jamesclay, Author at Tech Stuff

November 11, 2010

Apple TV

Though I have had my Apple TV a few weeks now, however I have not really used it, nor have I streamed any rented films either.

Now this is not because of any problem with the Apple TV. It’s partly that I haven’t watched that much television over the last few weeks and haven’t had the time to sit down and watch a film either. When I have wanted to watch something I have relied on on my EyeTV or the Mac mini that is currently under my TV. The Mac mini won’t be here forever and when it goes I am sure that the Apple TV will be used more.

November 11, 2010

A life on Facebook

via David Kernohan

November 10, 2010

Navigate to a photo

I was using my iPhone the other day to navigate using the TomTom App when I noticed a new “destination” option, Photo!

I clicked the menu item and I was presented with a series of photographs.

Now initially I thought, well what was the point of that, if it was a photo I had taken I could (as I would be there) add the destination to the TomTom direct. That’s quite useful though as taking a photograph can be quicker than starting up the TomTom App, just have to remember not to delete it from the phone.

But looking through the photographs I realised that some of them were photographs from my photo albums and had not been taken with my iPhone, but obviously also had geo-data attached to the photo. I checked and found that the photographs were in fact taken with a Sony HDR video camera with GPS.

This made a big difference to the usefulness of this option, as somebody else could take a photograph with their GPS enabled camera, cameraphone or iPhone and send me the photo via e-mail. I could then save this and use TomTom to navigate to the GPS co-ordinates attached to the photograph. I tried this out and it worked.

I did try saving a photo from Flickr using FlickStackr, but the TomTom software didn’t pick it up, I suspect the geo-data was not included when I saved the image.

November 8, 2010

National Unfriend Day

November 17th is National Unfriend Day.

Are all the people you are “friends” with on Facebook actually your friend?

Is it really important to know that the person you sat next to in A Level Economics had a coffee at their local Starbucks?

November 17th is National Unfriend Day, time to ensure that only your friends are your friends on Facebook.

November 3, 2010

Replaced my Airport Express

After another session of “not working” I have replaced my aging Airport Express. Though I would like to have replaced it with a new model, I used one that I had got for AirTunes but in the end found wasn’t needed. So it was still sealed, as I hadn’t got around to opening it, or selling it on eBay.

Configuring it was pretty simple using Apple’s Airport Utility, though did forget to put it into Bridge Mode so at first it didn’t work.

Bridge Mode was necessary as my Airport Extreme is the router on my network, which broadcasts at 5GHz 802.11n. I use the Airport Express in 802.11b/g mode for legacy and mobile devices. As the Airport Extreme acts as the DHCP router, adding a second router on the network would mean that devices could connect to the wifi, but wouldn’t be able to access the internet or “connect” with other devices on my network.

The reason for two wireless networks is that the 802.11n network can work at the full 300Mbps speed, whilst legacy and mobile devices will work just fine on a slower network. If I had a single wireless network it would be “slow” for all devices. This usually isn’t too much of a problem, however I do stream video across my network, and when I use to do this in the past (with standard definition video) on an 802.11g network, I found that due to network congestion I would get buffering which was annoying. With 802.11n I can stream high definition video easily across the network to my Apple TV or my iPad. It also works well in moving large files across the network.

802.11n also makes much more sense when using FTTC (fibre) for internet with its higher speeds.

The main problem I was having with the old Airport Express was that it just stopped working and “vanishing” from the network. As a result it would need to be power cycled to get it working again.

So far so good.

November 2, 2010

What NOT To Post On Facebook: Things You Shouldn’t Tell Your Facebook Friends

Huffington Post has posted a series of Facebook safety tips.

Who’s watching your moves on Facebook? Employers, stalkers, federal agents, and even insurance companies have been known to scan Facebook profiles for information. Just as troubling are reports of Facebook account hackers, who put users at risk for identity fraud. Even if you safeguard personal information with a “Friends Only” setting, there is a chance you’ve friended someone whom you barely know or have never met.

MacBook Air, yes please…

Finally managed to get my hands on a real life 11.6″ MacBook Air at my local Apple Store (trying to remember what I did before there were lots of these in the UK). So there I was in the shop and I touched, used and felt the weight of the 11.6″ MacBook Air, I have to admit I pretty much well ignored the 13″ model as I have see the previous version, and to be honest if I was going with a 13″ MacBook, I would go for the MacBook Pro.

So back to the smaller MacBook Air brethren. The first thing that struck me, was how gorgeous the screen was, the high resolution makes for a really sharp display. As I started Safari (very snappy) and entered an URL, I noticed how nice the keyboard was too. One of the problems I have with small laptops (and I have used a fair few in my time) is that the keyboards can be too small for anything expect peck and touch typing. The MacBook Air keyboard felt full size and I could quite easily see myself typing up long blog posts and other things using it. I was impressed with the speed of the Air, for something that isn’t really a true powerhouse when it comes to processing power and memory.

Having lifted it up, it was lighter than I thought it was going to be. It felt much smaller and lighter than the iPad even though it is 50% heavier.

I do quite like it, would like to get one, but probably won’t as at £849 it’s a little expensive for what for me would be more of a toy than a serious workhorse.

October 22, 2010

Unpacking the Apple TV

You have to just love the way that Apple package their “toys”. Unpacking the Apple TV was a really wonderful experience… can’t believe I just said that.

Slide the box open, tip out the Apple TV. Remove the clear plastic and then a strip of black plastic film that protects it and the ports. Underneath was the remote, in at an angle so the box can be smaller and under that tightly tied was the power cord.

I connected the Apple TV to my TV and then using the remote connected it to the wireless network. After turning on Home Sharing it found my iMac on the network and I could easily play content from it. Now with my faster broadband I will have no worries about renting movies on the Apple TV, though not sure how often I will do that at £4.49 a pop… Disappointed that we in the UK don’t have TV episodes, hopefully at a later time. No BBC iPlayer either!

October 20, 2010

111.6″ MacBook Air

Well the rumours proved correct with the Apple event on the 20th October with the release of iLife ’11, details of OS X 10.7 Lion and new MacBook Air models.

We got a new 13.3″ MacBook Air and a nice little 11.6″ model.

For me the 11.6″ model is a true portable Mac, almost a netbook. I really like the idea of that.

Slightly pricy though at £849 for the low end model.

October 19, 2010