If that’s not a scam, then it’s at least pretty shady to me. I wont be doing business with them ever again because of this. — needed them so rarely that I would have saved way more money if I just called a tow truck company if I needed to. What people will pay for peace of mind .. silly

Things to note.  Nowhere does it say the word “promotion”.   But it does have my “member number”,  a “remit” payment date and an “amount due”.  Anyway.. I don’t like business practices like this.. /rant

VID_20110516_203055.m4v Watch on Posterous

I saw 2 beavers out here a second ago, I swear

The Linksys was around $90 dollars per camera and supposedly had all the motion detection and email triggers built in, but in practice they simply didn’t work.  I consider it more of a toy if you need to see whos at the front door or take a peek at your pet while your at work.  I tried to set it up pointing outside and there are just too many ISO white balancing fluctiontions in the image that it creates a lot of false positives.  (reviewers of the camera have pointed out this is a flaw in the firmware of the camera which makes it unsuitable for motion detection apps).   This model works over 802.11G and the new one’s operate on the N protacol.  It was pretty easy to set up, even setting it up to be viewable via your smartphone remotely, should you know how configure your router.  The image is terrible in low light as it provides no IR capabilities.

My roomate requested we upgrade the system to a camera capable of viewing images at night and after a lot of research, I ended up choosing the Logitech Alert 750e.  The price tag jumps up to over 4 times the cost of the Linksys at $350, but the feature set is about 4x that of the Linksys as well.   To start with, as seen in the picture, it has excellent optics capable of night vision at a few hundred feet in nearly complete darkness.  I find the motion detection to be extremely reliable with nearly no false positives.  The software is what really ties this package together and puts a complete DVR of history motion events at your finger tips.  It’s a breeze for my ~60 old roomate to use and I’m confident that she’ll not have any problems that require my technical support after I move out.  She could have even set it up because there are really no technical steps of configuring a router required.  Since it communicates over powerline (plugs into your wall power; no cat-5 cables or wifi signals) all you do is plug the camera into the wall and run the software on the computer to get it going.  I am a little let down by few things:

1. The software can only run on one computer, which makes it nearly impossible to view motion events from another computer.  Also, because the software uses ActiveX (or some advanced graphics) it’s not possible to remote into the computer via software like Remote Desktop or VNC.  Some people have had luck purchasing a subscription to Go To My PC of which supports the graphics used in the Logitech software.  Another method is to run motion detection software on a different computer and have it’s source pointed at the camera.  But that means your system needs to be on all the time and it’s going to take some serious cpu cycles to process the motion detection instead of using the onboard motion detection in the camera’s hardware.
2. They require you to pay a $50/yr subscription in order to view your motion detection results remotely.  Logitech says the cost is because they are using their servers to proxy your computers connection through them.  This is a technique called ‘NAT punching’ that foregoes any router configuration and what makes setup so easy.  However, I wish that they would at least give me the option to configure the router so I could connect remotely.  This just seems like a money grab by Logitech and dishonest because this price or mention of a subscription is not listed anywhere on the products box.  One caveat though, you can view live motion remotely without the subscription.  The software is fairly nice, but very buggy for the Andriod when I tried it.  (It only connects the first time, and coming back to the application gives and error and you have to do a ‘force close’)
3. The Logitech cameras are prohibitively expensive.  If you want to upgrade your system you have to buy another camera at nearly full price.  That means a 3 camera system is over ~$1000.  I’d say that if you plan on even adding one additional camera that you instead invest in an all in one DVR from newegg (they seemed to have the best price for this logitech and other DVRs.

The idea is that I periodically create new Gmail email accounts that forward to my main Gmail account.  When any one email address is ‘compromised’ and ends up with a lot of spam, I can either delete the email account or use filters in my main gmail account so I don’t see them.

I recently gave out an email address to the Men’s Warehouse when buying a suit and since then I’ve noticed a lot more spam messages in my in box.  Time to block that email.

Here’s how I do it:

(assuming you already have a Gmail account, I’ll refer to it as your ‘master’ account)

1. Create bogus email address at Gmail.com that you can easily remember.  This is what you’ll give out to retailers, promotions, websites.. whatever.  I’ll use Faithful.Fountains@gmail.com It’s helpful to use a random word generator to come up with a combination of words.

2. In the upper right corner, click ‘settings‘ In your newly created Gmail account. Click on the Forwarding and POP/IMAP. Use the options to ‘forward’ your email and when prompted, enter your ‘master’ gmail account email address.

3. Log into your ‘master’ gmail account and you should see a confirmation email.  Click on the link,.. now you have forwarding set up.

At this point, you’ll never have to log into your newly created gmail account again.  Everything that gets sent to that email address will be forwarded to your ‘master’ gmail email account.

Now you have control over what makes it into your email inbox.  If you find that one of the email addresses is putting a lot of spam into your ‘master’ gmail inbox, you can click the more button in gmail and choose ‘filter emails like this’ and choose to ‘archive immediately’ if the to: address is your disposable email address you gave out.  You’ll still receive emails from the disposable email address, they just won’t be shown as new mail in your inbox.

Added bonus: Send emails with a FROM: address of your disposible email from within your ‘master’ gmail account.   This is handy when you’re initiating the conversations, for example, responding to a craigslist posting. (of which are notorious for spamming)

1. Log into your ‘master’ gmail account and navigate to settings.  On the Account and Import tab, click Send mail from another address.

2. Continue through the wizard by entering your disposable email address.  I’m entering Faithful.Fountains@gmail.com address.  Then click the Send Verification button.

3. Log into the disposible email account you created.  You’ll find a confirmation email with a verification link that you’ll need to click.

Now when you log back into your ‘master’ gmail account and compose an email you’ll see a drop-down box in the ‘from’ address with your newly linked gmail account.  Mine says Faithful.Fountains@gmail.com

After a year of being in the box, I finally installed a media card reader in my roomate’s PC.  It would have stayed in the box indefinitely if it weren’t for her buying a new digital camera that needed the SD card reader this drive bay provides.

I was initially daunted by the sheer number of wires coming out the back that all needed their special connections on the motherboard, of which I lost the manual to.

I picked this unit up off ebay for $12 and what seemed like a month long wait on the shipping from China.  There’s a plethora of similar internal front panel usb readers available found with the search terms: “front usb panel 5.25″

Installation was surprisingly easy once I figured out that most of the cables were for the firewire and the 5.1 dolby audio cables, both of which weren’t needed with her setup.  Oh, and the fact I had to track down the pdf version of my mother board manual online.

Wiring mainly consisted of plugging in:

• molex power supply connector
• 6 pin keyed usb connector (for usb and memory card reader)
• and screws to secure the sides

I didn’t make use of and ended up bundling in a knot, the:

• 6 color coded firewire cables
• 6 wires for the 5.1 audio
• sata cable

For the above ports on the front panel that weren’t made use of, I used some black tape cut to squares and adhered over the port and the white text.  I was actually pretty happy with the asthetcs of the black tape; the poor man’s adhesive didn’t make it look ugly or cheap.

The end result is that she’s now able to navigate to ‘my computer’ and she’s got 4 or 5 removable drives available.  Because the drive letters are essential mounted and won’t change, I decided to rename the drives to names like “SD, CF, etc”.   I tested her CF, SD and USB thumb drive and all worked well.  (I didn’t go as far as testing transfer rates).

$12 and 30 mins well spent.

For the same price as the t-mobile data only plan I can get a 3g connection (my iPhone is limited to the slower EDGE network, so this is an upgrade) and then share the internet as a wifi hotspot to my iphone.  Of course, the credit card sized mifi hardware is $130 bucks up front, but then it’s only $40 bucks a month for unlimited data.

Then there’s the added bonus of sharing the internet connection for up to 5 devices.  Say hello to my little friend, the netbook.  Up until now, I’ve been using PDAnet to teather but it was kind of a pain to setup each time and the ssl limitation was a let down.  Being able to open the netbook on the fly and have it instantly connect to the mifi is a huge plus.

That leaves me with 3 other connections for sharing the Inernet with friends.. or a great way to make new friends.

The downside?  I no longer have an actual phone on my phone.  Like I mentioned, I rarely use my cell phone, so when I do need to make a call, I need to use a voip app like Skype (2.99 a month).  Also, no sms texts.  Not a big problem as there are a lot of sms apps for the iphone, not to mention Google Voice can send them for free.

This mifi device is really impressive and the first of it’s kind to offer prepay unlimited internet for a modest $40.. I think it’s worth it.  While on paper, my idea sounds like it will work, but there may be some shortcomings.  It’s in the mail on it’s way to me now, so after I get to use it for a bit I’ll update this post.

I like my computer on and ready to react as soon as I want to use it, and for this reason I never manually shut it off.  But does it really make sense to keep it on 24/7, even when I’m at work or asleep?  Probably not.

To get the best of both worlds, I use Windows Scheduled Tasks to automate hibernating and waking the computer.  I know I leave the house for work at X time, and won’t return until X time at night, so I might as well save a few dollars in electricity and have the computer shut itself off and turn back on when I get home.

Assuming you know how to add a scheduled task, add one to ‘run a program’ with the command below. You’ll also have to choose the option ‘run with highest privileges’ and then select the weekdays and times you want the computer to shut itself off.


shutdown /h The /h designates ‘hibernate’.

Then to wake the computer, add another scheduled task to start a program. It really doesn’t matter which program you choose, because it’s the ‘conditions’ tab of the scheduled task we’re interested in. On the ‘conditions’ tab, select ‘wake the computer to run this task’.

That’s all it takes. The computer will shut itself off and then turn itself back on at the times specified in each scheduled task. If you scheduled it to shut off 10 mins after you leave and turn back on 10 mins before you get home, you’ll never notice a thing. Well, maybe you’ll notice the savings on your electricity bill.

IMG_3585

Originally uploaded by Nick Skitch

With the new cellphone laws in our state, I had to come up with a solution for mounting my cellphone in my car and was underwhelmed by the products on the market, so I decided to use a low-tech solution.

In 2008 Washington made it illegal to text while driving. While I don’t text while I’m driving, I do occasionally pick up the cell phone to change the song on Pandora. From a cops point of view, he would see me pick up my cell phone and hit some buttons to change the song playing in my car and mistake that for me testing on my cell phone. Sirens, flashing lights, a ticket and a court date. No thanks!
To minimize this risk, I decided I needed to mount my phone somewhere close to the dash board so I could quickly interact with it and get my hands back on the wheel.

Unfortunately, most of the solutions out there are crap. Like this example of what’s available, I think it’s just too bulky, cheaply made, and expensive for what you get. Furthermore, it just advertises to thieves that you have the goods they are looking for. Most of the options either hook into your heat vent and block airflow or they use a suction cup to stick to the windshield, which doesn’t work too well in a Honda Element with it’s hard to reach windshield.

My solution was to use the awesome products put out by 3M with their line of Command adhesive strips. The Element has a great place to mount right by the gear shift, so I literally just keep my right hand on the shifter and can just move my finger to control the music.

I’ve been using this as a solution trouble free for over a year now, so I thought it was time to share. It’s velcro, but not like the traditional stuff that wears out overtime and can poke through your pants pocket and becomes uncomfortable. On the downside, it’s not all that pretty and it can collect a little bit of lint from your pocket over the course of months. If I had to do it again, I’d either get the hard to find black strips or use Krylon paint for plastics.

In the picture, you can see I used another 3M Command product to secure the cord for power/AUX at the bottom. This also works great because you can easily find the cord in the dark so getting in and out of the car and setting up the device takes only seconds. I did use the Krylon paint mentioned above to paint these from their hidious tan color to the black you see in the picture.

This $6 dollar setup works better than any expensive and bulky universal mount I found out on the market, and if it keeps the cops from noticing me, I’m happy.

T-mobile and why I have two phones

I hate seeing that 67.05 monthly recurring charges on my bank statement each month considering how little use I actual get out of my cell phone.   I have, no HAD, a t-mobile  “even more plus plan” $29 voice, $20 data $10 sms  but I found myself hardly ever using the $29 voice portion.  I figured it would be a lot more cost effective for me to get the $20 data and use the prepay service that t-mobile also offers.

I’ve actually been contemplating making this change for some time, but I’ve put it off because each time I call into t-mobile customer support my blood pressure rises due to some mess up on their end.  Would this time be different?,.. I crossed my fingers and called in.

I told the 1^st customer support rep about my usage and that I hardly ever used the voice portion and asked if I could change that portion to pre-pay.  He tinkered around in the computer and said that it would be possible and quoted to me my new plan fees and here are the notes I took from the discussion:

even more plus plan – voice barred for smart phones (which means I pay for voice by the min)  $39 data  / .45 cents a min voice — (unlimited text messages, included in data plan portion he said)

I was concerned when he told me the title of the plan: “voice barred for smart phones” , but when I asked him about this he told me no,  that’s just the name of the plan and I’d still get to use prepay for both incoming and outgoing calls billed at .45 cents a min.

Wow!  Just like that he made the switch for me and no issues at all?!  This is a first, THANK YOU T-MOBILE! No rising blood pressure from this call!  — The next day I found I had absolutely nothing to be thankful about….  someone told me they tried to call me, but my phone said it wouldn’t take incoming calls, and sure enough, when I tried to make outgoing calls I got the same message.

So I called back into T-mobile on someone else’s phone since t-mobile shut mine off.  The 2^nd support rep, Cedrick, gives me a phone number and says he can’t help or transfer the phone to their prepay division.   I had to point out the irony out to the rep… “You mean to tell me that the PHONE company can’t’ transfer a call within their own company?”..      … Now I’ve been involved with this prepay vs paid back and forth mess in the past, so I asked the rep again “Are you sure they can help me” .. “yes, just call this number and they will answer all your questions”.    Now I have to admit, I was a little sarcastic on the phone with my comment above, and there was something about the overly happy tone in his voice that made me uneasy.   I had no other option, so I made the call. (more on this at the end)

The phone rang 15x before I decided to redial.  This time it was an automated operator walking me through setting up my prepaid phone.  It didn’t’ work and no amount of hammering on the zero key got me to customer support; it was completely automated.   What other option do I have… time to call back and speak to customer support rep number 3.

The 3^rd customer support rep said that it’s not possible to have internet on a phone with prepay, and he can’t help me, so he’ll have to transfer me to the prepay division.  Somehow he’s able to do this but the 2^nd rep couldn’t?? He also confesses that the 1^st rep was misinformed and did not set up the account correctly.   T-mobile, you really need to train your reps and/or at least get the story straight.

By the time I spoke with the 4^th rep in the prepay division I had completely wasted my morning  and no amount of explaining to this rep was going to change anything and she actually hung up on me.

For the time being, T-mobile doesn’t cater to a customer with my needs.  So listen up t-mobile, you’re losing customers!  I’m a heavy data user and extremely light phone user and so are a lot of other’s out there based on some internet searches.   I need a phone that has unlimited data and a prepay voice portion for times when I need it. (e.g. emergencies)

Util they offer such a plan, I’ve reverted back to using my old ‘virgin mobile prepay’ phone for voice alongside my 2g iPhone for data. But my pockets are bulging so I’m considering cancelling the phone all together in lieu of some other options I’ll talk about in the following blog post.

T-mobile, if I missed something and there is an option, just give me a call, you have my phone number.   Oh wait you can’t, you disconnected it on me.

** some observations:

*The even more plus plan with data charges an extra $10 for text messages, yet this is somehow included in the data potion of the voice barred data plan.  So why can’t they include it in the even more plus plan’s data option? A: No technical reason, simply because they can. – cha-ching.

UPDATE:

I posted this problem in the t-mobile forums and someone pointed out that the first customer support rep had it slightly wrong when he set me up on the ‘voice barred’ plan.  There’s one that’s similiar,.. well I”ll let “cheekymonkee20” explain.  lol.

There actually is a plan that would work for you. The one the “1st rep” was talking about is a voice barred plan meaning you can’t use it to talk, period. There’s another plan that’s almost the same thing but allows you to use minutes as you go. It is $39.99/month however text messaging is not included. It’s an additional $10/month. Minutes are $0.45/minute. So he did give you partially correct information. Partially.

It’s not a true prepaid plan, so if you do call in to talk to someone, don’t mention prepaid. Let the rep know you want a data plan where minutes are optional and you are charged per minute if you choose to use it.

…

It’s something like “Even More Plus Smartphone with Unlimited Web”. It’s considered a data plan rather than a voice plan.

If you are still under contract, because this is an Even More Plus plan, you may be subject to fees for switching.

It’s a little late for me, I just don’t have the energy to go through that customer support experience again;  I’m done with t-mobile.  But maybe this can help someone else that’s heavy on the data, light on the voice.  When I called to disconnect the phone, the representative said I could have asked for a “Post pay data plan” with “pay as you go minutes”….   just don’t let them transfer you to their ‘prepay’ division.

UPDATE UPDATE: I decided to go a different route.

pdanet

Originally uploaded by Nick Skitch

Writing blog posts unthethered from wires is a cool thing. I’m writing this from my netbook at the dog park with full internet access(!), and not hunt-peck keyboard style on my iphone. That’s because this weekend I finally got around to setting up my phone to ‘tether’ it’s internet access to be used on my netbook.

A really cool program named PDAnet made this all possible, but you’re not going to find this iTunes app store. It’s downloadable on the iphone through the cydia application that gets installed when jailbreaking the phone with redsn0w.

Once it’s installed you start the app and create a hotspot, complete with an optional WEP key. At that point any device enabled with wifi can connect to your iPhone and slurp up some internet. It’s not blazing fast, (about 1/8th the speed of my dsl and 450ms latency according to a speed test) but it’s fine for light web surfing. I’m still rocking the first generation (2g) iphone that has the EDGE network, so that may be slowing me down a litle bit too.

OK, now I’m having second thoughts about this whole netbook at the dog park idea. My lcd screen just got slimed by dog drool… If I can figure out how to shield myself from these dogs I’m willing to stay a whole lot longer at the dog park, so I think my dog appreciates this even more than I do. Otherwise, PDAnet is a pretty cool way to get your money out of that ~$80 a month cell phone bill.

Here’s a tutorial on how to get it working on your iPhone.

UPDATE: Apparently even though the application says it’s free, it disables your ability to connect to SSL (https://) websites  after something like ~14 days after first use until you pay them $29 bucks for the app.  Kind of annoying if you can’t access sites like Gmail.  I haven’t seen this confirmed anywhere, but I’m having the same problem as this post.   I guess you could disable ssl logins in Gmail, but that doesn’t work for all sites.  Kind of annoying!   I’ll be on the lookout for another free option.