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How to Get U.S.-only iPhone Apps with Hotspot Shield

hotspot shield logo With a few easy steps that take only minutes to complete, iPhone users the world round can get access to some (but not all) of the iPhone Apps that are only available in the U.S.. I’m surprised it took me so long to try this.  I just used it to d0wnload the Lose It! which was previously not available to me in Canada.

[Note: Rogers is somehow still blocking Pandora and Skype even when I removed the SIM  card. Grrr! Here’s a Skype iPhone App workaround for Canadians – I haven’t tried it yet.]

configuring a vpn on the iphone with hotspot shield Setup is a breeze. It took me about two minutes. You essentially set up a VPN connection to the U.S. through the HotSpot Shield servers. This, of course, would also be useful for safe surfing at coffee shops and other wifi locations.

Once you have set up your account, configured and activated the VPN (see instructions below), navigate to the App Store on your iPhone. Search for the app you want and (if its there) download it. It’s that simple.

Survives Desktop Sync

I was concerned that if I downloaded apps this way, they would be wiped out after I synced my iPhone with iTunes to my desktop. Not so. The sync went fine and the apps remained on the iPhone.

No Need to Keep VPN Turned On

You only need to activate the VPN to download the app. Once downloaded, you can use the app with the VPN shut off.

Continue reading “How to Get U.S.-only iPhone Apps with Hotspot Shield”

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Wimbledon 2009 Live Streaming – Bootleg Version

wimbledon live logo Last year (see my 2008 post), both live and downloadable versions of most Wimbledon matches were available to all over the Internet through the Wimbledon Live service for a flat fee of $24.99.

Unfortunately, Wimbledon’s 2009 licensing regime makes it so that honest viewers from many countries, including Canada and the U.S. (see complete list below) can no longer access the service for any fee.

Amercian’s can watch online through NBCSports or ESPN360.com. Unfortunately NBCSports must be using the same proxy-shield blocking technology as hulu because Hotspot Shield users can’t access the site outside of the U.S.

Below, I include links to several bootleg services offering 2009 Wimbledon matches live streamed. Some are fantastic. Some less so. When I clicked around I could usually find the match I wanted to watch in English.

Of course, these only work when Wimbledon matches are underway. To schedule your viewing, the play schedule is here.

Channelsurfing.net

channelsurfing.net bootleg wimbledon live streamingAs far as I know there is no legal way for me to watch streamed Wimbledon matches in Canada. Fortunately there is at least one bootleg service available where Canadians, and anyone else, can view live matches – Channelsurfing.net.

Once on Channelsurfing.net scroll down to the Wimbledon logos and click on one of the several available streams – available in different languages. As I’m watching now (June 24, 2009 at 3:00 pm Eastern) there are 7 available live streams. I am watching the ESPN stream on both my iMac and PC and both are working fine.  [Update: The ESPN stream cut out midway through a Roddick match and hasn’t returned as 11:30.am Eastern June 25]

Continue reading “Wimbledon 2009 Live Streaming – Bootleg Version”

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Windows 7 Can Natively Burn ISO files

windows 7 logo

Windows has not provided .iso file burning functionality before. Rather than use a specialized tool, I have, until now, used my iMac to burn iso files. This morning I discovered that with a couple clicks of the mouse, Windows 7 users can now burn .iso files. 

Here’s how:

  • In Windows Explorer double click the .iso file you wish to burn
  • Windows 7 opens the following dialogue

windows 7 iso file burner dialogue box

  • Choose the DVD burner you wish to use (in my case Drive F:)
  • Select whether or not you wish to verify the disk after burning
  • Click the ‘Burn’ button and you are off:

windows 7 iso file burning status

That’s it. I’m surprised it took Redmond this long to finally include this functionality.

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Analyzing My Second $100 from Google AdSense – in One Third the Time

google adsense logoMy first $100 in AdSense revenue was generated from my three blogs in approximately 10  months. My second $100 was generated in just over 3 months – from March 4 to June 7 2009. It took 327,383 served ad impressions to generate the first $100,  189,290 to generate the second.

As I described in my ‘Analyzing My First $100 from Google AdSense’ post, for this last three month period I dropped footer ads in lieu of what I hoped to be a more lucrative ad type – inline text ads. I was right. Some how I also benefited from higher per-click revenues (see details below) for the second $100 than I did for the first $100.

Ad Structure

For the last three months each of my sites used the following three primary ad types (channels in AdSense parlance) – each as depicted in the image below:

  • tower ads (120 x 600 down the right column);
  • cube ads (250 x 250 in the middle column); and
  • inline text ads (468 x 60 in-post text ads – below the title, categories and tags fields and above each post entry).

2nd adsense $100 - ad structure on daleisphere

Continue reading “Analyzing My Second $100 from Google AdSense – in One Third the Time”

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New iPhone 3G S Announced – Available June 19

image

  • $199 for 16 GB in U.S. – $299 for 32GB version (on contract of course)
    • pricing only available to new AT&T customers
    • $700 Upgrade fee for current AT&T iPhone users
    • [June 10 Update: Rogers has announced that Canadian pricing will be the same as U.S. pricing – in Cdn $. So, $199 and $299 Cdn for the 16 and 32 GB units respectively. Only available on 3 year contracts again. No pricing for un-subbed units announced – un-subbed 3G iPhones still cannot be purchased in Canada. 8-GB, 3G Units will be decreased to $99. No word on 16GB units]
  • Available June 19 (U.S. & Canada)
  • $99 for prior 16 GB iPhone
  • “up to” two times Faster
  • Voice Control:
    • voice dialing
    • ask iPhone what song is playing and it will tell you
    • tell iPhone to play a song, or songs by an artist or a playlist and it will play it
    • developers can integrate into any app

image

Continue reading “New iPhone 3G S Announced – Available June 19”

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Leo Laporte Blows up at Mike Arrington on Gilmore Gang!

I am a loyal Leo Laporte fan. I have enjoyed his TV shows and have been listening to/watching his podcasts and net streams for years. He is one of the nicest guys you’d ever want to meet. Honest as the day is long. He is so kind tempered he reminds me of Mr. Rogers. I have never seen him loose his temper, let alone swear on his shows, podcasts or feeds.

 

I admire Arrington as well, but I too have grown a bit weary of his bullying. In light of their history, to my mind, Arrington’s calling Leo’s integrity into question crossed the line – especially when he followed up with a childish ‘… what are you going to do about it” comment.

Normally this kind of thing would have been laughed off by Leo. But I’ve heard Arrington go after Leo’s/Gilmore’s guests unnecessarily hard in recent shows and its time someone called him out on it. It would be one thing if Mike didn’t know Leo well. He does. Leo assiduously discloses all conflicts of interest at every opportunity. Michael knows this.

Good for you Leo! 

[June 9 Update 1: A few hours later Leo recorded a 2nd Gilmore Gang where apologies and explanations were proffered. Click here to access it. It doesn’t start until about 13 minutes in. As you’ll hear, there is a real issue as to whether the Gilmore Gang will continue to be produced by the twit.tv network. I’m of mixed opinion. I fear that Gilmore’s personality and the kind of show he produces is not a match for the rest of the Twit network content.]

[June 9 Update 2: It seems the Internet mob has been tearing into Mike and he has shut down his Techcrunch account on Friendfeed. As I read through the comments against Mike and Leo, too  many in the crowd have been unnecessarily abusive, mostly towards Michael. While I was upset with Mike’s cavalier attack on Leo’s integrity, Michael doesn’t deserve all this grief either. He made a mistake, he apologized. Leo accepted the apology. That should be enough. I’m now feeling sorry for Michael.]

See also:

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Sony’s E3 2009 Press Conference Summary

sony e3 2009 - jack trenton

Sony’s 2009 E3 Press Conference can be viewed here.  See also my 2008 Sony E3 coverage. Click on images below for larger views.

Exclusive PS3 Games Shown

sony e3 2009 press conference - god of war demo God of War III:  (demo’d – coming March 2010 ) Looks terrific! Except, that is,  for Sony’s continued reliance on quick time events in boss battles. Grrr! But I still can’t wait GoW 1 and 2 were terrific games.

sony e3 2009 - gran turismao teaser trailer Gran Turismo 5 (polyphony – teaser trailer – still no ship date) – photo realistically gorgeous as you’d expect – first time cars show damage in this franchise – still a SIM that is likely only playable by extreme racing gamers.

e3 2009 sony - uncharted 2: among thevesUncharted 2: Among Thieves (demo’d – naughty dog – no ship date – multi-player beta starting immediately) I’m looking forward to this one! Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune is still my favorite PS3 game to date. Demo looked terrific but the female lead has changed. Elena Fisher seems to be gone :( 

Continue reading “Sony’s E3 2009 Press Conference Summary”

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Bing Drives Traffic to Daleisphere on its Second Day

I was delighted to see that bing is driving traffic to the Daleisphere on only its second day of operation. Below is a clip from my Woopra dash-board showing the Daleisphere’s first bing referral (that I’ve noticed).

woopra shows traffic from bing

I find this particularly interesting because I do not recall ever seeing traffic driven from Live.com in the past. Until now 95% of my search engine traffic came from Google. Yahoo!, perhaps, drives 2%. I’m hoping bing refers more traffic in the future.

So far I like what I’ve seen of it. But I’m not ready to give up Google just yet. 😉

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Eric Schmidt’s Definition of Web 3.0

Eric Schmidt is the CEO of Google. In the 2 minute video below he describes what he believes Web 3.0 applications will be.

 

In summary, he defines, Web 3.0 as:

  • Applications that are pieced together.
  • They are relatively small.
  • The data is in the cloud.
  • The application can run on any device, PC or mobile phone.
  • Applications are fast and customizable
  • Applications are distributed virally via social networks and email.
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Microsoft Games on Demand Service – One Step Away from Microsoft Points

Microsoft Points Card

In my opinion, the biggest Microsoft announcement at E3 today was made after their press conference was over. They announced a new Games on Demand service (coming this August). It has two important features:

  1. Full Games Available for Purchase on Demand: Microsoft will start selling full games on-demand via download through the Xbox Live Service starting this fall. Following in the footsteps of Steam (and to some degree Sony), this may be a critical inflection point on the path away from retail game sales. The 30 announced games are all older games (eg: Mass Effect, Assassin’s Creed and Bioshock). Games are to be sold at regular retail prices (no disk-free, Gamespot/E.B.; disintermediation discount). Nothing was said about the future availability of new titles day-and-date with retail releases. With the service in place there is, of course, no technological reason why this couldn’t happen. It’s just a matter of time.
  2. A Step Away from Microsoft Points: Anyone who is a regular reader of my blog knows that I am a critic of Microsoft Points (see this post, for example). Games purchased through the Games on Demand service will be purchasable with a credit card. No Microsoft Points required. Amen! Let’s hope this is the beginning of the end for Microsoft Points. 

For details see:

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Microsoft E3 2009 Press Conference Summary

image

The Microsoft Press Conference can be viewed here. See also: My 2008 Microsoft E3 coverage.

Big Announcements:

  • halo reach logoHalo Reach: Bungie teased this new Halo game, set for a fall 2010 release. Whoo hoo! If its a Bungie shooter, and it has the name Halo on it, I’m in! Is ‘Noble 1’, Will Master Chief?
     
  • metal gear rising logoMetal Gear Rising: The next Kojima / Konami Metal Gear game is coming to the Xbox!!! Holy Cow! The final coup de gras against Sony.  Kojima seemed genuinely happy to appear on stage for the announcement.
  • lyons gate mylo demoProject Natal: A ‘controller free’ , full body motion capture, item scanning, facial and voice recognition. Will work on every 360. See demo here. I’ll believe it when I see it! I don’t believe the Lion’s Gate Milo demo pictured on right. It had to be heavily scripted (click for larger view).

Continue reading “Microsoft E3 2009 Press Conference Summary”

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How to Make Windows 7 Activate a Window by Hovering a Mouse Over It.

windows 7 logo

To me, and I suspect to many Windows users, it would be intuitive for Windows to bring whatever window the mouse is currently hovering over into focus without the need to click on that window.

It turns out that Windows 7 now makes this possible. I stumbled upon this tip when writing my ‘How to Shut Off Windows 7 Aero Snap – Stop it from Auto Arranging Windows’ post.

There are two additional reasons why I want Windows 7 to activate (bring focus to an ‘out of focus’ window) by hovering the mouse over it:

 

1. Symbiotic With Single-Click Item Activation

For the better part of a year I have been using the ‘single-click to open’ option in Windows Vista and Windows 7 (The option has been around since Windows 95). The idea behind this one-click option is to make the Windows use experience similar to the web-browsing experience. Instead of double clicking icons and options to open/access/activate them in Windows, you need only click icons, items etc. once.

Continue reading “How to Make Windows 7 Activate a Window by Hovering a Mouse Over It.”

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How to Shut Off Windows 7 Aero Snap – Stop it from Auto Arranging Windows

image

Window’s 7 new Aero Snap feature is, no doubt, a useful feature for those with just one monitor. In my case, where I use multiple monitors, it is a major pain. Windows 7 frequently auto-adjusts windows across multiple monitors when I have no desire for this to happen.

In the picture above, my Firefox window was originally open in just the lower, central, window. I was dragging the lower right corner with my mouse (see yellow arrow) to adjust the window when, suddenly, it popped up across three monitors (see four red arrows above). Yikes!

Windows 7 does this because it thinks that if you drag an edge of a window to the edge of a screen (any screen) you want the widow stretched across the full screen (or in my case, multiple screens). Nobody would want the result produced above.

Before disabling Aero Snap this happened to me several times a day. It doesn’t any longer. To disable Aero Snap, follow these steps:

Continue reading “How to Shut Off Windows 7 Aero Snap – Stop it from Auto Arranging Windows”

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Canadian Cabinet Ministers, Party Leaders & Members of Parliament using Twitter

   canadian parliament   twitter logo 

Following recent reports (see here, here and here) on the growing number of U.S. Senators and Congressional Representatives that use Twitter (about 120 right now), I decided to look into which Canadian Cabinet ministers, party leaders, Senators and Members of Parliament use Twitter. Below are my preliminary results as of May 12, 2009. I have included the number of each person’s Twitter followers in parenthesis.

This list is not exhaustive. If you know of other Cabinet Ministers, Senators or MPs using Twitter, please add them in the comments with a link to their twitter profile. Many thanks.

Cabinet Members

Stephen Harper – Prime Minister:

http://twitter.com/pmharper (12,219)

Jason Kenney – Minister of Citizenship, Immigration and Multiculturalism:

http://twitter.com/MinJK (702)

Tony Clement – Minister of Industry:

http://twitter.com/TonyClementMP (501)

[Update: This must be someone spoofing a Tony Clement profile.]

Stockwell Day Minister of International Trade:

http://twitter.com/Stockwell_Day  (2 – hasn’t posted anything yet)

Steven Fletcher – Minister of State (Democratic Reform):

http://twitter.com/stevenjfletcher (377)

Continue reading “Canadian Cabinet Ministers, Party Leaders & Members of Parliament using Twitter”

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Hulu Blocks Canadians (and others) from using Hotspot Shield

imageAfter years of putting it off I finally installed and learned how to use Hotspot Shield last week. It worked wonderfully.  I was all set to write a blog post about it. Wouldn’t you know it, within a week Hulu has found a way to block it!

imageI just tested it and indeed I’m blocked. I’ll still use Hotspot Shield for the plethora of other free services not available in Canada (eg: Pandora, last.fm) for so long as it works. But, once again, it sucks to be a new media enthusiast when you live in Canada!

Until hulu comes to Canada (if ever) we still have TV streaming from CTV and Global.

See: Control Freaks: Hulu Now Blocks Anonymous Proxies Too (TechCrunch)

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How to Share News Items, Music, Videos and Websites on Facebook

share on facebook bookmarklet

Have you ever wanted to share a blog post, website, video, music or news story in Facebook?

There are two ways to do this, by using either: (i) the ‘Share on Facebook’ bookmarklet’ (depicted in the image above); or (ii)  the attach ‘Links’ method.  Either way, your friends will see what you share in their Facebook feeds. Shared music and videos will be directly playable by them from within the feed.

Using the ‘Share on Facebook’ Bookmarklet

This is the easiest way. Get the the ‘Share on Facebook’ bookmarklet here. You’ll be taken to this page:

facebook share bookmarklet page

Follow the instructions. Grab (point and hold-click on) the ‘Share on Facebook’ bookmarklet icon on that page, then drag and drop it onto your browser’s bookmarks bar.

Later, when you are on a website, YouTube page, whatever, that you want to share:

  • click on the ‘Share on Facebook’ bookmarklet. A page like this will pop up:

Continue reading “How to Share News Items, Music, Videos and Websites on Facebook”

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Canada’s Global Network Also Offers Full Primetime TV Episodes Online

 24 being streamed on globaltv
Following my recent ‘Canada’s CTV Puts Full Primetime TV Episodes Online’ post, my commenters (see here and here) have justly schooled me in Canada’s current TV episode streaming offerings. While I was aware of the rather piddling offerings that had been available over the last few years, as of late, it seems, there is a lot more on offer than I was aware.

Case in Point – GlobalTV.com’s increasingly impressive array of full-episode primetime and daytime TV streaming offerings. Global is one of Canada’s three nation-wide broadcasters. It carries about half of all U.S. primetime network content. 

The index of shows available from GlobalTV.com is here. Only clips are available for some shows like Survivor and ET Canada. But recent full episodes (plus indicated bonus materials) for the following shows are available:

Continue reading “Canada’s Global Network Also Offers Full Primetime TV Episodes Online”

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How to Listen to Video Podcasts with the iPhone Display Turned Off

diggnation podcast - alex albrecht and kevin rose
While listening to audio-only podcasts, iPhone users can press the ‘Sleep/Wake’ button to turn off the display, yet still continue listening to the podcast. iPhone users can also click the iPhone’s ‘Start’ button when listening to audio podcasts, use other iPhone apps, and continue listening to the podcast uninterrupted.

Not so with video podcasts. Clicking the ‘Sleep/Wake’ button, or clicking the iPhone’s start button shuts video podcasts off. The inability to just listen to video podcasts has been one of my primary complaints with the iPhone’s iPod functionality. See my other major complaints here and here.

Why Would Anyone Want to Just Listen to a Video Podcast?

All video podcasts are not created equal. Some video podcasts such as CO-OP, demand that the user ‘watch’ them to get the most out of them. Other podcasts , such as the ‘Cranky Geeks’, Geek Brief TV and Diggnation can usually be enjoyed without ever looking at the screen.

There are several reasons why one might wish to consume a video podcast with the visual element shut off:

  • While Using other IPhone Apps: Since I can, and often do, use other iPhone/iTouch apps while listening to audio podcasts, I sometimes just want/need to just listen to video podcasts while using other apps. Why not?
  • Increased battery life: Video playback consumes an enormous amount of battery charge. If you don’t need to watch the video to enjoy it, why waste the battery?
  • Putting iPhone in Pocket: I often put my iPhone in my pocket while listening to podcasts. When the iPhone screen cannot be shut off, this becomes a bit clumsy. The act of putting it in my pocket (or taking it out) often results in unwanted screen clicks that can shut the podcast off, fast forward it, pause it etc.
  • While Driving: Who needs the video on while driving?

Bottom Line: Hardly a day has gone by since I purchased my iPhone last August, when I didn’t wish I could turn off the screen and still listen to my video podcasts.

Turns out that there has been a way to do this all along. It took me 8 months before I stumbled upon this trick.

Continue reading “How to Listen to Video Podcasts with the iPhone Display Turned Off”

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Canada’s CTV Puts Full Primetime TV Episodes Online

imageCanada’s CTV Network hast recently started putting full-length episodes of prime TV shows online. CTV is one of Canada’s three major television networks. It carries about half of the major U.S. primetime shows in Canada. Global carries the other half.

The new service is available here (see the ‘Watch Online at CTV.ca’ heading to the right). Episodes can be viewed full screen, though the resolution is quite low by Hulu standards. Episodes are divided into segments/clips, presumably matching how shows are segmented between commercials when broadcast. Canadians can fast forward and rewind or jump from segment to segment. Users cannot, however, fast forward through the short commercials (about 10 to 15 seconds each) that play before some, but not all, segments. So far I haven’t seen many commercials. Below is a picture of the interface:

ctv.ca prime time tv episode viewer

A FAQ is available here. Multiple seasons/episodes of some shows, like ‘The Daily Show’ are available. Only the most recent of others, like Lost  and Grey’s Anatomy, are available. I’ve tested several shows and so far the system works well – though the resolution certainly needs a boost.

Continue reading “Canada’s CTV Puts Full Primetime TV Episodes Online”

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How to Upgrade to Windows 7 Release Candidate

windows 7 logoI completed an in-place Windows 7 Release Candidate (build 7100) upgrade from the original beta build 7000. The upgrade took approximately 1.5 hours and went smoothly. The upgrade went faster than my original upgrade from Vista to Win7 Beta. See my ‘Windows 7 Release Candidate First Impressions and Observations’ post for post-upgrade details).

[May 5, 2009 Update: Download the Windows 7 release Candidate here. It will be available here until July. They are not limiting the number of downloads this time. The release candidate will function until March 1, 2010 after which it will nag you several times a day to purchase the RTM version. It will cease functioning on June 1, 2010. Until then, party!]

windows 7 release candidate installation screenThe instructions for how to do an in-place upgrade are set out below. I edited them  to make them easier to follow from the instructions provided by Paul Thurrott on his SuperSite for Windows blog  here. See similar instructions here (scroll down to the ‘How-To’ section).

Despite Thurrott’s ivory-tower purity of not recommending users do in-place upgrades, I went ahead anyway. At worst, I could have rolled back to my prior Windows 7 beta image. Doing a fresh install is obviously the best practice. But anyone that takes even a cursory look at my ‘The Windows Apps I Use and How I Configure Them’ post can understand why I was loathe to do yet another clean install for just a release candidate. That said, I probably will do a clean install when the RTM version comes out this summer.

In the mean time, here are the instructions for how to do an in-place upgrade:

Continue reading “How to Upgrade to Windows 7 Release Candidate”

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Best Video Game Podcasts – Updated

video game podcasts - co-op review of riddick, dark athena
This is an updated version of the earlier ‘Best Video Game Podcast’ post I made on April 18, 2008. I have listened to, and abandoned, many video game-related podcasts. Those listed below have survived the culling and, with one exception, are recommended without hesitation. At the bottom I list the deadpool – formerly good podcasts that are now deceased or reincarnated. 🙂

1. Listen Up – formerly The 1Up Yours Podcast:

listen up podcast iconListen Up is the successor to the 1Up Yours Podcast. Oddly, the name was changed after 1UP.com was purchased by UGO Networks in January 2009, but the format and content is largely the same. It ‘airs’ Friday evenings. The show is still hosted by Garnett Lee, but most of the former cast (who make occasional guest appearances) have moved on to other things: Luke Smith – now with the Bungie podcast; Bryan Intihar -now with Insomniac Games; Dan ‘Shoe’ Hsu – now on permanent vacation; John Davison now at what they play; and Shane Bettenhausen, now Director of Business Development at Ignition Entertainment. Despite the constant cast changes, Garnet continues to provide an interesting set of revolving guests that consistently provide an entertaining and informative podcast week-in and week-out. My original 1Up Yours criticism still remains – the show is often too long and the interesting content (ie: the news) is usually held back to the the end. Not quite as good as it was when the old cast was there, but still the best video game podcast out there.

2. CO-OP – formerly The 1Up Show (video) Podcast:

co-op podcast iconThe CO-OP podcast (pictured above), continues on where the cancelled The 1Up Show left off. It shares the same cast and terrific production crew. It’s still my favorite video podcast. It provides a comprehensive set of visual video game previews and reviews. It also features interviews with industry luminaries and provides trade show coverage. If you want to watch a video game before purchase, this  is the best place to do it. This video podcast comes in small and large sizes (3x the size) suitable for viewing on the iPhone/iTouch and AppleTV respectively.

Continue reading “Best Video Game Podcasts – Updated”

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Analyzing My First $100 from Google AdSense

Google AdSense Logo I signed up for Google AdSense on April 4, 2008. It took several weeks to sort it out and to slowly integrate the ads into The Daleisphere and my two professional blogs. After some initial testing, I had them implemented by early June 2008.

Round about March 3, 2009 I cleared my first $100 in AdSense revenue! Whoo hoo! That’s $100 in 10 short months – roughly 30 cents per day.

No Text or RSS Ads at First

My biggest mistake, it seems, was to decide not to use the text-based Google Ads – like the ad you can now see at the top of this post (just under the Categories and Tags). I think blogs littered with AdSense text-ads look hideous. I wanted my ads to be presented tastefully. Hence, for the first 10 months I opted for image-only ads.

Note: My sites only became eligible for RSS Feedburner ads in January 2009. So no significant revenue came in from that source.

Continue reading “Analyzing My First $100 from Google AdSense”

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How to Use Windows 7’s System Image Backup Feature

windows 7 - control panel - system and security - backup and restore - page

In mid February 2009, shortly after installing Windows 7 Beta on my primary PC, I made the huge mistake of running an automated ‘Registry Cleaner’ program. Suffice it to say, it destroyed my system.

Because, my data is backed up on a nightly basis, I lost no data. But I did lose years (stretching back to my first Vista x64 install in January of 2007) of application installations and tweaks. Two months later I have finally (mostly) completed the long and laborious chore of re-installing and tweaking the many dozens of applications I use every day.

To ensure that I NEVER experience this special kind of hell again I decided to create an image of my primary system C:\ drive. I looked at various commercial system image/ghosting programs but decided that the system image feature built into Windows 7 was sufficient for my needs.

Highlights:

  • The process took about 30 minutes for a 100 Gig C:\ drive.
  • I was able to use Windows 7 and all my apps as normal during the entire time the image was being created.
  • Compression was terrific. It compressed my 100 GB system to a 45 GB image backup.

Below is a simple step-by-step description of how to use it. The process is simple:

Continue reading “How to Use Windows 7’s System Image Backup Feature”

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Variable Speed Scrubbing (Fast Forwarding – Rewinding) Coming to iPhone 3.0

variable speed scrubbing on iPhone 3.0

Next to my ongoing desire for a podcast delete function, the next-most glaring problem I have had with the iPhone and iPod Touch’s iPod playback functionality is its janky fast-forwarding and rewinding (also known as ‘scrubbing’).

The two most common scrubbing issues I have with my iPhone are when I want: (i) to skip back , say 10 seconds, to re-listen to something i missed – like I can with TiVo’s instant replay button; and (ii) to jump forward past podcast commercials – I can only listen to so many Audible ads on the Twit Network.

scrubbing with scroll wheel on an iPod nano Scrubbing with the scroll wheel on iPods is a breeze. (See this ‘How to Scrub on Your iPod’ video, depicted in the picture on the right, for example.) You can easily jump back and forth to the exact desired spot within the song, podcast or video you are consuming by moving your thumb clockwise or counterclockwise on the scroll wheel as shown in the picture.

There is no scroll wheel on the iPhone or the iPod Touch. Instead, there is tiny round selector (see image above) on a small 1.25” horizontal scroll bar that you slide left and right to move around your media. This provides decent accuracy for short items such as a 3 minute song. For longer-form content, such as multi-hour podcasts and movies, the 1.25” scroll bar is too small to accurately select any given point of play. I personally consume long-form content the most. Such clumsy scrubbing has often left me 5 to 10 minutes away from the place I want to be.

The solution, variable speed scrubbing.

Continue reading “Variable Speed Scrubbing (Fast Forwarding – Rewinding) Coming to iPhone 3.0”

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How to Import Firefox Bookmarks into Safari 4 Beta in Windows

hot to import firefox bookmarks in safari 4 beta in windowsWhile Firefox is my mainstay browser, I pretty much use all current browsers from time to time both to test my various websites for compatibility and to keep current with what’s new in the browser wars.

I recently installed the Safari 4 beta. In earlier versions of Safari, there was always an option to import bookmarks from IE or Firefox during the installation process. Not-so with the Safari 4 beta install.

Note: I purposely uninstalled Safari 3 before installing Safari 4. My hope was to get a fresh import of my most current Firefox bookmarks in the process. That didn’t work.

I use xmarks (formerly foxmarks)  to synchronize my bookmarks between computers. While there is an xmarks beta client for use on the Mac, so far there is none for the PC.

Here’s the easiest way I could find to import Firefox bookmarks into the Safari 4 beta:

In Firefox:

  • Click on Bookmarks
  • Click on ‘Organize Bookmarks’ (Ctrl-Shift-B)
  • Click on ‘Export HTML…’ under the ‘Import and Backup’ pull-down menu

export bookmarks in firefox

Continue reading “How to Import Firefox Bookmarks into Safari 4 Beta in Windows”