Technology

eee PC

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Today I got my eee PC 1000h. It is a tiny 3lbs or so mini laptop. My first impressions are mixed. It is small but feels heavier than i thought. The Vaio I have feels allot lighter but is only slightly lighter. The eee PC does feel a bit sturdier. The keyboard seems ok. The speed of the system seems pretty sluggish, but I don't plan on doing intense stuff on it. I bought it mainly tto take notes and blog like I am doing right now.

I want to plug the eee PC into a monitor and see how it performs on a big screen. From what I can tell this is a great little limited capacity computer, but by no way does it replace a full functioned laptop.

SugarSync

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I have been using .Mac on and off for a few years as a remote file storage location for my documents. The service was the only one that I found that had a workable system that kept a local cashed copy on my computer and synced the changes to a central server. The problem is that .Mac doesn't work that well. I stopped using it back in January when my annual renewal was coming up. I didn't want to keep paying it since I didn't think I was getting my money's worth. In June I changed my tune since the MobileMe functionality was coming out with the iPhone 3G. I thought those added functions were worth it the fee, and if I was already paying for the MobileMe syncing I might as well use the iDisk feature as well.

That decision hasn't worked out well for me. I constantly get sync errors when I have documents open that iDisk is trying to "automatically" sync. I have had iDisk totally corrupt two of my personal wiki's I have using VoodooPad.

I was happy to stumble upon an article that talked about among other things different file syncing and storage services. I had heard about Xdrive, and Box.net, but I looked up a new one called SugarSync. On paper it does everything I need:

  1. Price is reasonable
  2. Mac & WIndows clients
  3. Local (or multiple local) copies as well as the server copy
  4. Sync on when changes happen
  5. Plus it offered other features that I didn't think of but probibly could use.

Best of all the reviews were all really good, and from reputable people like Mossberg and Pouge (I hope I spelled their names right). With all this good "sounding" information I signed up for a 45 day trial with 10gigs of file space. I am slowly syncing my documents folder to their system now. According to their status meeter it will be about 7 more hours before the data is fully synced. I will then give it a true test drive at work tomorrow. I will also be able to install the Windows agent on my Vaio laptop at work and see if I can access everything. That was something I couldn't do with iDisk.

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Mobile Phone Savings

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Back around March / April time frame I upgraded my mobile phone plan to the new unlimited minutes option from AT&T. I was using my mobile for just about all calls and my usage on the phone shot up. Then in June I was able to make outbound calls via Skype but have my caller ID come up as my mobile #. That change allowed me to use my computer to make most of my outbound calls. In July my mobile usage peaked, but towards the end of the month I began to seriously use Skype over my mobile. I mean why use my mobile when I am sitting at my desk at work or at home where I spend most of my time on the phone anyway? Because of this huge decrease in the usage of my mobile I am switching to a cheaper plan when my billing cycle changes next week. I will save $40 a month by going to a 900 minute plan with rollover. That might even be over kill at the usage rate I am going but I don't want to chance it. The cost of Skype in and out for one year is around $61. I make that back in under two months. Now all I need to do is wait for more friends of mine to use video chat and I won't need to make any calls at all!

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Vista

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I am once again dabbling with Microsoft Vista. I installed Vista using bootcamp on my Mac Mini the other day. Now that I am using the iMac more and more, I can give the Mini a dual role of normal Mac and Vista. The iMac is much more powerful so using it for video processing and other functions I used to do on the Mini makes sense. WIth the Mini freed up I can play with it and do Vista on it. So far I haven't put any software on it. I am just tweaking the install and patching it. I don't know why I am really spending any time with Vista if I am so happy with my Mac. I guess my need to tinker outweighs common sense sometimes. Not to worry I am not abandoning my Mac any time soon. On the contrary, I am waiting for the new Macbook's or Macbook Pro's to get released so I can upgrade.

Apps That Should Be Written To Be Put On My iPhone 3G

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I know the iPhone App Store is only a few weeks old but I really would like to see some apps that I am used to on the palm. I don't miss the Palm OS, but some of the apps I had on my Treo's were very helpful or fun.

SSH Client – someone wrote a Telnet client, but lets face it if you are a decent network or systems person you really want SSH and not telnet. Or both!

FTP Client – Probably wouldn't use it that much, but a cheap or free client would be a nice to have.

Quicken or an expense program that will export inputed data into a format that Quicken will read. Am I the only one that uses Quicken that wants this? They make a Palm and Windows Mobile version!

Call Recording – This was a must have for me on all my recent phones. Until you have it, you don't realize how much you need to record calls. Especially when dealing with vendors, support people, etc. Had it on my Palm Treo's and my Nokia E61i. I actually didn't use the Treo 750 because it couldn't record calls. Not having this function was a trade off I made when getting the iPhone, but I would hope someone would write a program to do this!

Skype – probably too much to ask for since you can't use VOIP applications via the 3G network, but Skype would be nice!!!

There is probably more, but for now that is all that I can come up with.

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Apps Found on My iPhone 3G

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I have been using my iPhone 3G for a few weeks now. So far I am a fan! There are still a few things it cannot do (call recording!) but overall it is a great phone. I have downloaded a ton of free and paid apps. Some of my favorites installed on my phone now are:

GrandDialer – Basically an app that will do GrandCentral's click to dial. I haven't used it that much yet, but so far it is really cool.

Weather Bug – because I like to know the weather.

iTrans NYC – fantastic NYC subway maps, plus transit alerts

Facebook – because I got addicted to it back in May!

iDrink – You never know when you need the ingrediants to make a fantastic drink

GoContact – send contacts details quickly. It is amazing how often I need to do this

Loopt – Location based stuff is just fun. I just wish anyone I know used it

aSubnet & Instant Byte – Subnet calculator. I also have some unit converter software specifically for technology. Very helpful. I am waiting for an SSH client, and a cheap FTP program (the only one out there is $10).

iNetwork Test – runs a test of my wireless connection and keeps track of results and the locations they were taken. Very cool.

Mobile News & NY Times – my fix of the news.

1Password – website password management on my iphone. I love this on my Mac and it works great on my phone.

SplashID – I had this on my Palm for ages, and the concept is the same. My password library with me anywhere i go, but in a nice secured format.

Remote – iTunes / Apple TV remote that just works.

PwGen – random password generator. I have a program like this on my Mac, but a portable one is cool. In my job creating passwords happens all the time!

BigTipper – I hate calculating tips, this makes life easy.

Flashlight – It is just cool!

and More…

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I Cannot Stand The Blackberry Pearl

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I cannot stand the Blackberry Pearl! I know it is a really small phone, and it is a Blackberry but it drives me crazy. The only reason to have a Blackberry is to use it for email. I think all other functions of it are sub-par as smart phones go, so to have an email device without a full keyboard is driving me up the wall. My office gave me a brand new Verizon Wireless Pearl when I started and I tolerated the horrible keyboard since it was the nicest phone they had. The last straw was about two weeks ago when I was writing my boss and the dam predictive text or whatever you call it could not type out LAN, nor could I cancel out of the options it was giving me.

Early last week I had our telecom person switch me to an Blackberry 8800 that my predecessor had. That phone is huge, and kind of sucks but it has a full keyboard. I will use it until we can figure out why we cannot get the iPhone or any other Wireless Active Sync device to connect to our Exchange 2003 server.

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This Weekend

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I went to see The Dark Knight with Danny in Union Square Saturday night. We went for some food and a few drinks afterward. The movie was good, but not awesome. Until the last Batman movie I hadn’t been a huge fan of the franchise anyway, so the new ones are converting me over!

Today was more relaxing. I cleaned up my apartment, and did some reorganization on my computer. It took all week to move 1.4+ terabytes of data around on my newly upgraded Drobo. I like the unit, but performance is sucking big time after I put the 4th 1TB drive in. It stinks attached to my Mini or as a NAS. I don’t know what the deal is.

Other than that I relaxed. Having some down time since the weeks are hectic is nice!

DroboShare and Drive Storage

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Since John turned me onto the Drobo I have been a huge fan. I finally finished filling all 4 drive bays with 1TB drives a few weeks ago. Buying drives over the course of a few months defrayed the cost a bit. Last week I realized that if I want to have all 2.7TB of usable storage in one volume I will need to reformat the unit. Apparently the original firmware could only do up to 2TB volumes. Newer ones will do up to 16TB so I can add storage later and not have to worry about formatting the volume.

In order to reformat the Drobo I needed to move all the data currently on it off onto other storage while I performed the reconfiguration. The moving of the data off the Drobo took about 3 days. The reformatting of the unit took 15 minutes. While I was moving the data off the drive I realized that I would rather have that storage as NAS instead of directly connected to my Mac Mini desktop. When I was out earlier this morning I went over to J&R and picked up a DroboShare NAS attachment. The setup was just as easy as setting up the Drobo. I also like the fact that it piggy backs its power off of the Drobo.

Now that my Drobo is formatted for 8TB I can expand disks over the next few years without worrying about doing this exercise again. I am now copying all the data back onto the Drobo. It is slightly faster to do this by direct attaching the drive to my computer. Once I am done uploading the data, I will plug the drive back into the NAS head and my home network storage setup will be complete, for now. I want to see how long it takes me to use up 2.7TB?

The next big question is what to do with all my older external hard drives I have accumulated? I have many. I have about 5 250GB drives, and two 750GB external drives. It is allot, but I got the 750’s to replace some 250’s, and the 250’s never really went away. Once everything is on the Drobo I want to get rid of the 250’s and just have the two 750’s around for backups. And only a few years ago I thought it was allot to manage the data on one or two 18gb SCSI drives!

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iPhone Attempt Number Three

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I freely admit that I went out and bought an iPhone on the second day they came out last year. I also admit that I bad mouthed getting one, but got one in hopes that my assessment was wrong. It turned out that I was right. I couldn’t use the original iPhone. It was too limited in what it could do, and had too many quirks. Last year the line wasn’t so bad on the second day, and it moved quick. I think Jayson and I were done with the line in like 30-40 minutes tops.

This year was a totally different story. I wanted the new phone. On paper it had almost everything I am looking for in a phone, and the lines were huge and slow. So far my assessment has been good. The two issues I have with the phone is the touch keyboard is small, and I make key errors allot. Hopefully i will get better over time. The other issue is like all smart phones with installed software, it is buggy. I have had two apps reboot the phone already. This isn’t really Apples fault, but lets hope the iPhone doesn’t turn into the Palm OS Treo’s that require me to reboot them on at least a daily basis.

This is my 3rd iPhone. I did buy two of the originals and returned them. The second attempt was me trying to see if I was too critical of the first one I had. Turned out at the time I wasn’t too critical. I couldn’t use the original version of this hardware. Of course I had major issues with the first version of the Treo as well, and then ended up having many versions of the later models.

Now reading this you will rightfully think that I harp allot on certain technology gear like a mobile phone. My mobile is my only phone. It is with me almost all the time, and is always on. It is my link to everyone. It contains all my contacts, schedule, notes, etc. it also keeps me sane with games or reading when I have down time while out and about. This is not unlike many people. The issue is that I wont put up with sub par stuff. So when I read that on paper this new phone will be able to solve most of my issues, I want one.

iPhone 3G Unboxing - 1 iPhone 3G Unboxing - 2 iPhone 3G Unboxing - 3 iPhone 3G Unboxing - 4 iPhone 3G Unboxing - 5 iPhone 3G Unboxing - 7

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