High Tech Life: 2010

Sunday, December 26, 2010

The 4G trap.

Every one is toting faster speeds and such with 4G service, but no one is showing you up front the data caps. Yes they are limiting your use,some will throttle your speed back to the days of dial up, some will charge you 10 or 20 dollars per data block over. For many this cap is not a problem, I mean 2gig is a lot if all you do is check mail and a few documents. If however you have a job that needs more than just email, you can use it up fast. Like me, on a good day I can do 4 to 5 gigabytes of data, and no I am not running a web server on that connection. Well I am but it is a sandbox so has minimal impact. My job requires a VPN connection for security, then I have a remote desktop to work, then connections to each customer I deal with. It all adds up fast, so even though 4G speed sounds good, it is not practical. Even 3G plans are getting harder to find in an unlimited plan now. Verizon does not have one at all. Tmobile only on the tablet and androids themself. The Blackberry is the only smartphone that has unlimited data that you can share with your laptop. Even thier 'aircards' have a limit of 2 gigabytes of data per month. You need to read the fine print on the plan and the contract before you order it or you will get stuck with a big bill for little service.

Steven Young
Technician Supervisor
S.a.A. Computer Repair
steven@saacomputer.com
Cell 503-851-6977
Field Solutions Tech #44922
Field Nation Tech #17515

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Sunday, November 21, 2010

How quickly we learn?

Those that have been reading my posts know I use t-mobile service. You also know I have a few issues with them at times. Well earlier this week I found myself in the store looking at new hardware. Well I found myself looking specifically at the new Samsung Galaxy Tablet, breaking my own rules about bleeding edge technology. Well 400.00 later I was walking out with one. I mean ZDNet had not even posted a review yet, no one I read or follow had yet. So I take it home and start to customize the apps and such on it. I didn't even have it an hour when my family (even my mother) was trying to steal it from me. Everyone wanted the new 'toy'. Well keeping it from them has not been hard, the kids all know it is daddy's for work, my mom lives elsewhere and my wife really only wants to play solitaire on it (which I actually have to install). Well over the last few days I have gotten so used to it that this morning I literally almost panicked when it had a major fault. You read right, major fault.

I pulled it off the charger and was surfing when all of a sudden the screen went dark. Not a reason right away to panic but what happened next was, it wouldn't turn back on at all. So panicked I started searching the book for reset instructions, none. Searched the net, no one posted about how to reset. Oh great was my thought, so I called my local store where I bought it, the manager remembering me (I was the first Tablet sale for their store.) said bring it in. Well lucky by the time I got there it had decided to start booting. Seems there was a national outage that effected the 4G system, well I stated that should not have effected this as it is only 3G. It seems though it did, it burned the sim card. Lucky though for me the manager was nice enough to replace my sim. I didn't really want to do 2 more days re customizing a new tablet so soon. Though it has made me rethink how I store my documents on it. If you get one make sure you use the SD card as storage or even use Google Doc's as it is a supported android device for even creating a new doc.

In all I have had a pleasant experience with it unlike when I got burned with windows mobile.

Steven Young
Technician Supervisor
S.a.A. Computer Repair
steven@saacomputer.com
Cell 503-851-6977
Field Solutions Tech #44922
Field Nation Tech #17515

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Monday, October 11, 2010

Android vs. Windows Mobile

Well I went to the T Mobile store saturday and was checking out the phones like any geek looking to change. Though I myself am by choice stuck on the mostly stable blackberry platform. Other members of my family want other options.  I am open to the open platform of the droid, so I start looking at phones, pick one up and start playing with it, then after bout 2 minutes spot to my horror the flag key. Yup it was Windows in a droid clone. To make it worse it was in the middle of a row with 6 others that actually had the Android OS on them. Plus to make it worse, the phone was less expensive. Yes, Free just to look more appealing. I let the salesman do his pitch, not once did he mention it was not a droid or that it was. I bet though I can't find the apps I want in a Windows platform.  MS has stooped to a new low. Disguising itself as something more popular just to gain sales and to lock you into its use. Even if functionality is drastically reduced and just not there.   

So I say, be warned, that flashy new phone, may not really be Android.

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Seem's someone is noticing me.

Well it would seem in the last week or maybe even longer someone has noticed me, My website http://www.saacomputer.com has come under attack. Some of you out there would say 'yeah right' but I use Qualys to scan my site daily, on both the 29th and the 30th my site tested true for Malware. Both days that it was found I imeadiatly upon being notified of the infection cleaned the site. Both days the infection was employed differently, first was through an iframe implementation and the second time was an embedded javascript. All I can think off is that someone does not like the fact I inform users of what is out there and what to avoid. Educated users are less likely to become infected which in turns lowers the rate of which these malicious children are able to do damage. Well I have to thank the children as now I know at least someone reads my posts and notices my work. It also tells me that I may be on the right path of educating people.

Steven Young
Technician Supervisor
S.a.A. Computer Repair
steven@saacomputer.com
Cell 503-851-6977
Field Solutions Tech #44922
Field Nation Tech #17515

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Monday, February 8, 2010

More T-Mobile Issues

Well a lot has happened since last posting. I have upgraded phones but unfortunately I am still on T Mobile. Last week alone I had to call to have my tower connection reset 5 times. You know it has to be bad when I, the customer can and do tell the tech more about the error than they know and what they need to do to fix it. I would fix it myself if I had access to the tools. My issue is when I swap batteries so I can use my phone as a modem to get my laptop online, my phone logs in but not all the way. I can browse and log in on the phone but when DUN on my laptop authenticates, the ppp link won't establish. In other words the modem won't talk.

So I call up, get the wrong queue every time cause when I say blackberry support, I guess the system hears pay my bill, so I end up in billing every time, they then transfer me to Level 1 support which never listen and waste 2 hours of time, so I have to ask to be transfered to Level 2. They at least most times will listen to me tell them 'Just reset my connection, yes I know the call will drop' 2 or 3 times then actually do it.

Come on, yes I know what will happen, look at my account history. I call in several times a week to do this. I know what will happen. Why can't they though set the towers to see the fact I am disconnected long enough to reboot and auto reset? Would make sense, I am off for 10 minutes. It should see I am gone for 2 and reset all my connections to allow a fresh connection when I come up.

Not that hard, if AOL can detect 2 minutes idle time and boot you off, they can do the same. It would be better and save a lot of headaches.

Steven Young
Technician Supervisor
S.a.A. Computer Repair
steven@saacomputer.com
Cell 503-851-6977
Field Solutions Tech #44922

http://www.saacomputer.com

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