a little science lesson. Essentially, you'll be using a Peltier device scavenged from a USB drink chiller, a can of cooking fuel, and a cheap AA phone charger to create the device. You won't need a ton of electronics experience to pull it off, either, so it's great for when you just feel like tinkering around. Of course, you could always charge it with the AA charger, but why waste a battery when you could charge your phone and light your house at the same time (not to mention roast a few marshmallows)? Check out the video above to see it in action.

Candle Powered Phone Charger | Tinkernut

Ever been told that you should fully discharge your battery to prolong its life? Or that jailbreaking your phone is illegal? Or that you should wait for the newest Intel processor because it's going to be "so much faster"? These are tech myths we hear all the time, and likely spread to our friends—but most are just a waste of your time (and in some cases, they can actually harm your gadgets). Here are some of the worst offenders.

10. Better Hardware Specs = Better Gadgets

If you're waiting to upgrade your gear until the next big processor comes out, or until the latest Android phone with even more RAM appears, you're probably wasting your time. These days, most hardware specs don't even matter that much. Processors have more power than most users will ever need, and phones come out so often that by the time your dream phone comes out, another one will have already been announced. There are exceptions to these rules, of course—both for computers and smartphones—but in general, stop crying over your current device and just upgrade. You'll be a lot happier once you do.

9. Lossless Music Sounds Better than MP3

While bitrate can make a difference in your music, there's a pretty big misconception that as long as you have a good ear, you can hear the difference between lossless files and MP3. It takes a lot more than just careful listening—you'd need a very fine-tuned ear, some really high-end speakers, and a specific type of music, like classical or jazz. Don't believe me? Take an ABX test with your own music files and find out for yourself. You may be surprised at the results. Of course, that doesn't mean you should junk all those FLAC files—they're still ideal if you want to convert that music to a new format later on. Photo by Tess Watson.

8. Android Task Killers Are Necessary for Good Performance

Not only have we Android users perpetuated this myth, but lots of hardware manufacturers and cellphone carriers will recommend you use a task killer to lengthen your battery life and speed up your phone. Not only will they do nothing for your battery life, but most are designed to solve problems that don't actually exist (like running out of RAM). If you experience performance boosts with a task killer, it's because you're killing a task that's either gone awry (in which case you're better off just rebooting your phone) or because you've downloaded a poorly written app (in which case you should uninstall it). Task killers can cause other problems with your phones, and you shouldn't use them unless you're using a very, very old phone with very, very outdated software. Check out our explainer on task killers to learn more, and if you want to speed up your phone, check out these other tried and true methods instead.

7. Jailbreaking Your Phone Is Illegal

While jailbreaking your phone will definitely void your warranty, people have been going around saying it's actually illegal to do—which is 100% false. The Copyright office has officially said that jailbreaking is completely legal to do with a device you own, as long as you aren't using it to pirate apps, of course. That said, there are a lot of ways you're probably breaking the law without knowing it, so read up on those if you're curious. But if you were holding back on jailbreaking your phone, now would be a great time to check out all its awesome, legal benefits.

6. Mac Users Don't Need to Worry About Malware

Mac users have often touted their computers as "more secure" than Windows PCs, which is a very hotly-contested issue—some say OS X's UNIX underpinnings make it inherently more secure, while others claim it's only because the Mac isn't a big target for viruses. Either way, it's important to note that while viruses aren't as widespread as they are on Windows, Macs are far from immune—in fact, we've already seen a few instances of real Mac malware. Don't let your choice of OS obscure the fact that safe browsing and common sense are the best protection against viruses and other malware. After all, just because that email virus didn't infect you doesn't mean you didn't pass it on to your other Windows-using friends.

5. You Should Buy an Extended Warranty for New Gadgets

No matter how careful you are, we've all broken at least one gadget in our lives—and it may have tempted you to buy an extended warranty the next time. However, extended warranties aren't all they're cracked up to be. Sometimes they only cover half the things that could go wrong, or sometimes the chances of your device failing are just plain slim. Instead, you're better off setting up an extended warranty fund for yourself—as long as you aren't really clumsy, you'll probably come out ahead in the end.

4. You Should Fully Discharge Your Laptop Battery Every Time

Battery life is always at a premium these days, and you've probably heard a whole host of tricks for keeping your battery in tip top shape. This particular myth—that you should fully discharge your battery every time you use it—is left over from old nickel cadmium batteries that suffer from a memory effect no longer present in modern lithium batteries. Today's batteries take less maintenance, but there are still some good ways you can prolong its lifespan, so check out our guide to battery care for more info.

3. Password-Protected Wi-Fi Networks Are Safe from Hackers

So you've heard about how important security is on public Wi-Fi networks, but a lot of people are still misinformed about what really constitutes a public network. Just because your network's protected with a password doesn't mean it's secure. In the case of home networks, it means it's secure from outside hackers, but if you head to a coffee shop or hotel, that network is still public. Anyone with a password can still connect to the network (like other coffee shop patrons) and potentially sniff your traffic. So, unless you're at home, always protect yourself when connected to Wi-Fi—you never know who else is connected. Photo by °Florian.

2. PeerBlock will Keep You Safe and Anonymous on BitTorrent

A lot of BitTorrent users are looking to cover their tracks these days, and most are doing so by enabling encryption and using something like PeerBlock to keep unwanted eyes from watching their downloads. However, this does not make you anonymous in any way—encryption only keeps your ISP from throttling you, and PeerBlock is not even close to being foolproof. If you really want to stay anonymous, you have to use a VPN or a proxy service like BTGuard. You can also use a private tracker, which offers other benefits as well, but still isn't quite as secure as other methods.

1. [Insert Tweak Here] Will Speed Up Your Computer

These are some of the worst myths out there. Everyone's always looking for a quick, free way to drastically increase their computer's speed, and a lot of them are loads of baloney. At best, they'll do nothing, and at worst, they can actually degrade performance. We've talked about a ton of them before, so brush up on your myths before you go trying to speed up your PC. If you really want some speed boosts, upgrade your hardware, or at least make sure you're performing regular maintenance. With proper care, you should never need to do a clean install of Windows again.

We regularly test the four most popular browsers for speed, but what about battery life? If you're on a laptop, an extra 20 minutes can make a pretty big difference. Weblog 7Tutorials did a battery life test of each browser, and found that Internet Explorer was the most likely to give you a noticeable battery boost.

They used the Peacekeeper battery test on Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox, and Opera, on a clean install of Windows 7 using the Power Saver power plan, and run three times to get an average for each browser. Internet Explorer 9 came out ahead, providing 104 minutes of battery life in the Peacekeeper test, with Opera not far behind at 100 minutes. Firefox lagged behind a bit at 92 minutes, while Chrome got almost 20 minutes less, lasting only 85 minutes.

Obviously, your mileage may vary on this, but it's a good thing to know if you're in a bind and need to squeeze every ounce of battery from your laptop. Hit the link to read more about their methodology and the results.

Test Comparison: Which Browser Will Make Your Laptop's Battery Last Longer? | 7Tutorials

Android (rooted): SwitchMe dual boots your Android phone in just a few taps, so you can configure different Android installations for different situations.

We've already shown you how to dual boot your Android phone, but SwitchMe is a bit different. Unlike BootManager,it won't let you dual boot different ROMs, but it's also much less complex to use. With the touch of a button, SwitchMe will create a new, clean installation of your current ROM, free of the apps and settings tweaks you're currently using. You can then craft that installation to fit whatever purpose you want—like one with fewer apps that doesn't suck up battery life. The app's developer offers some other great suggestions for your other installations, or "profiles":

Privacy—the most obvious benefit is that you can securely share one device among multiple users, which gives you privacy and peace of mind.

Testing—if you are a developer, you can use profiles as clean sandboxes to test your applications and their interaction with the system.

Gaming—with multiple installations of Android on a single device, you can now play online MMOs as different characters.

Speed—the games your kids play slow down your tablet, but with SwitchMe you can easily create profiles in without games or messengers.

Battery life—when the battery is low but there are important emails or documents to edit later, switch to a profile which only contains these essentials.

If you aren't looking to try new ROMs, SwitchMe is a fantastic way to dual boot your phone without any fuss—it literally just takes a couple taps to create a new installation, and you can manage it all from SwitchMe's simple interface. Hit the link to check it out.

SwitchMe is a free download for Android. For $2, though, you can grab the pro key that lets you create as many profiles as you want, and password protect them for increased privacy.

SwitchMe | Android Market via XDA Developers