Hardware

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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Bluetooth Mice & USB Hubs

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Today I did get my package I was waiting for so I now have a 7 port USB hub for my Macbook at home. No more swapping out one device to make room for another. The old 4 port hub now can goto the office since I need one there. I also got a bluetooth mouse for the Vaio laptop I got at work. There are only two USB ports on that little thing. One of them is hidden so it is difficult to get to. I want to plug in my Skype phone to the USB port, so it makes life easier if I have a bluetooth mouse that I don’t have to worry about plugging in a dongle to get the wireless to work. My current travel mouse is like that. It works, but it is a pain to deal with the dongle. This new Microsoft travel mouse worked in about a minute with the bluetooth on the Vaio. I can also use it on my Macbook if I need to when traveling.

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My New Webcam

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Yesterday I got a brand new USB webcam I ordered. I know, I have an iMac with a camera, and my Macbook has one too, so why is this a big deal. It is because I use my Macbook as my main computer and when it is on my desk at work or at home it is plugged into a monitor and the lid is closed. That means using the built in iSight camera is not an option. I have wanted to buy a camera for a while but most recent USB camera's don't always support the Mac. I didn't want to deal with open source drivers. Thankfully Macally came out with a nice cheap USB webcam, the IceCam2.. It didn't need any drivers, and I was up and running with the camera in about 5 minutes. I placed a test call to my dad via Skype and it worked great. There is something wrong with his speakers because we always get static when doing a call, but the next time I am over there I will take a look at it.

I also got a laptop stand I can keep at work. One of the things I don't like about the Macbook is that when it gets hot the fan run's really loud and it is annoying. The stand should hopefully allow better airflow on the Macbook.

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The Harmony

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I am like most people (or at least people that I know). I have allot of remote controls needed to watch TV. At last count I had 6. I have wanted a universal remote for years, but for almost as long as I can remember there have been universal remotes that just haven’t done what they were supposed to do. I remember my teenage years at home and my dad had at least 3 “universal” remotes sitting along with the remotes for the TV, VCR, & Cable. None of them did everything they were supposed to. I have also had the same problem, so for years I gave up.

I had almost lost hope in technology solving this problem that it had created, until I read the reviews of the Harmony 1. I had read and heard great things about the Harmony remotes, but they were expensive and seemed difficult to teach the remote how to do stuff. Because of that I avoided them. Then I read about the Harmony 1, and I was impressed. Now granted it did seem that other of the more recent Harmony remotes by Logitech did the same thing, but 1 was the latest model that was in my price range. After reading CNET’s review and talking to a friend or two I went and shelled out the $250 for the remote. Yes you heard me right, it was $250 plus tax for a remote control. Let me tell you it is worth every penny!

I have what you would call a slightly more complicated entertainment system setup than most. I was skeptical that it could be programed easily enough for all the stuff I have. I can safely say now more than a week later that this remote works as advertised. It took me about 30-45 minutes to program in all my devices, and activities but after that it worked on the very first attempt to use my setup. My entertainment setup is complicated because I have a TV, Tivo HD, stereo receiver, DVD player, Apple TV, Xbox 360, and a HDMI switcher (KVM) to cycle between everything. That means the Harmony needs to know to switch the KVM to one channel, the receiver to another channel, use the receiver to change volume, use the Tivo to change channels and know all the special Tivo buttons just for me to watch some TV. It also needs to know what to do when i want to switch to the Apple TV to watch TV and listen to music, but like i said on the very first attempt the remote knew what to do. I was amazed. The only remote the Harmony needed a little extra assistance understanding was my Tivo remote. Everything else it knew how it functioned right away. The online database of devices was very thorough. It even knew my HDMI switcher model. I was impressed and still am. I am waiting for the day I come home from work and the Harmony just gives me a run down of what I missed on the TV that day!

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The Drobo

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My friend John told me about this neat external drive unit a few months ago called the Drobo. I took a look at the web page and was instantly curious. My only issues were the price and how they actually got RAID like data protection. After some reading I was comfortable with the units functionality but the cost was still a factor. The dam thing is $499 for just an empty chassis. My problem is the Drobo could solve many of my storage issues. I currently have no less than 8 external drives in my home computer setup. This doesn’t count my portable drive I have VM’s on that i shuttle back and forth to work, and the external units (that are mine) at work. Most of them are 250 gig drives. I have slowly been consolidating when I buy newer bigger drives. The problem is I am getting more and more drive space but I have no good backup for all this data. The really important stuff is replicated to a backup drive, but the stuff that would be a pain in the ass to replace but too costly to replicate is still a problem.

That was until Tuesday. I finally broke down and spent some of my tax return money and got a Drobo and some drives. Even with its cost, the benefit of having some true disaster recovery ability at home was too much to pass up. So far I am very happy with the unit. I will slowly add 2 additional 1TB drives over the next few months. I started out with 2 1TB drives in the unit. That gives me 1TB of usable space. What is good about the Drobo is that it gives you RAID1 or 5 like protection but allows you more flexibility when upgrading drives.

The Drobo

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Nokia N810

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The N810 finally came out late last week. I was actually very lucky and found a reseller in downtown Manhattan that had them in stock. I picked on up and have been playing with it for about a week. It is a really interesting device. I am finding that I am not going to use it for what I originally planned (as a PDA/Internet tablet to complement a normal mobile phone) but I still like it just the same.

The Palm VM on it is really cool. I have been playing with that for a while. I am getting addicted to mine sweaper again. Email, Chat and browsing on the tablet is cool also. I also think that Skype & Gizmo on it are amazing. You can barely tell that I am on speakerphone when using Skype on it. I did an entire conference call on speaker using skype and wifi. It was really cool.

I am waiting to see what other applications get ported over to the Maemo 2008 OS.

NYTimes.com

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A Phone That is Not a Smartphone?

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I have been having a love hate relationship with my Treo 680 (well several Treo’s over the years) but I haven’t found a suitable replacement so I have been stuck with a great phone that crashes all the time. It has been driving me crazy. I know I shouldn’t get emotional about technology but I work with technology all day long and I live off my phone(s). So when I am expecting a call it would be nice for the phone to ring, and if I don’t hear the ring the voice mail chime should go off. Instead I have on more than one occasion had the phone do nothing until I think to reboot it and then get 5 voice mails.

Needless to say I am very frustrated. I need the functions of a PDA, but all stand alone PDA’s don’t have built in Keyboards, so until very recently it has been a smart phone that does everything but does everything not so great or a PDA and a phone that doesn’t do everything I want. That was until I found out that Nokia was making the N810. It is an internet tablet that has a slide out keyboard. I have been eying the N800 (didn’t have a keyboard) for a while, but no keyboard means I didn’t get it. The N810 isn’t a PDA so when I first saw it I was still stuck with my Treo (and still may be), but then I read that Access the makers of the current version of the Palm OS released a VM of their OS for both the N800 and N810. That means I can install and run all my Palm applications on the N810 and get all my PDA functions that the device was missing. In theory this sounds great. Now all I need to do is get an N810 when it comes out and see if it works the way I think it will.

In anticipation of the new Internet Tablet, I needed to get a good regular mobile phone. My current “regular” phone is a now aging Motorola Razr V3. I always liked the form factor of the Razr but the functions sucked. I can’t stand the Motorola UI. Why does each phone number for a contact have to be its own address book entry? Nokia and Sony Ericsson both have multiple numbers per contact, it just makes sense. That issue and the fact that the Razr doesn’t support high speed data I needed something new. Unfortunately finding something new wasn’t as easy as I thought it would be.

After some research I ended buying a Nokia 6120 Classic. It wasn’t my first choice, but every other phone I wanted first didn’t cover some basic function that I wanted. To be clear I wasn’t asking for things like video calling, or Wifi, etc. I wanted BASIC stuff like a quad band phone, aka a phone that will work in the USA on both GSM frequencies here. Apparently most of the really good phones I liked are sold as Tri band phones, and don’t have the new 850mhz frequency on them. Eventually I found the 6120. It is actually a cool phone. The initial things that I didn’t like about the phone I found ways to work around. The only thing that I don’t like so far is the fact that the keypad is so small, but that is why I have an address book!

So for now I am happy with my change. I am the first to admit that i am fickle, so since it is less than a day since I switched the jury is still out on if I keep this setup, but the real test will be when the N810 comes out and I use it and the 6120 together. Until then I will keep my Treo 680 in my bag and use it as a simple PDA. Oh and to be completely accurate about what I am writting, I know the 6120 Classic actually a Smartphone. It does have the Symbian Series 60 OS, but any smartphone without a keyboard isn’t really a smartphone to me.

Ipod Classic

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I know, my recent posts have been all about new gear. I like writing about it. It is my guilty pleasure. So sue me. Well, actually don’t sue me. That would be bad! As readers of this site know i am perpetually upgrading. Some things more often than others. My iPod has been one of those things that I haven’t needed to upgrade in almost 2 years. (2 years in November). I had a nice basic black regular iPod 60 gig. The 80gig wasn’t that much larger than my 60gig to warrant an upgrade, and no other new wiz bang feature came out to get me to upgrade so my trusty iPod stayed with me. When Apple announced the new iPod Touch i was tempted to go with one of those, but at 18gig I wasn’t sold, but when I heard about the 160gb classic. That was another story. I can keep all my photos, music, some movies and all my documents on that.

Today i checked apple’s website and saw that the 160gb models were now “available to ship within 24 hours”. That is a usually sign that they have them in stock at the store. I swung over to the 5th Ave Apple store on the way home and within 10 minutes i was walking out with my new classic 160gb iPod (silver). Apple sure knows how to get people in and out of the store if they are buying a popular item and are willing to get an email of their receipt (credit card’s only). I don’t mind, it is faster and i am down with it.

I am now syncing the new pod with my iTunes. Then it will be time to load up the drive with my docs and stuff. After that I need to wipe my old one and get it up on ebay!

Oh, and a shinny easily scratch-able iPod is not complete with its nice protective mylar case. My new Agent 18 clear case is now on order. I just hope i don’t scratch the pod before i get it. The old case on my 60gb served me very nicely so i have high hopes for this new one! And yes i will pimp products if they actually do what they are supposed! These Agent 18 cases are awesome. My old iPod looks brand new since it has stayed in that case.

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The Old 20″ Display

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After puttering around for a while I finally put my Apple 20″ Cinema display up on Craigslist to be sold. I have been lazy about selling it, and frankly it would have sold on ebay in no time but i didn’t want to deal with all the shipping and fees, etc. So i tried Craig’s list. I was about to give up hope, when after a few days someone replied to the posting, and the awesome flat panel now has a new home. I mean it was awesome. I just wanted even bigger, so I have my 23″.

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