Category Archives: Gnrl Bckt

Watch Out

Posted on by
1

Nerd cred is nerd cred, right? Not necessarily. Take, for instance, gaining nerd cred via unboxing a Woot BOC…pretty nerdy. That is contrasted by more nerdy nerd cred, like trading messages with the IOIO designer on his Google Groups page. Huge nerd cred.

Another level of nerd cred comes via gadgets. Gadgetry is the best…on of my favorite things in the world. There are overt ways to geek out…like a screaming fast notebook running an obscure, maybe stable version of Linux. Bonus points for sure. Blogging is sort of credulous, but blogging the crap out of stuff and posting apps…gigantic nerd cred.

Then comes watches. Nerd cred on the down-low. I’ll go on record saying that Invicta Men Watches are a source of geek cred. Take a look:

invicta watch

big watch.

You can nerd out by the design, or nerd out by the specs. I choose both, as that watch is crazy functional and crazy cool looking. Not slide rule and pocket protector cool, but pretty solid.

The best deal, is the prices you can find on Invicta watches on BlueDial:

big old watch

oh, cool

That doesn’t even make sense. How they can chop the price that much is crazy. Blogging about watches crazy. Hit the link and check one out. It is a pretty sweet site, and you really won’t beat that price anywhere.

Black Monday 2011

Posted on by
1

I finally gathered my nerves and opened my TDAmeritrade account after the market closed. Pretty ugly.

stock crash

boooooooooo

If the dollar wasn’t jacked, I would be in buy mode. As it stands, I’m staying put. Sure glad I am not a soon-to-be retiree; things could be bleaker.

Here’s to a rebound…

Choosing a Web Designer

Posted on by
1

My skill set is so sufficiently awesome in the design realm, that I can turn this…

chicken crop

crop == gizzard


…into this…
chicken wattle

wattle you have? (A: a whole bunch of MSG)


…using nothing but MS Paint. I can also put down an entire box of MSG in a Biskit Chicken in a Biskit. But that is for another day.

If you, unlike me, are shopping for a web designer, take the following into consideration.

Whether you are building a new website or having an older one redesigned, it is likely that you will need the assistance of a web designer. If you spend some time browsing the internet, you will soon discover that there is a significant difference in those websites which have been professionally designed and those that haven’t.
Nowadays, if you want your business to get noticed then hiring a reputable web designer is a necessity. So how do you go about choosing one?
Firstly you should do your research on potential web designers or web design companies. You will find that Southampton web design agencies may work in a completely different way to a web designer in Dorset. Therefore, it pays to look around and not necessarily just in London.
You need to enquire into their previous work and ensure it is similar to the standard you are after for your own site. It is important to remember that your website should not just be a copy of previous work, so look at more than one example to ensure that the designer is capable of catering to individual client needs. You also need to research into whether this work was delivered in a timely manner. It is all well and good receiving an incredible design for a new website, however if it is going to take 3 years, you may need to reconsider. The majority or web designers will have a portfolio and this is a great way to judge their work and their professionalism.
Client testimonials are another way in which you can compare designers. Be wary about these testimonials as it is possible to make these up, so it is important to follow them up and actually speak to previous clients to gain further information. For example if you are contemplating a web design Bournemouth agency, you may wish to speak to a range of their clients to gauge an understanding of how they work.

Application Hosting Option

Posted on by
2

It is a prudent exercise to step back and look at the state of technology with an objective eye from time to time. It is easy to get wrapped up in the frenzied pace with which tech progresses, and lose site of the end-goal, end-user, etc.

After all, this would have been the bee’s knees not-too-long ago…

old school terminal

kicking it old school

Fresh off of a few recent battles with my web host, I am looking into current options for application hosting. I would love to have my own server up and rolling, but do not want to be married to Bresnan/Optimum for up-time. My best bet, still, is cloud hosting…like it or hate it, that is the case.

My needs are simple. A few sites and a relatively small amount of data; I need a basic web host. I can manage my stuff easily, but the same would not be true (at all) for a business, for example. Imagine trying to do VoIP, host email servers, maintain remote databases, and whatever else. All, while remaining secure…not an easy task.

The light at the end of the tunnel is that there are some very good options in the application hosting realm. I found some good info in the above links…Spirinet seems to be one of the best. Take a look.

Satellite Internet Basics

Posted on by

Q) What would make a guy throw caution to the wind, and void a (quite significant) warranty on a piece of technology?
A) An internet addiction.

I rooted my Droid 2 a while back, largely due that answer above. That power-thirsty screen, with all of its hi-def beauty, is awesome for web browsing. My project requirements often find myself hammering out code on either my netbook or notebook, in dire need of an internet connection. Poor wi-fi signals just don’t cut it…I rooted my phone for access to that lovely Verizon 3G. Don’t tell Verizon. Do tell Verizon that my battery life is easily doubled, now that their bloat-wear has been removed. Nuked from orbit. But, I digress.

There are many, many places that have either awful cell reception or no reception at all. What is a guy to do? Connect from orbit…

satellite internet

satellite internet alien is unidentified

Say you have just moved to a new house. Say you are in a trough of garbage cell coverage…out in the country, maybe. You will find yourself with two likely options: low speed dial-up internet, or high speed satellite internet. I bet you know which one I would chose. Hit that link to see what I am talking about. It is the only viable option for a decent connection at times.

If you want some numbers, with these connections you can see download speeds up to 1.5Mbp…which is roughly 30 times faster than dial-up. See…no joke here. The weird thing is that these packages are pretty much the same price as my connection with Bresnan. Sort of puzzling how they can offer deals like this.

Hit that link to see what I am getting at. I’m off to feed my internet addiction.

Makeshift Linux Heads-Up Display

Posted on by

Per my last post, I began upgrading my Dell Mini 9 last night…from Ubuntu 10.10 to 11.04. Well, at some point, it tossed a fit about not being able to snag a package, and hung on a dialogue box all night. No worries…I’ll finish this install on the way to work.

ubuntu linux netbook on my silverado dashboard

check the speedometer...

Who said netbooks are passe? Looks like that guy was designed to ride on the dash of a Silverado if you ask me.

For the record, I was not doing 110 MPH by the MSU campus. I have an issue with my speedometer. I was doing 90 MPH, tops.

My install was a success for the record. I will see if all functions are fully functional soon, and put together a post.

Trustworthy Online Brokerage Account & Services

Posted on by

So. I may be one of the only people in the world left who listen to talk radio. More embarrassing than that, I would, without a doubt, be considered a dedicated listener. There is nothing worse than the audio quality of AM radio, except for AM radio in a truck with all sorts of metal accelerating around…big pistons, questionable wiring, and a poor antenna make for very, very poor radio reception. Interference, for the loss.

I used to be all over antenna theory back in my undergrad days…KD7NZI. Yep. Licensed HAM radio dude. I promise to touch on that one of these days. Or threaten. Now, I am pretty much on the AM radio, and on my talk shows. The heart of the matter for today lies in ways to handle finances. My beloved, awful AM radio is nearly wall-to-wall advertisements for gold purchasing firms. Places of ill repute, when compared to legitimate stock account joints. It may be tough to consider, but it is very important to do so. Money of all nature has (inherently) value, and that is not to be taken lightly. Pause for picture.

online money consolitadaion

-1 no table

I do 100% of my money work online. In fact, my Wells Fargo accounts have embarrassingly small rates of return…interest takes second base to online access for me, for what it is worth. That is where it is…from my IRA, to my stocks, to my savings and DDA accounts, it is all accessed/managed online.

The question remains, what do you do to juggle all of these balances? Is there some sort of service that you can find to consolidate stuff of this nature? Yes, there is. Hint: that link back there <—

Take a look. Do what you will. Drop me a line with any suggestions you may have….and good luck.

Inexpensive Ink Cartridges

Posted on by

Back in my college days, I did a lot of printing. As a math major, I probably printed a fraction of the amount of pages that most students had to rifle off. Most of our work was done either by hand on paper, or done utilizing math software of some nature (Matlab, Maple, etc.) and submitted directly into a professor’s shared folder. Call it old school or just plain old, but that is the nature of the beast. Even with that on my side, I wound up printing all of the time…between my core course work and math reports (no kidding) I was constantly hitting Ctrl – P.

My sample size is sufficiently large to draw a parallel between ‘important printing task’ and ‘empty ink cartridge.’ Every…single…time.

I don’t know how many times I found myself trying to get to Staples before closing time, in order to buy a replacement cartridge. Too many. To add insult to injury, brick and mortar retail prices are the stuff of nightmares. Those markups still blow my mind. Pretty much outrageous. Like my octopus drawing:

octopus ink

boo


Not to date myself, but online shopping was limited in my day. Amazon was around, but primarily for books. Specialty places were popping up…and then subsequently bursting when everything hit the colloquial fan. Comparative online shopping stuck, however. One of the things I am jealous of now are the deal pricing that you can find on ink cartridges. Very jealous…that would have put me in Cup of Noodle instead of Ramen. But, I digress.

I have seen some creative stuff out there. You can buy bulk ink…shooting for the DIY fill-it-at-home crowd. Some models have cartridge reset units springing up…allowing the user to gain a few more prints per refill. The two main drawbacks of that are time (time is money) and quality. A lot of the replacements are prone to smudging…may as well pay for the real deal and do it right.

At the end of it all, I have had good luck finding ink cartridges for my HP and Kodak printer online. Hit that link to see my go-to site.

Electronics Recycling Info

Posted on by

Let me vent, briefly. My first cell phone was a mobile phone. Mobile, as in car phone. Car phone, as in ‘you can make calls from this faux leather bag that sits on the passenger seat with this gigantic handset’ apparatus. No kidding. The bonus to that phone, and to the candy bar Nokia phones that I had after that gem, was in the unit’s reliability. Believe me, I did my fair share of stress testing those first cellies…I was using those things, and using them hard.

At some point along the way, mobile phones became disposable. Whereas you could probably still dig a Motorola StarTac out of your junk bin and power it on, an LG from three years ago would be absolutely worthless. Likely, it would be problematic within the first few months.

To combat this, companies like Verizon jumped all over a marketing plan for ‘new in two’ and similar schemes…wherein you look forward to getting a shiny new phone…often after your buggy unit started acting up out of the gate. Distraction? Yes.

Term of the day: planned obsolescence.

Stuff fails, which is fine, but the whole idea of moving products often shows itself on the back side of things. What to do with old electronics?

old electronical components

man lab is full of scraps


My workspace is full of old components. I am big into the ‘REUSE” side of the triple Rs. I can (and do) pull all sorts of awesome junk off of a scrapped piece of tech. But when that is done, one must figure out the whole electronics recycling aspect of the deal. There is a reason not to throw out an old tower or television…several chemical reasons, in fact.

The big reason we see computer recycling companies is not for them to turn a profit selling used wares. There are lead, cadmium, beryllium, mercury, and bromine en mass in old components…good example being those wonky old CRT televisions and computer monitors that are quickly being replaced. Can’t exactly introduce that into a standard landfill. Those companies are keeping the lights on by grabbing usable components, true, but are doing better by selling the copper, steel, and plastic that they can reap from recycled goods. Win/win.

Hit one of those links to see an example of how this is done (and done well.) If you don’t take me up on that advice, don’t toss your old electronics in the trash out of principle. All of that solder is mostly lead, and circuit boards are swimming in solder.