From michael at auzzie.net Sun Jan 24 22:23:40 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Sun, 24 Jan 2010 22:23:40 +1100 Subject: [CCC News] Assorted News 27 - Good News Week? :) Message-ID: <4B5C2DBC.3020106@auzzie.net> *In this edition:* * Good News Week *Surprise wireless internet price reductions at Telstra. Nokia gives many people free phone GPS maps *Assorted News: * ExeSMS broken - how to fix.* * Back on deck: Most happy, some not. Pricing Revisited. IE (Internet Explorer) in the news... *General Ramblings: *Affectionately Mauled Embroidery - a new skill for CCC? Portable Landline & cheap diversions. Turning Right. *Entertainment: * FMyLife and Uh Oh moments. * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Surprise Wireless Price Drops at Telstra / BigPond: *As many of you know, I sell wireless broadband with Exetel; and where there's good coverage it's a well priced product. However, there are several cases where Telstra has a good signal and Optus (which Exetel uses) does not; meaning I have not been able to help those people get better-priced Internet Access. Telstra / BigPond is often an option in these places due to their superior coverage; but up until now the prices have been so ridiculously high that they were simply not competitive. In addition, their horrendous excess usage charges could scare even the most savvy user. (One last week got a bill for over $2,000; but was subsequently able to get it reduced significantly.) Last week, Telstra announced the complete removal of excess usage fees on their wireless broadband for home users, and some significant reductions in mobile internet usage costs for business users. Of course, like any telephony and internet product these days you have to read the fine print; but as an example of what you could do if you're out in the sticks with a mobile that gets at least one bar of coverage in the window and have an ABN: You could get 1GB of Internet for $19 a month using your mobile as the modem. You could get 3GB of Internet for $29 a month using your mobile as the modem. Similar pricing is available for residential users as well, with the advantage of no excess usage fees but the possible need to buy a modem. That's cheaper and usually faster than satellite. For those of you with suitable NextG phones, you can sit the phone in the window (if necessary for coverage) and your computer will talk wirelessly via bluetooth to it to get you online. Alternatively, for those of you with 'country phones' you have the advantage that while connected to your computer, the phone also recharges, but last I looked they won't do internet via Bluetooth. So there you go. It's nice to see that for home users, Telstra has dropped the unconscionable excess usage fees; and for business users it's great to see some realistic pricing; albeit tied to contracts. For BigPond Residential's pricing: http://www.telstra.com.au/abouttelstra/media/wireless-broadband-plans.cfm For NextG Business pricing: http://www.telstrabusiness.com/business/portal/online/site/productsservices/internetonyourmobile.10917 Note: I'm not affiliated with Telstra or BigPond in any way, so while I can help you get these services up and running; it will be at the normal consulting rate :) (I can't be a rep for them as they require exclusivity.) Unfortunately all my efforts to get Exetel to offer alternatives to their admittedly small excess usage fees on their wireless broadband product have so far failed - apparently on technical grounds, but at least they're still cheaper and have no contract: See http://www.exetel.com.au/residential-hspa-pricing.php - use code N040 if you want me as your agent for support / installation. *Nokia gives many people Free GPS! *Now here was a pleasant surprise that came in yesterday... Nokia offering free Maps for most of their current and recent phones - even going back as far as the old Nokia E51 that many of you still have. For more information go to http://maps.nokia.com/explore-services/ovi-maps If you don't see your phone listed, click here - http://europe.nokia.com/support/product-support/maps-support/compatibility-and-download#/default/ - for the full list. This will allow you to do one or two things. Firstly, it means you have a relatively up to date street directory always in your phone. (And not just for Australia either... although you might need a new larger memory card if you want to store the US maps!) Secondly, it means that you can use your phone as a GPS provided it has a GPS receiver built in. For phones that don't, you can buy a bluetooth GPS receiver that will work with your phone, such as http://jaycar.com.au/productView.asp?ID=XC4895&keywords=bluetooth&form=KEYWORD - which is available from AMAC Digital Products in Armidale. Note that I believe, by law, if you're going to use this in your car you need to have a means of securing your phone to the dashboard / windscreen. Why is Nokia doing this? Probably to compete with Google after they announced the same thing for their latest phones recently. No more buying those ridiculously expensive map upgrades for your Garmin / NavMan / TomTom. (Side note - I used to recommend TomTom for cheap updates, but that has since passed.) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *ExeSMS Broken: How to fix. *If you use the PC based SMS program "ExeSMS" with Exetel, you might have found in the last couple of days that it stopped working. The problem is that whoever wrote the program has disappeared - or at least part of his website has - and the update checker crashes the program. If you want it to work again straight away, try the steps at http://forum.exetel.com.au/viewtopic.php?f=303&t=34981#p266737 * Back on Deck :) *Well there have been winners and losers this last two weeks since I returned to work. Due to the higher than normal number of calls, I've had to prioritise who gets attended to based on the type of problems they were experiencing, and location. The order of priority has been: No Internet / Phones --> Business computers down --> No Phones --> Virus --> Storm Damage --> New Internet Connections --> New Computer setups --> TV Tuning / Set Top Box tuning --> Websites --> Dialup Internet support --> Fax Machines --> Problem Customers. This unfortunately has meant that people in the last five categories have sometimes gone with unanswered calls as there hasn't been enough hours in the day to cover them all. The sheer number of calls has also meant that a few accidentally fell through the cracks - typically where two people had the same type of problem and I lost track of them while on the road; or simply because I've stuffed up while shuffling calendar events in Outlook / Symbian. I think I caught up with most of those on Friday :) Calls come in via email, the landline, the mobile and SMS so co-ordinating them all can be tricky as I'm yet to find a way to unify them. This past week I've been trialling spending an hour each morning working out what needed doing that day and the next, and answering email queries; so most callouts have been from 11am onwards, with the latest one being 8:45pm last week. (A TV tuning job that had been waiting a few days.) I can see why some people have secretaries, but it'd be hard to do that in my case since only I can really guess how long each job's going to take. *Pricing Revisited *Well it happened again. One customer this week was adamant that I don't charge enough, and then a couple of days later another cringed at the already slightly discounted $90 bill for a new laptop setup. Admittedly one customer lives in a house in town, while the other had a rambling farming property :) I am toying with the idea of redesigning my invoices to have five totals ranging from $45 per hour (my low income / not for profit rate) up to $85 (which is what some Tamworth IT consultant quoted me) and giving the payee the choice to pick what they felt comfortable with. Not sure how that would go really... Interested in your thoughts on that one... I guess it's the fun of being in a relatively small town - I have developed the skills of a system engineer / programmer and yet I still look after those who have simple needs too as we're all human :) .. and I like the variety! *IE (Internet Explorer) in the news*... I've converted most of you over to using Firefox since it's faster and safer than Internet Explorer; and can be set to block all ads as well as display your Internet Usage meter. (A handy side effect of this is that it tends to block fake ads that trick people in to thinking they have a virus and need to buy whatever fake cleaning program they're selling.) However, many people still prefer Internet Explorer out of habit or for other reasons I haven't quite worked out. I guess that's good for me in a way as it keeps me employed killing bugs, but it's not good for your online banking, etc. The most recent case in the news was http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/8460819.stm where the holes in Internet Explorer were used to attack Google. A side effect of all this was that Google is considering shutting down operations in China; and also the German government recommend people stop using it... http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1244138/Internet-Explorer-Germany-warns-using-IE-Microsoft-admits-browser-weak-link-China-Google-hacks.html - although now that Microsoft has fixed the problem that may no longer apply. Google's Chrome and Safari are other alternative web browsers you can try as well, if for some reason you don't like Firefox :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Affectionately Mauled. *Here's an amusing tail, err tale, for you. One of my customers has a number of animals on their property; and a number of computers too. One of their animals is a very tall dog - a bit like the one pictured at http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_GQ6M9d5gRHw/Shq4Qdl3O4I/AAAAAAAABRI/8pENk1ifcgo/s320/big-dog-small-dog.jpg but with a lighter coloured face While I was sitting down working on their computers, it decided to come and have a chat, meaning I was now head-hight with it. I knew it was a friendly dog because whenever I visit it always bounces around excitedly - and slightly alarmingly as it just wants to play, but it's a bit like a short-necked giraffe bouncing around the yard with long straight but slightly splayed legs. Anyway, it turned out that it's favourite position was to sit there with gently holding the side of my chin in the side of it's mouth while I worked away transferring files between computers - a relatively surreal experience! Eventually the owners realised it was inside and sent it back out again, leaving two of their tiny dogs to run around and occasionally jump on me instead. I get on well with most animals, so it doesn't worry me; provided they stay off the keyboard. (I did leave the customer to clear off the 1cm wide ball of slobber the big dog flicked onto their monitor however!) *Embroidery - a new skill for CCC? *When my other half asked for car seat covers with frogs on for Christmas, I thought it was going to be easy enough - just go to SuperCheap Auto and buy a set. Problem is, no one makes them in Australia. There are now websites selling them. Nothing on eBay. So I asked the various Armidale embroidery companies if they could put one on for me, and the answer was a unanimous no from all of them - too hard; our machines can't use the material because it's too thick, etc. One agreed to putting a pattern onto some material for me to sew on later, but the quote for that came back at - if I read it right - $170 to convert my drawing to a mostly two colour computerised pattern, and $75 each copy. I decided to ask around locally as I have two customers I know of with domestic-grade computerised embroiding sewing machines as I've repaired and installed the software for them before now. One thought she could do it, but didn't know how to get the drawing into the machine. So, for a couple of days there you might have seen me parked in the Bluebird under a tree in Guyra while I taught myself how to 'digitise' images. Final product in hand on a quaint floppy disk - as these sewing machines are now getting on a bit! - and 12,000 stitches / 45 minutes later each, the car seat covers were done :) They weren't perfect, possibly due to an error on my part in telling the software how to handle stitches leading to different image segments; and probably due to the 'stretchy' nature of the material; but they were sure good enough; and a damn site cheaper than what the others wanted to charge. They also had to be slightly smaller than planned since the material was not flat - these were pre-made covers. You can see the images here: Original image: http://lh3.ggpht.com/_NLoFolZ2mFo/SzdYDY1CtrI/AAAAAAAADrY/6aZpi_ybzos/s144/Frog.jpg Final product: http://lh3.ggpht.com/_NLoFolZ2mFo/SzdYHvdNWmI/AAAAAAAADrk/aS-fyiYfJ2Q/s800/MVC-126F.JPG (The flash made the reflective purple look white.) *Portable Landline / Cheap Diversions. *The Billion 7404VGPX is an expensive little bugger at $175, but combined with a wireless broadband service with strong coverage, it affords a portable VoIP landline. I'm still testing it with some customers to see if it's reliable enough to be considered a landline replacement service, with reasonable results so far. Unfortunately local Guyra / Armidale numbers are not available for use with this device as a phone number for people to call you on, but the 10 cent per call untimed rates make up for that a bit. (The phone numbers are all Sydney / Canberra / Adelaide numbers.) Optus has a similar product but charges traditional line rental and call rates. Another box I am experimenting with - the $80 Cormain GW211 - allows you to connect it to your existing (Telstra) landline, and forward your calls via VoIP to any other number you choose. For example, if you have a mobile phone for your business; when you divert calls from your landline to it with Telstra you pay hefty call costs. With this unit, the diverted call costs whatever a VoIP call to that destination would be - so typically 15 cents a minute for mobiles or 10 cents untimed for landlines. You could use this: - to transfer business / home calls to your mobile cheaply - to transfer your business / home line to another phone line cheaply (like when on holiday, etc.) - to transfer your phone calls overseas for 3c a minute depending on destination. The three downsides: - there is an added delay of about .1 to .2 seconds. - Incoming CallerID is not passed to the phone. - There might be an issue with volume being a bit quiet. I might trial this some more - the loss of CallerID is a slight problem for me. *Turning Right. *Some of you have spotted the ghost of the Kingswood doing the rounds in Guyra. Most of the problems are fixed, but the mechanics are struggling with its tendency to turn right when you put the brakes on. It's often done this when first taken out in the morning, but gets over it by the time it gets to the railway line. Perhaps it's some latent damage from when it had no membrane on the master cylinder reservoir 15 years ago and was thus sucking dust into the fluid, making it muddy orange instead of green. I fixed that long ago. The Nissan is going well, with it's only party trick at the moment being occasional idling at a very low 500rpm and the odd stall at the lights, etc. I really need to get the dash apart one day and resolder all those bad connections so the rev computer behaves :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Entertaining Sites* /*Think your life's bad? You could try http://www.fmylife.com/*/ It's a listing of things that have gone wrong for people - so if you get depressed easily it might not suit you; but if you find the perverse comedy in the situations instead you might enjoy it. Some of them might be a bit rude / off-colour. For example: /"Today, I texted my college boyfriend to tell him how terrible I felt about cheating. He replied saying he was so relieved because he had been cheating on me with a girl in his dorm. I was talking about my math exam. FML"/ / *Uh Oh Moments*/ A great post on Whirlpool about all the things that people have done wrong at work. This could keep you reading for hours... http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies.cfm?t=1269886 Some are a bit techy, but others - such as setting KFC cookers on fire, plugging in the wrong cable, crashing forklifts, cutting open softdrink cases by mistake, changing in an elevator, spilling hundreds of litres of ice cream, etc we can all understand :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Well, that's it for another Newsletter! I better get back to work now. I hope 2010's going well for you all. So far, so good :) As a PS, the electric bike is still going well, no breakdowns at all yet and still getting over 17km to a charge on the Black Mountain roads. The electric mower likewise is still doing a great job. A customer gave me an old FlyMo they didn't want - and it lasted 5 minutes before it ceased to work. They are worlds apart in performance.* * Cheers, Mike ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Old Editions *You can find old editions of this newsletter on the CCC Blog. http://auzzie.net/cccblog/ You can also subscribe or unsubscribe at http://auzzie.net/mailman/listinfo/ccc-news_auzzie.net * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Cool Country Consulting & Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Fri Mar 5 23:19:04 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Fri, 05 Mar 2010 23:19:04 +1100 Subject: [CCC News] Assorted News 28 - The only certain thing in life is Change? :) Message-ID: <4B90F6B8.60008@auzzie.net> *In this edition:* * Good News Week 2 * The mobile plan to end all mobile plans? $1 a month, 10c/min... *Assorted News: * More Exetel Strangeness. (Ups some rates, kills PAYG on ADSL.) Busy again... ** *General Ramblings: * Three people drop their landlines for Wireless VoIP... Internet TV in the future? Your New TV is a computer screen too :) *Entertainment: * The Varnishing Act. The Kingswood Lives... Amusing Exam Cheating Stories Gruesome Shark Game. * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *The Mobile Plan to end all mobile plans? *A company called TPG has released a new mobile plan. It is just $1 per month and 10 cents per minute to landlines and mobiles, with a 10 cent flagfall. No contract. No caps. They use the Optus towers, so of course this may be an issue for some of you. I do have outdoor aerials that will fix this for some handsets and locations. This is enough to make you wonder why you still have a landline. You'd have to spend at least four hours on the mobile phone a month before you'd even reach what you're paying just for basic line rental to Telstra. Oh, and as I've said before - if you need Telstra's superior mobile coverage, why not have a Telstra mobile on a $15 or $20 a month plan, use them for incoming calls, and carry a second mobile for making calls on. The savings would surely be worth the extra hassle of carrying two phones :) I am too small to be an agent for TPG unfortunately, so if you need help with signing up or setting up your phone, this would be at standard consulting rates. More details are at http://tpg.com.au/mobile/plans.html - scroll down to find the $1 plan. *Busy again... *Work is back to being pretty busy. This has meant some delays in getting back to some people. My apologies for those affected. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *More Exetel Strangeness...* As most of you know, I'm an agent for Exetel. This is because they're normally the best value ISP. Unfortunately this appears to be changing a little... They put a number of people's plans up by $5 a month this week, explaining that this was necessary because on average, people are downloading more now than they were a few years ago. This mainly affected long-time customers on older plans, and this was probably a legitimate need. They also went and changed their plan offerings two days after this announcement, along with introducing a $10 plan change fee - without warning. Charging $10 to change a plan is a simple money grab. Exetel brags about having an automated system so changing a plan should have no cost to them if it doesn't involve changing line speeds, etc. They don't see it this way. They did a similar thing a couple of years ago when they introduced an 'administrative fee' of $3 so they seem to be starting to want to make money just because they can rather than by providing a service to match that expense. The plans they have introduced are aimed at moderate to heavy downloaders; so the 'pay for what you use' type plans are now history. This is a shame because it wipes out the most popular plan I was selling, making the nearest equivalent $10 a month higher, making them equivalent to pretty much every other reasonably-priced reasonably-reliable ISP out there for light to moderate users. Fortunately, Wireless Broadband plans remain unchanged and are still good value within their own limits of usage. Since most plans these days have no contract requirement, the good news is that if something really unexpected and catastrophic happened at Exetel, the time to recover would be quite short :) I am confused by what's going on there at the moment. I think it's related to growing pains as they have grown bigger than they had planned to in a relatively short time; but there's a sort of schizophrenic feel to it all. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Three customers ditch their landlines...* I have three customers in Guyra who have ditched their landlines since moving to an Exetel wireless broadband with VoIP setup, saving themselves about $40 to $60 a month plus an estimated $50 in calls per month in the process. (You could do similar without using Exetel.) This isn't for everyone, but it works well for some. The good bits: - no landline rental any more - bye bye Telstra - still use a standard landline phone - call costs 10c untimed to landlines, 15c/min to mobiles - still have a landline number of sorts* - Internet costs between $20 and $37.50 per month roughly. The bad bits - requires strong coverage. - requires $175 router plus $90 modem - might require outdoor antenna $45 to $250 - will cost about $75 to have installed - quoted first. - not guaranteed to always work - *the landline number is not a Guyra / Armidale number, - calling 000 won't tell them where you are, so not great for emergencies. - doesn't work without power unless you hook it to a car battery or UPS :) - fax machines don't particularly like it, but will usually work. - sometimes has echoes when calling mobiles, partially fixable. - Limited to 5GB per month. The single biggest problem with doing this is that the wireless broadband system is not designed to do phone calls over the Internet. It will work, mostly, but if the tower is busy or the reception wavers, it will give you some rather weird results. However, if you're saving $60 or more a month then maybe you wouldn't care about the occasional problem. Of course, combine it with the $1 per month TPG mobile and it hardly matters anyway since the mobile phone calls always have priority over internet users, and it's even cheaper than VoIP for calling other mobiles. I can't really recommend it for Armidale as the Armidale towers are overloaded. Generally speaking, if Skype works well on your connection, then VoIP will probably work too. *Internet TV in the future? *Despite being way behind the US in what we have in the way of Internet TV services; I have a suspicion that they will become somewhat more important to people over time. For example, if there's "nothing on" on TV, it's quite convenient to go to http://abc.net.au/iview/ and watch something. All the shows are categorised so documentary-fans for example can find something to watch quickly. Why am I bringing this up again? Well, because it's the one thing that makes me feel a little uncertain about recommending wireless broadband to people. Each show is about 250 megabytes on average, so they can chew through even the biggest 5000MB plan appreciably over a month. (Of course, many people don't want to do this, ..yet...) This means it's largely out of reach of people who can only get Satellite. It's doable on wireless but risky if you don't know your limits; and it's of no consequence at all to people who can get ADSL. It should soon get to the point where it is better to spend your money on a decent Internet connection rather than paying for Austar, etc. In the US, it is apparently becoming common for people to not even have a TV, as they watch http://www.hulu.com/ instead. To watch Hulu in Australia requires some creative cheating that I have not yet felt the need to work out - there are other ways to get what you want :) *Your New TV is a Computer Screen Too :) *Many people still don't know this. Pretty much all flat screen TVs these days have one or two different connectors on the back that let you use them as a huge computer screen. Just yesterday I helped a customer to hook her laptop to her TV after she had been decidedly hard on her laptop by dropping it, breaking off a corner, smashing the screen by mistake and melting some of the keys somehow. (Fortunately the TV has not yet been melted, smashed, or dropped, but I fear for the remote!) If your computer and TV both have a socket labeled HDMI, then all you need is one cable to connect the two. If instead your TV has something labeled VGA or D-SUB, then you'll need two cables if you want both picture and sound. Someone has written a more comprehensive guide at http://www.reevoo.com/decidewhattobuy/2009/08/how-to-connect-a-computer-to-a-tv/ For both options, I usually have the required cables. This will of course let you watch anything from the Internet or on a hard drive on your TV set. That's things like iView, YouTube, etc; and those hard drives full of movies that kids have these days - much to the chagrin of traditional media companies! Oh, and of course if you have Skype and a webcam, you can have a live wall into someone elses house! (With a decent broadband connection, you could actually do this 24/7 so you'd never be separated from your loved ones - SciFi becoming reality...) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *The Varnishing Act. *OK, you all know I'm a bit mad. This won't help you with that assessment! The '86 Bluebird had developed a problem. It was starting to go grey - like an old man's beard. Worse, the paint on the bonnet was turning white and spotty, and has been disappearing little by little, tiny flake by tiny flake. No amount of waxing would satiate its thirst. An '86 Bluebird is not a particularly valuable car; so paying $2,000 or so to respray it would be hard to justify. .. I bet you can see where this is going can't you ;-) Some years ago I stumbled on a can of Marine Varnish hiding in the laundry. A year ago a small amount of this went on the roof to fix a small spot of clearcoat cancer. Now, a good deal more of it covers the entire bonnet and one of the mirrors too. It will be interesting to see how this product ages. Certainly the bit that's been on the roof for a year hasn't deteriorated at all... It was particularly surprising how it turned the whitish plastic mirrors back to black. Pictures are at http://picasaweb.google.com.au/CCCMikey/VarnishingTheNissan# One customer said I should have seen an Armidale business who can match colours etc, and sells a clearcoat product. Perhaps later I will. For now, at least the deterioration has been halted. *The Kingswood Lives... *It's back from its brake, engine mount and gearbox seal repair. So far I am sticking with the Nissan because of the cheaper running costs, steering that doesn't wander around with tiny camber changes, likely increased safety and the ability to speed through a roundabout if something doesn't go to plan. (Not that it's perfect - it has its own cold weather quirks.) The Kingswood is now 39 years old, so perhaps it's time to give it lighter duties, and hope its value appreciates. (No I won't be varnishing it ;-) ) *Amusing Exam Cheating Stories... *http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/b7a5u/whats_the_most_clever_way_youve_ever_heard_of/* *Another page that will take a few hours of life :) Find out all the ingenious ways people cheated in exams. A couple of favourites... / / /It is funny that this should come up, only last week, on the radio, a guy was on saying how when he was at college doing a marine engineering course (or something in that field) part of the course was Morse Code./ /When they had external examiners in for exams on non morse parts of the course, he and his class mates would of course tap out not just the answers but have whole conversations./ /A few times the whole exam room would erupt in laughter and leave the examiner clueless./ --- /I went to a Catholic high school, and one of the nuns that taught there was pretty far toward senility. She'd always walk up and down the aisles during tests to make sure people weren't cheating, so a couple of kids started putting post-it notes on her as she walked by. Kid in the front corner would ask "What did you get for number 7?" Kid in the back corner would snag the note, write an answer, and put it back when she came by next. It went on like that all semester./ *Gruesome but Simple Shark Game. *http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/513760* *A ridiculous game that you play in your browser. (Nothing to install.) --- Well that's it for another newsletter. I guess I better get back to work! I have some more time consuming projects on the boil, which explains why the December and January invoices were only sent last week! Cheers, Mike ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Old Editions *You can find old editions of this newsletter on the CCC Blog. http://auzzie.net/cccblog/ You can also subscribe or unsubscribe at http://auzzie.net/mailman/listinfo/ccc-news_auzzie.net * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Cool Country Consulting & Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Sat Apr 17 21:38:02 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Sat, 17 Apr 2010 21:38:02 +1000 Subject: [CCC News] Assorted News 29 - Away Mid May, and Winter Tips... :) Message-ID: <4BC99D9A.40705@auzzie.net> *In this edition:* *Assorted News: * Away Mid May *General Ramblings: * Picasa now doing Facial Recognition A better free PDF program: PDF-Xchange *Entertainment: * Winter Tips Dash Cam ahoy :) Telling lies ten times a day. * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Away Mid May... *Just a quick note that I'll be off duty from 18th May to 3rd June. I'm actually going a long way away this time - some place called America. (Well I'll be...!) Of course, this will make me harder to contact than normal - I'm not even sure yet how I'll get online over there although no doubt I'll find a way... If you have any IT emergencies during this time I may have to reluctantly refer you to some of my competitors, but try the phone first. The two companies I currently trust the most not to rip you off are Armidale Computers 02 6771 2712 and Amac Digital Products 02 6771 2266. They are both Armidale-based businesses with limited callout capabilities, but their shop-based repairs are mostly reasonable - albeit often higher than my own and perhaps without the 'what it should have cost' clause - I'm yet to have a 'horror story' from either. I will have a house-sitter during some of the time away so hopefully if you were planning on breaking in and stealing my precious goodies - all of which are second hand anyway - please think again :) Besides, you know I'm crazy by now - I can see my house on the 'net:) It's strangely relaxing being able to log in and watch the goldfish from afar. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Picasa now doing Facial Recognition* As some of you have already discovered, Picasa - the free photo management program - has begun doing facial recognition. What this means is that one day, if it hasn't already happened, you'll open Picasa and a new item will appear in the list on the left called "People" or "Unnamed" A few people have freaked out when this happened, because suddenly it appears there are a few thousand extra photos on their computers. What's actually happening is that it's making a listing of all the faces it has recognised in your existing photos, but it's not making copies of them. If you're on a laptop or a modern computer, you might also notice that the fan works overtime for a while when you first open Picasa after the facial recognition is first started because it's hard work looking at hundreds of faces a minute! It will eventually settle down, depending on the speed of the computer and how many photos you have. If you haven't dared play with it, don't be too worried - it's quite fun really; although in my case it's embarrassing since I'm so cr*p with names! Basically, it will show you a few photos of people it has recognised at first; and ask you to name them. As soon as you name one, suddenly a whole heap of photos will appear under that name; some with ticks and crosses where the computer isn't sure if it's got the right person. And as you name more, the list shuffles around as it finds more and more matches. It's quite entertaining. Of course, if it's not for you; you can turn that feature off by clicking Tools - Options - Name Tags, and untick the "Enable Face Detection" box. *A better PDF program *If the words Adobe Reader, Acrobat Reader or Foxit Reader mean anything to you, you might be interested in trying a program called PDF-Xchange. It's a free PDF viewer like all the others, but unlike the others it will allow you to type onto PDFs and save what you've done - something that the others won't let you do without either buying them or installing a rubbishy toolbar. Of course, you can pick and choose between these programs so if you're already happy with the one you have but are curious to try it, it should not cause any harm :) Free download from http://www.docu-track.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Winter Tips...*** OK we know winter's on it's way. It's starting to get cold in the evenings. The long sleeve shirts are disappearing off the rack instead of the short ones. And for those of us with old cars, they're starting to get cantankerous too. Of course, we've all heard about plans to 'put the power up' too... which is a bit of a pest. Thus, there are two tips I have this year. One is the one I always have for cheap electric heating - and that is that halogen heaters are probably the cheapest electric ones to run. For example, this unit - http://lh3.ggpht.com/_NLoFolZ2mFo/S8mTr_daQVI/AAAAAAAAET0/N07_5l5yhpE/s800/Fullscreen%20capture%2017042010%2085504%20PM.jpg - uses 1200 watts on high, which is half of what a typical fan heater will use. Since they heat you primarily and the room next, they can be quite effective. However they can come close to setting pets on fire so be careful. The next is a new tip I'm trying out, using bubble wrap and water... Any ideas??? Well, many of us live in houses that are wholly unsuitable to our chilly climate. We have houses that have limited or no insulation, and certainly no double-glazing. And that's where the bubble wrap comes in :) I don't know if it really works - and after all I read it on the Internet - but I'll know in a few months. http://www.builditsolar.com/Projects/Conservation/bubblewrap.htm It doesn't sound great of course - having windows that you can't see out of all that well because of a layer of bubble wrap; but it does mean you can leave the curtains open and enjoy all that lovely winter light :) Application is simple - just spray water on the window and apply bubble wrap. Done :) You can leave holes too so you can see out the windows - see my examples here: http://picasaweb.google.com.au/CCCMikey/BubblewrapWindows - no need to do all your windows - you could just try the bathroom ones for example - heck they're usually frosted anywayz. *I have a Dash Cam now :) *Well, for ages I've had this old cheap camera lying around. I've finally found a use for it - as a dash cam. A dash cam is a camera that sits on your dashboard - or probably more likely is built into the car - that records whenever you're moving; or whenever something unexpected happens. I figure that since I'm on the road a lot, it would make sense to have something like that set up just in case I ever am in, or witness to, an accident. There's been a few teething problems with it of course - like not being able to handle 2GB SD cards, and being about as good at night vision as a {insert animal that can't see in the dark}. *Telling Lies Ten Times a Day... *The cars have been pricey this year, so I've decided to try claiming all vehicle expenses since it seems likely that they'll be higher this year than what I can claim using the 5000km method. To do this requires a log book. And of course log books are a right PITA. So, after some experimenting I've worked out how to get my Navman GPS to do the work for me. Unfortunately it involves lying through my teeth many times a day since in order for 'her' to keep track of where I started and ended up she has to think I'm 'going somewhere.' Unfortunately she's a dumb bint who doesn't know Ollera Street from TIngha Road, so as far as she's concerned I'm going to Ebor every day; and I'm reaalllllyy bad at taking directions. I end up with something like this at the end of the week: 12/04/2010 12:20 12:30:00 Toms Gully Road, Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia New England Highway (NI15), Northern Tablelands, New South Wales 7.4 12/04/2010 13:19 13:30:00 New England Highway (NI15), Northern Tablelands, New South Wales Odonnel Street, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia 11.62 12/04/2010 14:04 14:07:00 Odonnel Street, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia Bradley Street, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia 1.28 12/04/2010 14:14 14:15:00 Bradley Street, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia Bradley Street, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia 0.71 12/04/2010 15:25 15:36:00 Bradley Street, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia Wards Mistake Road, Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia 8.44 12/04/2010 18:00 18:15:00 Wards Mistake Road, Northern Tablelands, New South Wales, Australia Falconer Road, Guyra, New South Wales, Australia 9.16 One handy side effect of this is that it gives me an accurate record of arrival and departure times for jobs - something which I occasionally don't record accurately in the calendar since there's lots to do in a day. .. Anyway that's about it for another newsletter - sorry it's a bit light-on in content. I have to get ready now - my sister and her partner came to visit a few weeks ago, but they're coming back tomorrow since they got stuck in Seoul and can't get home to the UK. They're apparently unwilling or unable to do a "John Cleese" - see http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2010/04/16/2875390.htm?section=entertainment for a laugh :) I never thought of Guyra being a sister city to Seoul! Here's hoping Mount Fwalakanjgjjinginging doesn't go bang while I'm away! Cheers, Mike. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Old Editions *You can find old editions of this newsletter on the CCC Blog. http://auzzie.net/cccblog/ You can also subscribe or unsubscribe at http://auzzie.net/mailman/listinfo/ccc-news_auzzie.net * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Cool Country Consulting & Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Sun Jun 20 20:58:44 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Sun, 20 Jun 2010 20:58:44 +1000 Subject: [CCC News] Assorted News 30 - Back again, Free Video Surveillance... :) Message-ID: <4C1DF464.90705@auzzie.net> *In this edition: */a quick dehydrated newsletter!/* */The story's on the blog./* * *Assorted News: * I'm Back :) *General Ramblings: * Free Video Surveillance with Skype or iSpy... *Entertainment: * Growth and Limits. * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *I'm Back :) *There's always a stack of catching up to do when you go on holiday and then come back. Fortunately I'm almost caught up with the work load. For those of you who want to know how the American experience went, you can find it at http://auzzie.net/cccblog//index.php?title=the_american_experience&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1 In short, it was an interesting holiday, but a bit rushed; and with a few relatively spectacular dramas along the way... ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Free Video Surveillance with Skype or iSpy...* As most of you know, Skype is program that lets you call other people from the computer, and if the person at the other end has a camera you get to see them as well. If you're going traveling and you just want to be able to check on the house or dog; or in my case the goldfish with the giant lump on it's side; you can leave a computer running with Skype set to auto-answer. Here's some other ideas... Perhaps you'd like to know if your dog misbehaves during the day when you're out. Perhaps you'd like to know who came to visit while you were out. Perhaps your into ornithology and want to know what birds have been to visit. Or perhaps you want to know who's nicked your firewood. Maybe you're planning a new career as a Bond Villain. In any of those cases, you might be interested in the free program called iSpy. It lets you hook up multiple cameras to multiple computers, and monitor them all from one computer. In addition, it can be configured to record only when there's movement detected. You can specify areas to watch too so that the wind blowing the trees doesn't trigger a recording. It's amazing what you can do for free these days with computers. Recording studios, home publishing, home theatre, photo development studio - we've come a long way since DOS 2.0! iSpy is free, and open source, from http://ispy.developerinabox.com/ Skype is free from http://www.skype.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Growth and Limits... *For those of you into sustainability you might like to have a look at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F-QA2rkpBSY&feature=PlayList&p=6A1FD147A45EF50D&playnext_from=PL&index=1 - some interesting points in this mathematical lecture. -- Sorry it's such a short newsletter - a few customers have had some big mishaps this week and time is short! The blog post, however, makes up for it! ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Old Editions *You can find old editions of this newsletter on the CCC Blog. http://auzzie.net/cccblog/ You can also subscribe or unsubscribe at http://auzzie.net/mailman/listinfo/ccc-news_auzzie.net * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Cool Country Consulting & Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Thu Sep 2 13:04:02 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Thu, 02 Sep 2010 13:04:02 +1000 Subject: [CCC News] Windows XP very slow to start last few weeks? Possible solution... Message-ID: <4C7F1422.7080805@auzzie.net> G'day all :) Just a quick note. This last few weeks I've seen a fair few older Windows XP computers with limited memory that have suddenly become really slow to get going, possibly accompanied by lots of 'rattling' noises coming from the computer itself. If you think this might be happening to you, an easy way to tell is to do a Ctrl + Alt + Delete on the keyboard, and then look on the "Performance" tab to see how high your "PF Usage" is. If it's up over 500MB, and you don't have any other programs open, then there's a chance that your computer is suffering from this problem. The problem happens because of an apparently unacknowledged problem with the "Microsoft Update" service. The solution, for now at least, is to turn off Microsoft Update, and go back to using Windows Update instead. To do this, go to http://update.microsoft.com/microsoftupdate Next, click on "Change Settings" Scroll to the end of the page and choose "Disable Microsoft Update software and use Windows Update only." Click Apply changes, then restart the computer. Microsoft Update ensures that your office programs (Word, Excel, etc) are all up to date; but there appears to be a problem with this service and is uses up around 500 MB or more of memory, which older computers often don't have. Turning it off is not a big risk because you still have you antivirus program to protect you. Windows itself is still protected. I will write back if this problem is acknowledged by Microsoft. Cheers, Mike PS - a newsletter will be released soon... -- Cool Country Consulting& Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Sun Sep 5 01:19:56 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Sun, 05 Sep 2010 01:19:56 +1000 Subject: [CCC News] Assorted News 31 - Lots of stuff :) Message-ID: <4C82639C.9090904@auzzie.net> *In this edition: * /I take a serious pay cut, try to get a pay rise, make a silly 'blog and try to peddle some wares.../ //** *Assorted News: * The $550 a month pay cut... Small price rise for CCC... Bright Side to Exetel plan changes... *General Ramblings: *Cheaper Outbound-only VoIP options Important Notice for BigPond Customers *Entertainment: * A New Blog for your amusement. RainyMood Cheezburger Network ABC iView coming to DVD players... *New and Existing Services *Web Hosting Offsite Backups VHS / DVD / Cassette / CD / MP3 / DivX conversions *Stuff to Buy *Simple Universal Learning Remote Control - stops you pushing the 'wrong' buttons. $40 Cordless Stereo Headphones - $65. Baby Cordless Keyboard - $45ish .. and unrelated banter at the end. * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ * The **$550 a month pay cut. *With competition in the Internet Supply market becoming ever tighter, Exetel has decided that they need to cut back on how much they give their agents. (And to be fair, it's probably true for ADSL, but I'm not so sure for the other services.) July's income from Exetel was a near-record $950, from about 250 services. Some of this was from temporary one-off bonuses from selling nine wireless broadband services ($225) and losing those would not have been a shock since it was always a temporary setup. However, they decided that they will also stop paying commission on VoIP services and Mobile Broadband PAYG services, and for the remainder they're dropping it from 10% back to 7.5% After all these adjustments, I'm down to $383 per month as a rough estimate. Now, admittedly they were paying us too much for some things. However, their choice to cut us out on profitable VoIP and HSPA PAYG doesn't sit that well with me as these are the hardest services to maintain. This $950 isn't all cream of course - for that money I proxy payments for about 80 customers, over $2,400 a month; and I carry the associated risk. I have also done many installations for free, and tried out non-profit ventures such as HSPA field antenna trials and the like. I also used it to subsidise the price of hardware (such as modems, etc) which I've often sold slightly below cost. So, what will change now? Well, I won't be doing free installs on anything other than ADSL from now on, and I won't be actively advertising VoIP products. HSPA support might be more likely to incur costs if the query exceeds 5 minutes, etc, and hardware costs will now be their normal wholesale+postage prices, and for the very few VoIP only customers I'll be contacting you soon to advise of possible solutions to make providing the service still viable. Their services are still good however, so where appropriate I will still suggest their services :) *A small price rise for CCC... *OK, so I'm about to become $550 a month worse off? Well, probably not that bad really since I will just ramp up other normally paid work instead; but I've been on about the same rate of $65 an hour since 2003. (I deregistered for GST in 2007 yielding a small pay rise as a result.) Since then, things which used to cost $141 now cost $171 - or in other words about 20% more based on CPI. So, unless there's a rebellion, I'm planning to increase my rates a small amount: *New rates starting October 2010:* General and Telephone Consulting: $70 per hour, charged by the minute. Non-Profit and Low Income customers: $50 per hour, charged by the minute. Callout: $10 for sites within 10km of Armidale, Guyra or Black Mountain. Travel: $1 per km one way if more than 10km from Armidale, Guyra, Black Mountain. Glen Innes: Travel to Glen Innes now $40 Cool Country Consulting is not registered for GST, so these amounts do not include a claimable GST amount. This is good for residential customers, slightly less so for businesses. It certainly helps keep paperwork down however, so if you run a business and turn over less than $75,000 a year, it can be a nice thing to be rid of the GST burden :) Please let me know if you're unhappy with these new prices :) They're still cheaper than most other providers. *The Bright Side to Exetel Plan Changes... * If you haven't recently checked what plan you're on with Exetel, it'd be a good idea! Most of their plans have come down by up to $15 a month for the same or better speeds in the last few weeks. For example... $35 a month will now get you 10GB at 1500 speed. (Used to be 256 speed or 512 speed.) $45 a month will now get you 10GB at up to 8,000 speed. (Used to be 1500 speed) $65 a month will now get you 50GB a month at up to 20,000 speed on ADSL2 via Telstra infrastructure. The down side of course is I'll earn less, but meh. It's more important to have happy customers than to pad my nest with guilt money :) Oh, and they will hit you up for a plan change fee too, the cheeky buggers. Plan changes take effect at the end of the month, so you have plenty of time to research. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Cheaper Out-Bound VoIP?* A few months ago, Exetel stuffed something up with an upgrade rendering their VoIP service problematic for anyone using a Billion or Open branded ADSL modem. They eventually fixed it three weeks later; but this gave me incentive to try some other providers again - namely MyNetFone and PennyTel. MyNetFone was as good as Exetel - pretty reliable, and a good service. PennyTel was also surprisingly pretty reliable - not as reliable as MyNetFone and Exetel, with the occasional call going nowhere, but certainly useable, and better than last time I tried their service. There's three reasons why you might be interested in PennyTel. 1 - Cheaper calls than Exetel and MyNetFone - just 10.5 cents per minute to mobiles instead of Exetel's 15 or 22 cents a minute. 2 - You can use your own landline number for CallerID on outgoing calls. (No more confusing "Sydney" numbers.) 3 - Seems less echo-prone than Exetel on Billion routers. .. and of course there's a few reasons you might not be interested. 1 - They're prepaid only. 2 - Call quality not quite as reliable. 3 - Getting started is a bit of a hassle. 4 - No incoming call capability by default. Since I have no financial relationship with PennyTel - they don't offer reseller / agent options - I'm unable to earn any residual income from supporting them. As a result, if you want to sign up with them, and need a hand changing settings in your modem, etc; this time will be chargeable. (Usually it takes about 20 minutes to get signed up, but since they need to verify your identity it can't be completed on the spot.) *Important Notice for BigPond customers.* Bigpond has, in the last few months, drastically increased the value of their ADSL plans. If you're on BigPond and don't want to change to another provider, it's a good idea to log in to the BigPond website and check what plan you're on. (Click the My BigPond link.) If you've forgotten your password I have a program that can sometimes reveal it, or ring 133933 for a new one.) Every week I still come across people paying $30 a month for 400MB and getting whacked for big excess fees when all they need to do is log in, click change plan, and for the same $30 a month they can get 2,000MB, six times the speed and no more excess fees. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *A New Blog for your amusement...** *Introducing *Inside The Ice Box! *I know some of you read these newsletters for the stories :) However, there are usually more stories out there than those which make it into the newsletter. So; to add to your amusement I've created the "Inside the Ice Box" blog. Every few days I log in to it and post some stories about those day's events. Some recent stories you might enjoy from there are: A Job On The Side: http://auzzie.net/icebox/?p=175 (Turning a laptop onto it's side fixes a problem.) Some Wiredo Hangs Up: http://auzzie.net/icebox/?p=167 (Customer gets blacklisted for a while.) "Boob Country:" http://auzzie.net/icebox/?p=164 (The perils of old fashioned Hand Writing.) The Ice Box is still an experimental site finding a purpose. You can find it http://auzzie.net/icebox/ *RainyMood *Do you like the sound of rain? Well, you might enjoy http://www.rainymood.com/ *Cheezburger Network *I can't resist http://thereifixedit.failblog.org/ and many of the other sites at the end of that page. Great for a laugh. *iView and the like. *ABC's iView (TV on demand over the internet service) is starting to make its way into new TVs and DVD players. Soon the new DVD player or TV you buy may be able to get TV over your Broadband internet connection. In the mean time you can check it out at http://abc.net.au/iview - at least half my TV viewing is now done via iView. (As usual, be careful of your download limts.) Example new player at http://apcmag.com/on-test-sonys-200-abc-iview-player.htm ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Web Hosting *Looking to get a website, or want to move a website to a new home? Maybe I can help. Hosting costs start from $4 a month, and domain names (the name for your website) start from about $15 for two years. Pricing at http://auzzie.net/hosting/ Basic website building in Joomla (which you can easily update yourself later) starting from around $120. Existing customers still waiting for a hosting bill? I've written a new accounting system for web hosting invoices, and it will be live soon. *Off-Site Backups *Too busy to remember to back up your computer? Taking the 8% chance a year that your hard drive might die? Well starting at $10 a month (plus initial setup) I can provide an automated off-site backup for you. Backups happen over the Internet via a secure VPN connection and are stored on an encrypted drive on a firewalled server. Information at http://auzzie.net/files/Remote%20Backup%20Information%20Sheet.pdf *VHS / Cassette / LP to CD / DVD / MP3 / DivX* Need to shift to a new medium? Contact me for a quote :) ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Stuff to Buy: *One of my wholesalers has a few great products that can be quite handy. These are: *A Programmable Universal Remote Control - ideal for seniors! *Priced at a reasonable $40 each, these are a simple, old-fashioned, solid remote control. Do you have trouble with the buttons on your set top box being too small, or pressing the wrong button now and then and having to get someone to come and fix it? With one of these, you can program just the buttons you want to use so there's no risk of pressing the wrong button. You can also program one button to turn on the TV, one for the video, one for the set top box for example so you don't have to have so many remote controls on the table. You can get really smart remotes for not much more, but those ones need a computer to set them up. This does not. And it's probably strong enough to use as a weapon too! Picture at http://lh4.ggpht.com/_NLoFolZ2mFo/TIDusX_CNgI/AAAAAAAAEuA/j_C6sYhXNyk/s800/Fullscreen%20capture%203092010%20104753%20PM.jpg Note: Price does not include installation / configuration. It's quite simple to set up however. I try to keep one unit in stock. *Cordless Rechargeable Headphones* * *Hard of hearing? I've sold three of these in the last month. (Two to the same customer - his son nicked his first pair!) They sound great, use wireless so you can move around the house with them on, and are rechargeable. A little pricey at $65 each, but worth it for the stereo sound quality. Picture at http://lh5.ggpht.com/_NLoFolZ2mFo/TIDv1uMGagI/AAAAAAAAEuI/CUvKKiTxmG4/s800/Fullscreen%20capture%203092010%20105307%20PM.jpg Note: Price does not include installation / configuration. In most cases it's straight forward - just connect these to the "Audio Out" on the back of your TV set. I try to keep one unit in stock. *Mini Wireless Keyboard. *Perhaps you're a modern person who has figured out how to connect your computer to your TV, and now you like to watch your movies, iView, etc on it. Well, here's a great little cordless keyboard / mouse about the size of your hand that will let you operate your computer (or PS3, and possibly XBOX too) from the comfort of the lounge chair. I don't sell this item since it's low demand - it's at http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.35354 for about $45-$50. Will take a week or so to arrive however. *Other reminders: *Don't forget TPG's $1 per month, 10c per minute mobile plan. It leaves practically everyone else for dead. Still in contract? Consider carrying a second phone for outgoing. It's no wonder people dump their landlines. (TPG uses Optus network, so consider this before ordering at http://tpg.com.au/mobile). I have no relationship with TPG. *Unrelated News: *Car: Yes, I'm still in the Bluebird. It's still working, mostly. Except for the incident at http://auzzie.net/icebox/?p=177 (1 hr from Wandsworth to home.) The drivers door won't open from the inside unless I pull it towards me first. I've lost 1 & 2 fan speeds and haven't fixed that yet. Apart from that, it's still working well. Nice to be coming into warmer weather so the auto choke doesn't stay on for so long... Kingswood still working, but semi-retired for preservation. Merc might be finding a new home soon - someone wants to buy it. Kitchen renovation nearly finished - see http://picasaweb.google.com.au/CCCMikey/Kitchen# Carpentry's fun :) Tools are amazingly cheap too - Circular saw 3 year warranty $48, Cordless drill 3 year warranty $39. -- Well that's it for another newsletter. Sorry it's taken so long to get this one out. Kitchen building took up the remaining spare time on weekends, along with two sizeable programming tasks. Hope you're all enjoying the new Spring weather! Cheers, Mike. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Old Editions *You can find old editions of this newsletter on the CCC Blog. http://auzzie.net/cccblog/ You can also subscribe or unsubscribe at http://auzzie.net/mailman/listinfo/ccc-news_auzzie.net * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Cool Country Consulting & Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Thu Sep 23 19:57:59 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Thu, 23 Sep 2010 19:57:59 +1000 Subject: [CCC News] New "Remote Assistance" icon :) Message-ID: <4C9B24A7.60009@auzzie.net> G'day all :) For technical reasons, the "Cool Country Remote Assistance" icon that many of you have is no longer functional. If you would like to be able to have me fix your computer via remote control in the future, you'll need to download a new one. You don't have to do that now of course as I'll talk you through it when you call for help. However, if you do want to grab it now - you can find it at the brand new Cool Country Consulting website by going to: http://coolhelp.com.au/ .. and clicking the "Remote Assistance 2010" icon to save it on your computer. As this is a standalone icon, you can place it wherever you like - such as on the desktop or in your Documents folder. Cheers, Mike PS - Sorry, this does not work on Apple computers. --- The technical reason is because my IP address changed. Since there are only four billion addresses, and more than half have been used, we're starting to run out of unique numbers. This is probably what caused the reshuffle. A new numbering system is in development to solve this shortage of numbers in the future - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IPv4_address_exhaustion for the nerdy stuff :) If you're thinking "why doesn't he just use DNS" there is a reason. By using a fixed IP this remote assistance program will often work even when the computer is full of creepy crawlies, because many creepy crawlies like to hijack the DNS system. -- Cool Country Consulting& Auzzie Internet http://coolhelp.com.au/ MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Wed Oct 6 21:30:31 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Wed, 06 Oct 2010 21:30:31 +1100 Subject: [CCC News] $198 for a new baby computer :) Message-ID: <4CAC4FC7.9080305@auzzie.net> Hi :) While fixing a computer today I did a quick scan of the news sites to see if there was anything new on the horizon. The usually relatively useless website belonging to APC Magazine alerted me to this article: http://apcmag.com/is-this-the-cheapest-asus-netbook-ever.htm (Last time they were useful was when they were the only website to alert me to the "Bigpond Security Killing Computers" article a few months ago.) So, just a quick note that Harvey Norman is, from today, selling a Netbook (small laptop) for $198 new. (Which was news to the Armidale branch when I called in today with the details :) ) Original price $329. It's a model that's about a year old and doesn't have a web camera, but those things aside it does have a few positives: Lightweight 4 hour battery Built in wireless. Running Windows XP, with 1GB of memory. Two brains, so performance is still reasonable. Of course, being a baby 9" screen means it's a bit small, but you can plug in a big screen and keyboard to use it just like an ordinary computer when you're home. So it's about as fast as a three or four year old average priced laptop computer. You could use it as a normal computer. You can use it as a photo frame and viewer. You can even use it as an Internet TV. You could use it as a media player in the car, or to play MP3s through your ancient stereo. You could surf in bed. You could bash it over someone's head... Armidale had 12 in stock when I went there, 11 when I left, and 10 on the way. Oh, and since I'm spamming you; if you get this email within the next two hours, you can also get a 1.5TB external drive for $99 from this mob: http://www.shoppingsquare.com.au/product.php?id=58415&utm_source=SilverpopMailing&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2010-05-10%20ShoppingSqaure.com.au%20Newsletter%20%281%29&utm_content= Anyway, sorry if this email wasn't of interest to you. I don't normally send such notices but it is a surprisingly good price. Cheers, Mike. -- Cool Country Consulting& Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Sat Nov 20 19:56:23 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2010 19:56:23 +1100 Subject: [CCC News] Assorted News 32 - You thought I was gone? :) Message-ID: <4CE78D37.2080003@auzzie.net> *In this edition: * /An assortment of news, nothing too serious./ *Assorted News: * AlternativeTo - find alternatives for programs you like. Bundled Crap - it affects us all. Time to Get Rid of Java? How to recognise a fake virus warning. Block Those Ads :) Tips for buying a new laptop. New plans again at Exetel. *General Ramblings: *Bunnings for Lunch? Why I use the NECU Three way VoIP calling Turn your Nokia mobile into a wireless router. *Entertainment: * Bluebirdy Blues. The Skype Wall? Weekend Woodies. * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ * AlternativeTo - Find alternatives to the programs you like.** *This tip is particularly handy for tinkering types who like to try out new programs. If you've ever gone looking on Google for something like "dvd copier" or "convert wav to mp3" or some other thing you think must exist, odds are you'll be given the same answers repeatedly, but the websites that you go to will instead try to give you everything else that you don't want including registry cleaners (which are all snake oil by the way) and driver updaters. In short, it's a complete disaster that Google seems to have no interest in dealing with. Instead, there's a great site called AlternativeTo. http://alternativeto.net/ As an example, if you type in "DVD ripper" (which is any program that stores a copy of a DVD on your computer) you'll first get a number of programs that seem to be DVD rippers. Click on one of them and you'll be given a list in descending order of popularity for all the DVD ripping programs that are known to exist. The trick to this site is knowing that the program you click on then appears at the top of the list, and you need to read the area in black to find out all about that program. It doesn't tell you which are free and which are commercial, but at least it helps keep you clear of the fake pages that Google gives you which only exist to make money for the page authors. *Bundled Crap - it affects us all... *Many companies that provide free programs on the Internet have a nasty habit of trying to trick you into installing things you don't need. The biggest culprit at the moment would have to be Adobe Flash, with Java a likely second. When installing updates from these companies, watch carefully so you can untick these unwanted extras. (Example at http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/515/cpsid_51559.html ) Things that commonly hitch a ride are OpenOffice, Yahoo Toolbar, Ask.com Toolbar, Google Toolbar, Google Chrome, McAfee Security Scan, Norton Security Scan. If you do accidentally end up with one of these things and you don't want it, you can remove it from your computer via the Control Panel section. By the way, the reason you should keep Flash and Java up to date is because the majority of 'viruses' written at the moment use faults inside these two programs to take over your computer - usually but not always via poisoned advertisements. *Time to Get Rid of Java? *Java appears to be becoming a dying technology. It is now rarely used. The only programs I regularly see that use Java (not to be confused with the more popular JavaScript) are Limewire (now defunct), FrostWire (its open-source freebie equivalent) and the ATO's E-Commerce site. Oh, and if you use OpenOffice you need to keep it. If I read http://www.grc.com/sn/sn-271.txt correctly, Microsoft has encountered more than six million computers infected so far this quarter by virsues that use Java to get into the computer. So, if you're not using it, it might be time to get rid of it. It's in Start --> Control Panel --> Add/ Remove programs or Uninstall a program. You might have several copies too by the way. If you do need it, just make sure you run the updates every time one is offered. If you get rid of it, then find you need it again, most programs that need it will automatically go and fetch it again. *How to recognise a fake Virus warning... *Here is an example of a fake virus warning. http://i.imgur.com/EJaOY.png What it actually is, is just a picture on a web page, designed to look like a legitimate warning from Windows. If you were to actually click on the "Remove" button, your computer would then download a 'virus' - or technically a fake antivirus program which will then incessantly nag you to buy it, and most likely prevent you from opening any programs on the computer. Probably the biggest giveaway to watch out for is that this fake warning does not bear the name of your antivirus program. If you have Avast for example, any message warning of a virus would bear the Avast logo. Similarly, a Microsoft Security Essentials or Norton / Trend window would bear the name of that program. It's also very unlikely you'd suddenly get ten different viruses at once :) Anyway, how could you avoid getting this type of bogus warning in the first place.... read on... *Block Those Ads :) *When I set up a new computer for a customer, I almost always put "Mozilla Firefox" on it. Why? Well, because it can be easily customised. Once of the customisations available is a feature called "AdBlock Plus". This blocks almost all advertisements on all webpages. As mentioned earlier, many viruses come through malicious advertisements - either advertisements that take advantage of a fault in the computer to get in - or play a trick by popping up a fake 'you've got blah blah viruses click here to remove' message. By blocking these ads, you also block that risk. (For added security, you can run FlashBlock as well, or for really high security run NoScript as well.) Of course, by blocking ads you are denying a small amount of money to the website you visit; so if it's a site you trust you can disable it for that site. For those of you on expensive Satellite connections, it saves you a fair bit on downloads too :) You can get firefox at http://getfirefox.com/ and once installed click Tools - Add-Ons, Get Add-Ons and search for AdBlock Plus. When Firefox restarts select the English ad blocking list subscription and you're done. *Tips for buying a new laptop. *This is a question I get asked every week. Generally speaking, for those of you that just do basic accounting work and use the Internet, there's not much need to buy a particularly expensive laptop. Also, as far as brands go it's hard to really pick one over the others these days for reliability. My general advice is to duck in to Harvey Norman, RetraVision and Dick Smith to see what's there. See what appeals to you design-wise. The general tips are to look for at least dual core processors, or the i3, i5, i7 range. Hard drive at least 320G and RAM at least 2G. You might also care about things like whether it has a webcam built in, how heavy it is and what the battery life is like. Whether or not it includes Microsoft Office (Word and Excel, etc) might also matter to you. One handy resource for comparing multiple laptops at once is http://apcmag.com/notebookhunter/index.htm Oh, and if you want an Apple - that's OK too. Provided you don't need to run any Windows-only programs. (Accounting programs in particular are a concern here.) It is possible to run Windows on an Apple with some fiddling. Some printers may not work on Apple computers. *New Plans again at Exetel. *Once again, Exetel has played with their plans a bit, so it might be worth having a look to see what plan you're on now and what you could be getting for the same price. For example with ADSL, $38 a month will now get 50GB a month, or $53 will now get you an unlimited downloads plan - both at 1500kbps, but only if you change from your existing plan. They also have some new wireless plans at $30 for 3GB or $45 for 5GB, and a more reasonable $20 per GB over. More details: http://www.exetel.com.au/a_plan_pricing_new.php and http://www.exetel.com.au/residential-hspa-pricing.php Telstra's wireless plans are still fairly good too - see http://go.bigpond.com/wireless/?ref=Net-Head-Int-Plans-Wireless ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ***Bunnings for Lunch? *It's funny talking to customers about the recent appearance of Bunnings in town. Some love it, some hate it. Some never leave Guyra :) In my opinion, it's just more competition; so it doesn't really worry me. They have some stuff I can't get elsewhere. When lunch time comes around, I'm usually to be found grabbing a quick pie at the North Hill bakery or the Guyra bakery. However, thereafter it's usually time to, ahem, spring a leak somewhere. Guyra is well catered for in terms of toilets for travellers; but Armidale is far less so. As a result, depending on the day I sometimes sacrifice a little on the pie quality for the convenience of a generic plastic-wrapped reheated Bunnings pie followed by a Bunnings Dunny. (The public ones that is, not the ones that are waiting for a new home.) I guess this is one of the reasons Maccas does so well - people know they're going to be able to eat and leak. Bakeries rarely do. I don't mind the occasional Maccas meal, but since the food there is so cheap, I worry about what conditions the donor animals lived in before becoming my Quarter Pounder - that information is not printed on the placements. Admittedly, a Bunnings Pie might also have come from a battery cow so perhaps that's a slight double-standard on my part... *Why I use the NECU? *.. or whatever they're called these days. There were two things that first made me change to them years ago. Bank fees, and opening hours. I get very frustrated when I go to any retailer and they're 'closed for lunch.' Surely lunch time is often the only time people have free to go to these places in the first place? However more recently I was saved by another default feature of their accounts. With traditional banks, each account is a distinct entity, and if it gets overdrawn you generally get whacked some nasty fees. However, with the NECU you have one master account and many sub-accounts. If you overdraw the master, it can automatically raid the sub-accounts. Earlier this week I was slack and didn't check the balance at the end of the month in the master account. Sure enough, Exetel's direct debits hit it and it goes overdrawn. About 10 transactions automatically came out of the tax reserve sub-account rather than whacking me for big 'failed transaction' fees. I don't know for sure, but that probably saved me about $300 or more had I been with a different bank. I suspect this feature might be optional at banks as well, but haven't looked. I should give the CBA credit for supplying me with a Merchant Facility many years ago that I still use today, and the NAB for the first home loan before it moved over to the CBA. *Three Way VoIP calling. *For those of you using Exetel VoIP still, just thought I'd let you know that it's possible to make three way calls with this service if your modem supports it. (All Billions / Open Networks ones do I believe.) In my case this is handy if needing to speak to Telstra and an account holder simultaneously. http://auzzie.net/cccblog//index.php?title=how_to_make_conference_calls_on_open_824&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1 has more details. These calls are at the usual VoIP rate, so for 20 cents you can talk to two people in Australia for as long as you like. *Turn your Nokia Mobile into a Wireless Router. *If you have a reasonably capable Nokia mobile - for example the E51 or something more recent that has WiFi built in, there's a free program you can load onto it that will turn it into a wireless router. (Note, some modern fancy phones like the iPhone, some Android phones, etc, also have this capability built in.) What does that mean? It means you can stick your phone somewhere that it gets reception, press a couple of buttons, and then get online within about 20 metres of it using your Laptop. No wires needed. This could be really handy in the following situations: 1 - You're on Satellite, and it's a cloudy day. Your Internet won't connect. Your phone only works in the window, and you need to send some emails. 2 - You're in the car and want to look up something on the 'net. 3 - You're on wireless broadband at the edge of reception and it's having a bad day. Your phone gets reception in the window or in the car. 4 - You're somewhere that has no internet at all, but your phone works. (Note: Mobile phones generally have stronger antennas built in than those inside USB sticks.) You might even already have some free downloads on your plan and not know it. To check, press the "Telstra" or "My Place" button on your phone, go to "My Account" and "Data Usage" to see how many MB you have. A big warning however - these plans still have super-high excess usage fees on them, so you need to be careful not to go over the limit. They will SMS you when you get close however so it's not extremely dangerous. The pricing for doing this (if it's not included on your plan) is at http://www.telstra.com.au/mobile/browsing_packs.html One good bit of news is that there is no contract on doing this, so you can arrange for a browsing pack before going away and cancel it when you get back, etc. For the Nokias, the free /program is at http://joiku.com/ - or you can install it on your phone directly by going to www.joikuspot.com/light with your mobile's web browser. (You can buy a fancy version as well, but in rural areas it's probably not necessary. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Bluebirdy Blues?* Modern cars use computers to control the motor. Mine doesn't. Instead it uses a funny arrangement of levers, sprays, wires, pumps and holes to get the juice in it to make it go. A couple of weeks ago it decided that it would try to save fuel by stalling whenever I stopped. A Guyra mechanic had a look for me but sadly only made it worse so sometimes it would die, and other times without warning it'd try to take off again. Predictable I can handle, unpredictable not so much :) Anyway, so it went to an Armidale mechanic who tamed it again somewhat - not quite perfect but better than it was before it went to the Guyra mechanic. Modern Mechanics are not the same as old ones. Modern mechanics have the luxury of computers that tell them why the car won't go :) It's getting harder to find mechanics who fully understand the older style - particularly when it comes to the 'fancy' ones like this; so I've had to teach myself just what all the bits are for on the ol' bugger. One handy resource has been http://www.tpub.com/content/armyordnance/Od16207/index.htm which explains what most of the weird add-on bits are. Of course, some of you wonder why I persist with an older vehicle? The main reason is because it sat in a shed for 8 years, and had a new motor not long before that; so in my mind at least it should still have some useful life in it. (Unfortunately rubber ages irrespective of use, which is bad news for vacuum-driven thinggies.) Of course, rego's nearly due now, and it failed a safety check because of a small transmission leak, and amusingly also because the drivers side door hinges are worn out. (I guess my sticker "pull door towards you to open" stuck above the handle as a courtesy to the mechanic might have given that away.) I have ordered new hinges for it (since there are none left in Guyra / Armidale wreckers) and am getting the very last original door hinge to come off the production line. A new TVV is on its way too so I can get the scavenger tank working again. Anyway, so I'm back on the road again - hopefully for another year. If you know anyone who specialises in dual-throat carbies with Hot Idle Compensators, EGR, Positive Crank Case Ventilation, Fast Idle cams, dual ignitions and a BCDD, let me know :) *The Skype Wall? *Here's an idea that would have been Sci-Fi years ago. It would now be possible to set up a projector (or big TV) and a webcam in two premises and have a skype video conference open between them. Imagine for example that you and your family had to be split up for a few months. You could pick a wall in each house and use it to link to a wall in the other. You could meet up at brekkie time for example, or just glance over in the afternoon for a chat. In these days of relatively cheap unlimited Internet plans it is a possibility :) ***Weekend Woodies! *The Weekend Woodies is not yet available as a traditional PodCast, but you can listen to the last week's episode at http://www.abc.net.au/sydney/programs/702_weekends/ - if you don't know what it is, it's a comedy radio show for DIY renovators who call in with assorted questions. -- Well that's it for another newsletter :) Thanks for reading :) Cheers, Mike. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ *Old Editions *You can find old editions of this newsletter on the CCC Blog. http://auzzie.net/cccblog/ You can also subscribe or unsubscribe at http://auzzie.net/mailman/listinfo/ccc-news_auzzie.net * * ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Cool Country Consulting & Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From michael at auzzie.net Tue Nov 23 10:48:31 2010 From: michael at auzzie.net (Michael Kean) Date: Tue, 23 Nov 2010 10:48:31 +1100 Subject: [CCC News] Tidbit: Massive Price Reduction for Telstra Internet via Mobile Message-ID: <4CEB014F.8020002@auzzie.net> G'day all :) Just a quick note that today Telstra released some massively reduced pricing on accessing the Internet via your Telstra phone. (For example, 1GB for $10 2GB $20, etc.) This means you can plug your phone into your computer (or do it wirelessly if your phone supports it) and access the Internet at a pretty decent speed provided you can get coverage. For those of you on Satellite, this could well be much cheaper than you're paying now, and with no contract on it. Pricing details are at http://www.telstra.com.au/mobile/browsing_packs.html - and you can buy online with just your name, DoB, address and account number. If you're on the edge of coverage areas, some phones support plugging in an extra antenna which I can source for you. (They usually have a small rubber cap or a sliding door on the back.) Those of you already using Telstra Browse Packs - I'm not sure exactly what the upgrade process is. It might not be automatic, so you might need to 'buy online' or give 'em a call. Sadly you still need to be careful - they do charge $250 per GB if you exceed your limit on the smaller plans. (25c per megabyte.) Thus it might not be safe if you have irresponsible people in the house. Cheers, Mike. PS - No I'm not a Telstra / BigPond agent. -- Cool Country Consulting& Auzzie Internet http://www.auzzie.net/ccc MSN: michael at auzzie.net Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825 Skype: cccons Yahoo: lispbourke -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: