Amazon Prime Perfect for the Impatient

Signing up for Amazon Prime has been a great asset to our company and household. Many times, you think of buying something online and convince yourself that by the time you get it, it will be later than if you went down to the local store and purchased it. Amazon Prime helps with that. Recently, we thought of purchasing some books at our local bookstore. Then the thought hit us...What if they did not have the title? Of course they would offer to order the titles. However, the hassle of organizing the time and the children to visit the store would be daunting, especially if the title was not in stock. Now, if we could look up the title online, pay for it, and have it waiting at the store within the hour...well, that is a different post...

Amazon Prime enters the mix here with product availability and quick shipping. Yes, it takes longer than 1 hour to receive the product (2 days) and does cost a small amount for 1 year ($79), however, you do not pay for shipping on most items within the Amazon inventory for that year. For those two days, you could have saved time and sanity. For those of you saying that you would have just called the store to check the stock...ask yourself how often you get a hold of someone who knows the stock and is helpful...then ask yourself what happens if they do not have the resource...

As we venture back to Amazon Prime...think about how much you would spend on tax and shipping if you ordered one item any way. With rising shipping costs due to rising gas prices, you have just locked in your rate at $79 for all you need to ship regardless of changes within that year. We have ordered about five items within the last 2 months that would have cost about $60 to ship if we shipped them using the 5-day shipping option and about $80-$90 for the 2 day option. That is within the first 2 months. For the rest of the orders that we have this year, shipping has already been paid.

Even though Amazon has many different products, which you will not get just going to a book store, the one thing that we would have liked are the 2-day options for everything on Amazon. Amazon Prime is only available for items sold on Amazon. Vendor products such as those pulled in from Target or their food retailers will still cost you shipping at regular rates.

The interesting thing for us was the 1 month trial. We ordered two items before the five mentioned above. All items were received within 2 days and we were able to track them online. Try it. There are no commitments. You can turn off automatic renewal so that your credit card is not charged if you don't like it and it cancels itself. Good luck and enjoy.

XP SP3

OK, so I debated whether to post this or not since I do not have complete specifics or have figured out why XP SP3 would actually slow down our machine...We recently reinstalled everything from the original install disks and went through the painstaking process of updating to SP2 and the various updates over the last 2-3 years or so...It would boot up very quickly...In fact, it was so quick, I thought we did something wrong in the installation and it would crash at any time...It has been running strong for a few months now...that is until we updated it to SP3...

The install took about 10 minutes and it rebooted. The first boot took longer than our newer Vista Machine which has enough extras on it to choke a rather small whale...After logging in completely, we shut down, waited a few moments, and rebooted again. Boot time still three times as long, and the start-up programs like Windows Live OneCare, LogMeIn, and Orb took at least double the previous time to load. The machine is even slow starting IE...

Now, I know that this 6-year old, P4 1.80GHz with 768 MB of RAM, running XP Home is not the fastest or the best machine out there...this is why we use it as the media server and backup machine...but, it was quick and clean before XP SP3...I have deactivated some items in the startup, but annoying would be a kind word to use for this update...I just hope it is more secure or has other features we are missing...

I will post more as we find out more. Good luck with the update...Enjoy...

MacBook Air Wrap-Up...For Now

OK, so I have had some great opportunities to use the Air as a standard and daily machine. Instead of separating out items, I decided to wrap up individual topics on the Air at least for now with this post...

* I attended a conference recently where I got tired of taking notes and transcribing them later...So, since the MacBook Air fit into my portfolio, I brought it with me. I used this wonderful tool the entire conference, from 8 AM to 5 PM two days in a row...I turned off wireless and bluetooth for the majority of the day and used mostly MS Word 2004. I only turned on Bluetooth and used Safari during 2 segments of about 10 minutes each on both days. I entered the notes into Word and closed the cover when I was not taking notes. The battery lasted the entire day and all sessions on each day. There were no outlets close, so plugging in was not an option. The battery can last, it just needs limited usage and manual power management of closing the cover when not using it.

* There have been many periods where when logging in or opening an application, especially Microsoft Office 2004 applications, the spinning beach ball lasted for a while. I am still trying to figure out what is causing the beach ball. I am still learning about Leopard, so there may be something in the logs that I am missing.

* For BootCamp, I noticed that when I changed our AirPort Extreme router to N only, I was not able to acquire an IP address. So, I have to use the slower G part of the network. Not too bad, but a pain. I will be playing with the settings further to make sure it is not a simple user error, but for some reason it is not connecting at N speeds...The ironic thing is that when I mixed the network, XP indicated that it was connecting at 130 mbps...interesting...

* A couple of harddrive clicks when shutting down have caused some worry, but all seems to be OK. I have run the diagnostics, checked disk permissions, and Onyx to make sure the drive was working OK. So, far, so good, but the sounds have been few and far in between.

* I believe I will be giving up on the virtual software for now as well. BootCamp will have to do even with the incredibly lower battery life...

* Lastly, the size of the hard drive is still a point of concern...While I am far from running out of space, it decreases everyday with podcasts, pictures, as well as personal and professional documents. About 15 GB remain even after splitting out pictures, movies, and most music files to an external drive.

Still excellent machine that I carry all over the house at ease. We'll see how an upcoming flight works out soon as well.

Security Now...and Later

When you think about security for your computer, the first thing that ay ome to your mind may be anti-virus software, firewalls, or perhaps infected...when I think about security on a pc, Mac, or Linux, I think about Security Now with Steve Gibson and Leo LaPorte.

Security Now is a weekly podcast that you can download directly from the iTunes podcast store or directly through Leo's website at Twit.tv or a lower bandwidth version at Steve's site GRC. They not only talk about the items you normally think about with computer security, they also use the techniques and tools themselves. The conversation within the podcast goes into more details than you will mostly ever need whether you are a tech youngin' or a codger tech.

I have tried multiple times to jusr stop listening, but the conversation touches that logical side of my brain, and I am lured back in. Secuirty Now recently went through encrypting your data so that those with less than good intentions could not do anything with it. This was a great and timely topic as I prepare to travel for my day job again and my usb key dangles from my keychain.

Listen, learn, and enjoy...

Orb.com

So, you want to be able to listen to your music when you are on the road...or, perhaps, you are on a business trip for weeks on end and wanted to watch that video of the kids you took last summer...well, Orb 2.0 to the rescue...OK, the rescue piece is a bit of an exaggeration, but, Orb is a great little tool that allows you to access your media from just about any device and location with a internet connection. You can watch videos, listen to music, and setup a security webcam from you home pc and check it on the road.

The setup was rather easy...in fact, it was a download and install. You complete a registration piece with very limited amount of information so that you have a login and a password. You navigate to http://mycast.orb.com, enter your information and away you go...

I know, I know, I am over-simplifying things, but is really was that easy. We have one computer acting as a server. This computer is on pretty consistently and almost always connected to the internet. Orb does the rest. We have used Orb for the following situations:

* Checking the house while we were out. The webcam functionality is a great little tool. We have it setup facing the door of the room. While we can see the mess we left behind, we can also check if there is any damage from storms or unexpected guests.

* Grabbing documents left behind. While on a business trip, I forgot to copy some stories that I was writing onto my thumb drive. Fortunately, I did copy them to the server and into the shared document folder. I was able to pick up where I left off. I have also used LogMeIn to copy the documents to the folder so I would not have to send them..for more on LogMeIn, see this post: LogMeIn Review

* LIstening to music...yes, your music. Orb, searches the directory that you specify and lists the music. Even though we have music on our laptop or iPod, not everything goes with us...This even worked with the AT&T Tilt. We were able to stream music using the 3G connection of the phone. You can sort by artist, album, playlist, and your favorites. The search feature works just like you were at your computer.

* Watching local and internet tv shows. Sometimes, we wish we put in a tv tuner into this pc. If we did, we wouldn't need the Slingbox. However, with the TV options in Orb, we have been able to watch tv stations from other states. This is good whether we are home or on the road. We watched local weather for Florida before a trip and while we stopped at a hotel on our way. No storms, but it worked well.

* Reminiscing with family. If you do not want to upload your pictures to Flickr or some other photo sharing site, you can share them on your public orb site or have your family member create an Orb account and give them access to your pictures and videos. We used this to show some pictures and video after a recent holiday concert from our little ones. Save time and space since they could not be there.

More to come, but so far, Orb is worth the FREE price tag. Enjoy...

MacBook Air, Parallels

OK, OK, I know there are many other people out there who have had great success with Parallels and the MacBook Air...I, however, was not one of them. I installed the trail download and received a 14-day activation key. I already installed BootCamp as shared in a previous storyline, so I was hoping that I would not have to reinstall for Parallels. I held out for this one simple thing for two reasons...one, the drive is only 74 GB formated (80 GB advertised), and 12 GB were spent on the BootCamp partition; two, the time it would take to install the slipstreamed version of XP SP2 and update it in Parallels. I ended up spending more time trying to get the BootCamp partition to work well than I would have trying to install another version. Here were some things that just went too far south...

* The mouse did not work within Parallels the first or second time I launched Parallels.

* The first time I ran Parallels, it actually gave me the mac "blue screen of death"...you know the one that says press and hold down the power button to restart. Not good...not good at all...

* Parallels ended up corrupting my BootCamp partition even after I uninstalled the program from the partition. In fact, when I booted into XP after removing everything, chkdsk ran and found three pages of files that were corrupt and attempted to repair them.

* When I deleted the files on the partition in an attempt to reinstall them from a back-up, there were many locked files. This was probably not a direct Parallels issue. However, the files that remain in my Trash were files that chkdsk left behind from the Parallels install and uninstall. I was able to get the files out of the trash, but they remain on the drive until I can get XP to remove them somehow.

Since I have read so much around the internet about how great the product is, I hesitate to say that Parallels is an terrible product. I would, however, say that it is not for me and I will not be purchasing it. There were things that I may have done incorrectly with the XP install...however, since it is working incredibly well in BootCamp, I am going to go with not so much...If you have this product and it works well, I am happy for you. If you don't have the time to create things properly and use Parallels as a true virtual machine, I would urge you to pause and reconsider. Good luck...enjoy...

MacBook Air BootCamp, XP

I had read some very interesting stories around the internet about installing windows on a Mac...some good...others not so good...However, the reports were pretty consistent in that the Macs were the best hardware on which to run Windows. I needed the functionality for work...given some unique working requirements. So, I took the plunge and installed. Now, on day 3, I can honestly say things are stable...I think...

OK, so here are some lessons I learned during the install:
1) Make sure you have enough room on your BootCamp partition because you can not resize it. I started out with 5 GB. After installing Windows XP SP2 (which was an adventure itself, slipstreaming from a previously purchased CD) and adding the 130+ updates, I was left with only about 1 GB. I had not even installed Office applications or other utilities...Resizing was in my future...However, this is not as simple as resizing an Apple partition, even thought it was formated FAT32...This is what I had to do to resize:

* I had to use Disk Utility to make an image of the exisiting XP drive...this was easy since I chose to format it in FAT32.
* I opened Disk Utility, selected the XP drive, and selected "New Image"...
* I saved the file to an external USB drive.
* Using the BootCamp Assistant, I made the drive one again...this deleted the Windows partition.
* I went back into BootCamp and started over, chosing a little bit larger 12 GB size this time...this seemed about right given the MacBook Air's drive is only 74 GB and was getting quite few.
* Since Apple does not make its partition bootable, you still have to use the SuperDrive to format the drive and copy over the install files.
* When the machine reboots after the formating and before the official install starts, make sure you hold down the "Option" key and launch into the OSX partition.
* After logging in, I deleted everything on the new XP partition.
* I then was able to open the image from the USB drive and copy over everything. I could have used Disk Utility to restore, but this seemed OK.
* I rebooted again, held down the "Option" key and selected the XP partition this time. It worked well. I proceeded to install Office 2003, Windows Live Components, Windows LiveOne Care, Bonjour, iTunes, QuickTime, Java, Acrobat, Flash, and Firefox.

2) Do not use Firefox...OK, kidding here, but it surely caused many problems. I use Firefox on OSX and thoroughly enjoy it. In fact, I was hoping to use my bookmarks interchangeably with the add-ins. However, Firefox decided to crash numerous times and shut down the system. Every time the system shut down, and I launched into XP, it went through chkdsk...this was time-consuming and a pain.

3) Change what happens when Windows crashes. Make sure you prevent Windows from restarting after an error. From what I can tell, besides this latest build of Firefox, this is what caused some errors on the install and chkdsk. To change this:
* I right-clicked on "My Computer"
* Chose the "Advance" tab
* Under, "Startup and Recovery," I chose the "Settings" button
* In the "System Failure" area, I deselected "Automatic Restart"
* Clicked "Apply" and "OK"
Things seem to be well...

4) Tapping on the trackpad does not work to select items. You need to use the click button on the mouse. You can still scroll down web pages with two fingers on the trackpad which is cool, but having grown accustomed to selecting answers with a simple tap, this will take some getting used to...

5) Speaking of getting used to...right clicking without an external mouse is interesting as always, but not too bad...you can put two fingers on the pad and tap the button...which is never the same...

6) The battery life is not as good...well, I can be honest, I did not play with any energy-saving settings. However, I was only getting about 2 hours 30 minutes to 2 hours 45 minutes of battery life using XP...a far cry from the 4 hours + I was getting recently with OSX.

7) Parallels using the BootCamp partiion...well, that is for another post...originally, it crashed my machine and corrupted my partition...I will cover that soon...

I will continue to update progress and usage as I encounter it. I am writing this right now in the XP BootCamp partition of my MacBook Air, so all is good and things are playing nicely...

MacBook Air Battery Life

It happened...yes, you guessed it, over 5 hours of battery life on the MacBook Air...Yes, you read that correctly OVER 5 hours...with Bluetooth off, iTunes open and no activity for over an hour...with display set to sleep at 3 minutes, and computer set to sleep after 15 minutes, the battery meter was at 75% after 2 hours...Upon returning to it, browsing the internet, checking email, downloading podcasts, and writing this posting...I hit the over 5 hour mark...

I know, I know, I cheated...it fell asleep a number of times and had very little activity during the first few hours. It has been able to last about 4 hours on standard usage...about 3.5 hours with some video (Joost, mostly)...and about 2.5 hours with "heavy" video (this was a 2 hour iTunes movie and a 30 minute Joost video)...Hey, guess what through, that is better than our older iBook and about the same as our MacBook Pro. The 2.5 hours of "heavy" video with wifi on and going strong with Joost, is also about the same as we get with a portable DVD player...However, we can not check email or edit a Word document on the DVD player while watching the movies.

We have never carried a second battery when traveling...when the battery is running low, we turn it off and recharge it. So, this is acceptable battery life in a smaller package.

I am going to digress a little here...who are these people who feel the need to carry an extra battery? What do they do with their laptops that requires them to need another battery? Do they really use up both batteries? Or, is it that they forget to plug in the device that needs electricity and it becomes an extension of a lazier excuse? There are probably good reasons to have a second battery...however, since my first laptop in the early 90s, I have not bought an extra battery for any laptop. There are some who will say that I am not a power user and would not understand...well, let them say it...I will say they are forgetful and lazy...See, name calling is not becoming, is it...?

The battery life is not a tradeoff with a MacBook Air. It is acceptable and comparable with the other portable computers I have and have used. Enjoy...

MacBook Air Ethernet Adapter

OK, so you have heard stories about the one USB port on the MacBook Air...really, I have been using this great device for close to 2 weeks now and have not found any of the challenges others complained about in the first reviews. As mentioned in a previous post, using a simple $12 USB hub without power, I have been able to connect many other devices...As I type this, I am connected through a non-powered, MI USB, 4 port hub with the ethernet adapter, a jump drive, a Wacom Tablet, and an iPod. All working well. Oh, did I mention that I am transferring a 2 GB file and watching Joost...

Again, the only thing that I have found not to work with the non-powered hub has been the SuperDrive. While the MacBook Air is not for everyone, it is still on outstanding product and an even better pleasure to use daily.

MacBook Air Storylines Experienced and Reviewed

So, you are asking yourself..."Who would buy one of these...they say it is under powered...they say it can't run things...they say that a business traveler would not be able to use it...why would I want one...?"

OK, I bought one. It is very, very nice. It is incredibly thin...it has a beautiful screen, and runs all of the software I need right now...it fits into a standard 8.5 X 11 portfolio without any zipper challenges.

So, I will cover some basics now and delve further into details as I use the MacBook Air. First of all, though, I must add that it is running Leopard. I have found the biggest change impact is just some changes in Leopard.

Screen: The screen, listed at 13.3 inches, is beautiful. It is crisp, clear, and adjusts in brightness better than the MacBook Pro we have. It looks good at every angle except maybe starring down from the exact top of the screen...but then, again, why would you like want to look directly from the top of any monitor.

The touchpad: Wonderful addition to the machine. We have many, many pictures, especially of our two little ones...Scrolling through them is a pleasant and easy experience in iPhoto or with Cover Flow. The preview mode for Windows is nice, especially using the large icons...However, paging through pictures, zooming in and out, and rotating pictures is better when you do not have to use anything but the touchpad.



The Superdrive...it is nice. While I am not sure I would have purchased the MacBook Air without it, I do not see myself using it much at home or on the road. I must admit that I have already used it to create a disk image of a business DVD we needed for work. I burned over 50 copies from that image directly to the Superdrive. No problems with the burning or playback from a Windows machine or standalone dvd player. The only wonder I had was regarding the recording speed of 8X. It seemed a little slow in theory, but I didn't really notice as I multi-tasked while the disks were being created. The great thing about this drive besides its size is that it does not have to come along for the ride. It does not work with the non-powered USB hub, but testing is not complete with a powered one.


Wifi and bluetooth included...same as any other MacBook. While the ethernet dongle is workable. It is obviously not ideal, but the only thing I tested so far was configuring of an airport express through ethernet. It would well, just as it it had the connection built in. It is not known through whether this will work in a usb hub. with other items attached.

Speaking of USB Hub...for those wondering what you can do with one USB port...buy a USB hub...I know, I know...why would want to spend even more money...well, I will get to that in a moment, but for the MacBook Air, I have a Wacom tablet, external harddrive, an iPod, and a usb drive connected to one hub. All work well and without interruption.

In regards to the what to do with the usb hub...the MacBook Air has allowed us to rethink the usage of each device such as the wacom tablet and harddrives. Instead of moving each item, we move the other items to the hub. Now, the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro can share the same hardware and iPhoto, and iTunes libraries just by plugging in the one cord from the hub...I know, I know...many of you already thought of that and have been using hubs like this since USB 1.1...

While the price may be a little higher than expected. It was about what I would have paid for a new machine anyway. It get to "test" new features and feel productive at the same time. So far, Office 2004, Citrix Presentation Server, Pixelmator, Wiretap Pro, and iStop Motion run about the same as on the MacBook Pro (2.16 GHz). This is, of course, without any statistical measurement. However, from a timing and pure user-experience satandpoint, it is the same. The speed (I am using the 1.8 GHz model) and RAM (2 GB) is fine to run these programs. I am sure they will have a memory upgrade that you need to pay Apple to perform, but for now, it works well with these programs.

Lastly, the only piece that seems to be a challenge is the hard drive space. While it was not a feasible expense to get the SDD harddrive, the 80 gig HDD is a little small to store all of those pictures, music to fill a 30 GB iPod, and the usable programs for business and family. Again, I suppose that this will be an optional upgrade from Apple at a later date. Until then, the usb hub and external harddrive will be there for the non-essential, and nice to have files...of course, that is also why we have a home and business network...

More to follow as more applications are used and experiences encountered...

Theme editing AT&T Tilt

One of the features that I have always found lacking in Windows Mobile was theme editing. I know, I know, versions before WM5 had a free download to edit the themes...however, what happened to the recent versions? I would like to change the font color and type without having to download a third-party software...or perhaps change the picture without as much fade...

The theme is one of the few items that I would like to change on the Tilt...without going outside the device itself. You can change al of this with a simple right-click on other window operating systems why not something similar here?

Still a great device, just one small annoyance...

AT&T Tilt Continued...

So, did I mention that the Tilt allow you to add applications without going through the many, many hoops other phones do...

I have been concerned about carrying one device for my phone, one for a ad hoc camera, and one for watching our Slingbox. The Slingbox works great with laptops especially on vacation with children who miss their favorite shows. While having a laptop...MacBook Pro really...is good for vacation, it becomes more difficult to carry on shorter trips, or in places without an internet connection. Enter the Tilt...you can use the Slingbox mobile player. With the 3G connection, the connection and picture is great. Just connect before you leave the house and watch on the road.

One device, multiple uses. TV to go...and calm children...good times for all.

No iPhone...No worries...

So, you wanted an iPhone...well, maybe you did the right thing by not buying one.

Apple did not upgrade the iPhone to include 3G yet. Having used Edge on a previous phone (Motorola SLVR), I can say that is definitely too slow...I know, I know, it might have been the phone...no, not really. iPhone stil slow.

So, this is realy not about the iPhone...really. Take advantage of what the iPhone does not bring with the AT&T Tilt. It is a great device that helps you type blog posts like this, get corporate email without driving most IT teams crazy, and gives you touch capability, wifi, a 3 megapixel camera, and yes, Skype. It even has this great little key board...yes, an actual key board...Oh, right, and it is a great phone.

The AT&T Tilt is a great phone that may run retail about $100 less than the iPhone, but look or call about a refurbished model...unlike the iPhone, whose refurbished model is only 50 bucks cheaper, a refurbished model of the AT&T Tilt was about $150...about half of its original price.

So far, after two weeks, more than worth it. More to come, including pictures and specifics on the phone's features.