Andy’s Web Blog

External hard drives have come a long way in the last few years, long gone are the noisy and slow performing devices that offer no real practical application as they run via usb and are unable to power down on the fly.

Western digital are a good established company and I have the pleasure of using two other smaller drives from the my book edition recently that I client was using. So I know what to expect, a lot of quality.

I needed a lot of storage as I wanted to back up everything, not just the essentials. So 1tb was the way forward, I also decided to us eSata ( to a sata2 port) for speed.

I know that there are some 1tb drives out their but the raid 0 set up is a brilliant addition, as a high data transfer rate is one of my main concerns.

Also the drive is very quiet and even though it does have a power switch (button) on the back it automatically powers down as computer shut down. So it is set and forget wear!

I give it 10 out of 10

Bulldog back up is not just another online drive. It is a brilliant automated system.

The importance and practical application of automated backup systems is really coming into its own as more and more people get access to high speed broadband connections.

Bulldog back takes advantage of this by providing you with an online drive that initially is 10gb. I am lucky enough to be trialling a free 6 month version thank you to the cover disc in this month’s edition of www.pcpro.co.uk . I really like it, provides that off site back up facility that is essential now a days in case all if your equipment is destroyed or lost.. It also includes a great system for backing up locally and the best thing is it is set up and forget about software as if you set bulldog to run the backup job when the computer is ideal it will back up your system whenever it can.. You can also manually start the jobs as well.

I will certainly be buying this when the trail ends.

Three mobile broadband is a great idea, in theory, as you can plug in the toggle and away you go. ADSL like broadband on the go and access wherever you want. So you can take all your online life with you. But how is it in practice.

Installing the Three mobile dongle, a Huawei E220 seemed to be an easy thing. Looking at the three website they had a Mac specific instruction manual and a driver to down load as the dongle does not contain Mac drivers as it does contain windows drivers. A minor set back I thought. So I download the driver and get the set up guide ready. Installing the driver goes well, but then the guide suggests that I change the APN number with the driver application… but where is it. It is not on the three website ad there is no mention of it in the questions and answers. Has Three made a mess up? Well only a small one, but thankfully where there is a technical problem there is a geek who has posted a solution in a forum. You need to download this file, it is not hosted in any official capacity, so please feel free to down load it from here to get your Mac working with three mobile broadband. (lhuaweidatacardapp) You then add the APN, three.co.uk and away you go.

Once connected I went to Speedtest.net, I manage to get a download of 1mb and upload of 100k. Not bd in my view for being in a built up area in London. The ping as high but in everyday usage it works. Pages are not as quick as appearing as on my home broadband connection, but that is 24mb from Bethere (see my review.)

So, it works while in London in my flat, but what about a road test. I am currently on a train speeding through the wonderful countryside of the west country in the UK. As soon as I got on the train at Paddington, I got the laptop out and fired up the device. It connected first time, registering 3.6mb, surfed a few pages, facebook being one (my profile is LINK if you want to add me.) and it worked well. It is a wonderful technology that allows my Mac to connect to the Internet from a high-speed train. Although, once we hit open country where I could hear the white noise of people saying, ‘hello, hello can you hear me?’ I realised my magical mystery tour of mobile broadband was about to turn into a wet British summer. The connection ground to a halt. I do not blame three for this, covering mile after mile of field is not a priority as cows and sheep simply don’t do mobiles. But I would like to see a greater commitment to developing a technology that provided a mobile service to long haul train routes. So I am writing this blog into a word file at the moment but do plan on posting it via three mobile broadband shortly.

The data plan is also very good, I have opted for a pay as you go option. For £15 I get 3gb of data to use over 30 days. I think this is very reasonable when there is no contract; the other options are 1gb for £10 and 7GB for £25.

One of the other reasons I brought three mobile broadband is you can use it abroad on three mobile networks for no extra cost. You can also look on that particular countries website and see if it they have signal in your area, even down to if they have signal in the accommodation you are planning to stay in. That is simply brilliant!

I am very happy with three mobile broadband, and once you have gotten around the comparative minor technical hitch at setting up it is a really useful and dependable service.

I have also contacted three and asked them to put the setup program on their website along with the driver for the Huawei E220.

1 & 1 8gb 8820 addthis ajax Apple Belkin Blackberry Blackberry 8820 Blogger Bootcamp dongle dual core 2 E8400 ebooks ecommerce ecommerce website Facbook mobile facebook firefox google Google maps hosting intel ipod mobile Mobile broadband myspace nano Package phone Platinum available from Andy's Web review SEO service skype USB Vodaphone VOIP Website Website Design WIFI Windows wordpress XP

Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull, yes I know it is not geeky in the strictest sense but I wanted to write a review of this film for several geeky reasons and also it is a great film.

The film is a compliment to the previous films, but as a friend of mine said, it is a great film if you forget how good the other films are. This is in fact true, this film has a faster pace than the other films. May be they thought the audience would not be able to coup with long plot related dialogue or development of the characters. But at the end of the day, you have your hero, with hat and whip, your baddies and big stunts!

All of the stunts are believable, well, in the realms of Indiana Jones, except using a fridge to survive a Nuclear blast.. hummm..

If I could suggest some additions to the film, as a fan, I would suggest a random German castle, a trip to Egypt and, of course, Sallah played by John Rhys-Davies.

The film is brilliant and I would recommend to anyone!

Wordpress is a community designed and supported blogging content management system.

I have been aware of it for sometime but only recently have I actually started to use it for my clients and myself for Blogs that I manage.

The system is driven by a SQL database, now before you go running and hiding away, that is probably that last time you will hear that if you’re a regular user.

The installation is simple. As such, it is nice and easy to get a blog started. The absolute brilliance of the system is the effective and clear way you write and manage the blogs. The entire interface is user friendly and for anyone used to using Microsoft’s Word, it will be easy to pick up.

The best thing about an open-sourced platform such as this is the large number and wide diversity of plugins available for it. For example, you can add you Adsence details to it to display ads from Google.

The most notable customisation is the themes that are readily available and with some css knowledge you can create your own.

Wordpress is a blogging dream, it is easy customisable and free! Give it a try and start and blog, let me know how you do?

I have been using Mozilla Firefox since it was first officially released in (date). I never liked Microsoft’s Internet Explorer. For many technical reasons and for some quirky personal reasons.

Internet Explorer (7) feels chunky, like a truck. It is hard to get going and steering is heavy. When Firefox, is, a fast nippy runner which twists and turns to my every whim!

Also, the entire philosophy of Firefox is that this is your browser. The sheer number of plug-ins and enhancements are amazing. Some of the best include an in built dictionary and an eBay plug-in.

If you have never used it I truly recommend you give it a try.

To try it out click the link below.

Recently I had the pleasure of using a new Macbook with Leopard installed while doing some consultancy work for a customer of Andy’s web. It was a white 13” model at 2.1GHZ and they, upon my advice opted for 2Gb instead of 1GB memory as this little baby had windows approaching!

Such a small thing and yet houses some real power – it is very lite. As with all macbooks since 2006 (ish), under the hood is an Intel dual core processor (Que annoying chimes). Powerful enough to deal with several tasks at once

I was working on this macbook pro for a client, the objective was set it up and install windows XP on it with bootcamp.

For those that have been under a rock or stuck on an island similar to the one featured in ‘Lost’, ever since Apple took this step, I mean logical leap, from PowerPC processor based Macs to Intel based Macs, there was the idea of a Mac dual booting into windows! And, after some well documented and intricate attempts Apple released a beta of an application that does just this - Bootcamp.

Bootcamp its self is now incorporated in Apple’s new incarnation of ‘OS X 10’ Leopard.

You will find the only real major decision is how much space you want for your windows drive

After preparing the Macs drive, you restart the computer… Then you presented with all too familiar windows bios style boot screen. With the XP or Vista CD/DVD in the drive the install starts.

After the, somewhat out dated ‘new features’(As this was Windows XP) articles during the install the system is almost ready. Before you do anything you need to pop the Mac OSX disc in the drive and install the Mac drivers to allow you to use all of the Macs hardware, eg web cam, track pad and keyboard effectively.

Running windows applications is like running them on a pc, the only difference is the keyboard. As there was ‘no spoon’ in a cult movie, there is no delete key(option and backspace works if I recall correctly). This will prove to be a definite learning curve for people used to PC keyboard layouts.

My client has been happy using the Mac as a PC for some time now – I wonder if that is the BIG Steve’s plan he he.

MySpace is dead long live Facebook. As every man and his iPhone carrying dog knows face book is the social networking tool. It is good, I have to give the creators that. They are certainly creating a good example of web 2.0 and how to use Ajax (that is a programming language - not the household cleaner lol.) the Facebook team are always improving the service they provide, a recent-ish service is a Facebook ap for blackberry’s!

The small Facebook app is handy; it has an offline application feel to it (although you need to be online to use it.) Which allows you to message contacts, poke people and write on walls. It also displays status updates and you can change your own update.

If you’re a fan of third party apps like fun wall it will either send you to the Facebook mobile site or you will have to wait until you can log in to a pc.

It is very handy for writing quick notes to people and random poking while you’re travelling! Lol

One other thing, in order for it to work with your phone you have to link your mobile number to Facebook and of course install an application.

If you have a Blackberry then go to the Blackberry site on your phone and give it a try.

Other formats may be available, so best check with your manufacturer/operator.

Thank you

Andy

The Blackberry 8820 has been critically acclaimed as god amongst smart phones by many established magazines and reviewers. It was from such reviews that led me to choose this brilliant device.

In the past I had enjoyed the nokia platforms. Based upon the same base operating system, operation is generally easy to pick up. But as my mobile contract with Orange (UK) draw to an end I needed something that would replace my mobile and my Dell Axim 51v. I also wanted emails on the go.

So it did not take long to decide on the Blackberry 8820.

The phone it’s self is well made, it is sturdy and does not have that cheap light plastic feel that many phones have. The screen quality is sharp and good. You can view images and even videos (encoded correctly on a memory card) appear good. Features include, wifi, bluetooth, gprs to name but three.

The functions of the 8820 are aided by the full qwerty keyboard, no more T9 rubbish! Email, texts and phone functions are brilliant.

The added software, free from Blackberry, of Yahoo messenger and Face book, are very useful.

As the Blackberry format is doing so well Google have recognised it and given it Google maps ( see my review).

The phone is an extension of my PC, a computer on the go. In fact I wrote this Blog on it.

Once you have a Blackberry you will never turn back!!

Andy

I have recently returned from a trip to Ireland and while I was over there I was able to use a mobile broadband service.

I have been wanting to use one of these for a while. To compare how it ‘feels’ compared to landline broadband.

In case you are unaware, mobile broadband uses the new high bandwidth High Speed Downlink Packet Access or HSDPA service that is establishing it’s self as a practical means of accessing real internet, not just wap text based pages, on the go.

The service I was using was on a newer model Sony Vaio laptop with Vista SP1. It brought up web pages reasonably fast, not as fast as a landline broadband connection but fast. But unlike the home broadband connection, it is not dependent upon a phone line or a power socket. If you use it with a laptop, you can quiet literally use it anywhere.

As I have mentioned, the speed is not great but it is good enough for most things. Like your mobile phone signal it is entirely dependent upon your mobile phone signal.

It is a good technology although I feel it still needs perfecting as it is prone to disconnection and drop outs in speed.

Andy