[CCC News] Assorted News 44 - Free Offsite Backups & More...

Sun Jun 3 14:41:52 AEST 2012

*In this edition:
**
*Free Offsite Backups, The 'Fat' Diet, Free Music, Speakers for your 
Bike & more...

*Handy Tips:
*    Free Offsite Backups!
     Automatic Photo Transfer from Phone / Tablet  to Computer.
     The Mystery of Free Music

*Other Stuff:
*     The "Fat" diet?
     Web hosting review pending...
     Sick again!

*Shop
*Bluetooth Stereo Speakers for your Bike, etc.
     Play your iPhone, Tablet or Android music wirelessly to your stereo.

*
*
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*Free Offsite Backups!*

If you have the following things, this might be of interest to you:

1 - A computer (Windows or Mac) with important files on it.
2 - A reasonable Internet connection.
3 - A friend who also has a reasonable Internet connection, or you own a 
home and work computer.

There is a great program available that lets you securely and 
automatically have a copy of your files sent to your friend's computer 
or your home computer, and vice versa if you like. And since you're 
using your own computers, it's free to do. (Possible internet costs 
excepted - check your plan.)

This free program is called "CrashPlan" and you can find out more at 
http://www.crashplan.com/consumer/crashplan.html

They do have a paid version as well, if you want to back up to their 
servers; or you're welcome to back up to one of my servers in Black 
Mountain for $5 per month up to 100GB. The only advantage of using my 
server instead of theirs is that I can probably get your data back to 
you on a hard drive faster than you can download it.

PS - your backups are password protected, so if you back up to another 
person's computer they cannot access your files.

*Automatic Photo Transfer from Phone / Tablet to Computer.

*Do you own an iPhone, BlackBerry or Android phone. (Android phones come 
from HTC, Samsung, Sony, Motorola primarily.)

I've mentioned before a free program called DropBox that lets you share 
files between multiple computers. Another new feature it has is that you 
can have it automatically copy your photos from your phone to your 
computer when you take them - either via WiFi when at home or via the 
mobile phone network.

The main advantage of this is it means you don't have to hunt for a 
cable to copy your photos off, and the second advantage is that it means 
you probably won't lose (all) your photos if your phone is lost or stolen.

You can get it free for your PC at https://www.dropbox.com/ and for your 
phones via the same website or their App Store / Play Store icons.

*The Mystery of Free Music!

*Something strange has happened in this world. You can now go to YouTube 
<http://www.youtube.com/>, type in almost any song or artist, and listen 
to them for free. My best guess is that Google uses their ads to 
compensate for the costs; but it's still a bit of a mystery how they get 
away with it.

Anyway, a common question I then get is 'how can I save this song onto 
my computer / phone / iPod'. And it's surprisingly simple, if perhaps a 
bit devious.

1 - Install Firefox <http://getfirefox.com/>if you don't already have it.
2 - Install 
<https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-to-mp3/> 
"Youtube to MP3" if you want to save just the music
3 - Install 
<https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/video-downloadhelper/?src=ss> 
"Video DownloadHelper" if you want to save the video.

Note: These are examples only - there are several other addons that can 
do similar things

PS - Note that many old TV Shows 
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEWmn8p_OoA> are also available in full 
on YouTube too.

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*
The "Fat" diet?*

I regularly listen to a Technology Podcast called SecurityNow by Steve 
Gibson. It helps me to keep up to date with what's going on with 
computer security etc.

He is also a bit of a 'health nut' and likes to do scientific 
experiments on himself.

One recent experiment was to see what would happen if he went onto a 
diet that removed almost all sugars.

The way he explains it, the body will preferentially process sugars for 
energy, but was pre-designed to run on fats prior to our age of 
harvesting grains, etc. When he deprived himself of sugars, after a few 
weeks his body suddenly switched to converting fats for energy instead, 
which manifested in a few ways:

1 - Suddenly his urine smelt funny.
2 - Suddenly, greater stamina when exercising since converting fat 
produces 70% of the carbon dioxide that converting sugars does.
3 - Suddenly, full after eating relatively small portions of food. (No 
longer always tempted by food.)
4 - His Tinnitus buggered off
5 - His blood pressure dropped.

You can watch the video presentation about it here: 
http://twit.tv/show/twit-live-specials/124

I haven't researched it further myself yet. Note that making such a 
drastic change should be done with some form of medical supervision.

*Web hosting review pending.

*I offer web hosting as part of my business. However, the prices and 
plans haven't changed in three or more years. It looks like I can move 
to a newer server soon which will have much more space than the current 
one; so hopefully by the time the next newsletter comes around I'll have 
some more attractive plans!

*Sick Again!

*Sheesh, When I was younger I almost never got sick. This year I seem to 
be breaking all the records! As of 6:30 Saturday night I can no longer 
keep food or water down. Hopefully the plumbing gets itself sorted soon! 
The frequency of detonation is reducing so hopefully I'll be right by 
tomorrow.

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*Bluetooth Stereo Speakers for your Bike, etc. (Play music wirelessly 
from phone or tablet.)

*A few months ago, one of those 'bargain of the day' sites (probably 
http://www.catchoftheday.com.au/ or http://www.dealsdirect.com.au/ ) had 
a small set of speakers for sale, down to roughly $30 + postage. They're 
usually around $120 retail. So, I took the gamble and grabbed a set; 
since I'd long planned to fit speakers to my daily dog-run electric bike.

Since then I have been very impressed by their sound, given that they're 
not much bigger than a clenched fist. I've thrown everything from 
PowerGlove <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=trGkPerU3-k> to Beethoven 
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQVeaIHWWck> at them and have not been 
able to fault them. They sound is pretty rich, clear yet with decent 
bass production that you wouldn't normally expect to get out of 
something that small, and they are satisfyingly loud if you want them to be.

A few days ago, they were listed again at $30 + postage, so I grabbed 
four sets, which I now have up for sale at $40 each. (Yes, I'm quite the 
greedy retailer!)

So, if you; or someone you know, is one of those foolish people who 
rides a bike while wearing headphones; these could be just for you. The 
sound is in front of you so you can still hear if a car comes up behind 
you. And there's no need to worry about annoying people with your music 
since they're quite directional - and besides there are noisy bastards 
with Harleys - your 6 watt speaker ain't going to compete!

Oh, forgot to mention they double as a hands free kit as well.

I'll carry a set with me in the car in case you want a demo.

*Play your iPhone, Tablet or Android music wirelessly to your stereo.*

Do you keep your music on your Phone? Do you like listening to online 
radio? Do you like 2AD but can't get decent AM reception? This might 
interest you.

One of my suppliers sells a number of adapters from about $85 that you 
can plug in to your stereo. These will then pair up with your phone or 
tablet, so that you can play your music through your stereo even though 
the phone is in your hand / pocket, etc.

Note: 2AD has stopped working on TuneIn radio for some reason, a few 
customers have asked about it but I haven't chased it up yet. If you 
only listen to it because your a Lawsie disciple, you can get your fix 
at 2SM instead.

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Well, another newsletter done. Business is going pretty well at the moment.

*Old Editions
*You can find old editions of this newsletter on  the CCC Blog. 
http://auzzie.net/cccblog/

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*
*
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Michael Kean
*Proprietor, Cool Country Consulting.*
Trading Hours: 10am to 8pm weekdays.
http://coolhelp.com.au/
Tel: 02 6775 0239 Fax: 02 8212 9582 Mob: 0427 644 825
Chat contacts: WLM: michael at auzzie.net Skype: cccons

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