Feb 28, 2008 | blog
Here’s an idea, and one I should have talked about sooner. As a cloud computing device, the Eee PC is the perfect example of a device that should take advantage of online storage.
Not only should mini-laptop, or Internet access devices be leveraging online software suites like Google Docs, Zoho Office, or ThinkFree, but also online storage as well. Services like Box.net, Microsoft’s SkyDrive, and AOL’s XDrive (thanks to Kevin Tofel for reminding me of it) all offer up free storage with options for additional storage as a premium service.
AOL’s XDrive is really exciting to any Eee PC device loaded with Windows XP as AOL offers a utility to map a drive directly to your storage account. All three of these options (I’m sure there are others I’m not aware of) will work with either IE or Firefox and with Windows or Linux, so even if you don’t try to have a mapped drive, you can easily upload/download files as needed to any of these services.
Just one more way to solve the data storage concerns for potential Eee PC users.
Feb 19, 2008 | blog
While it’s been out for awhile now, and I’ve read a quite a bit on it – only last night did it really hit me how useful this device may be. The little device with an instant-on capability that can be had for as little as $300 is getting rave reviews by just about everyone. Especially those that have been using one.
I’m thinking this is the perfect device to provide the grab-and-go needs that I have nearly daily. My laptop is great, but it’s always set up and running either at home or work. With a second device, I could simply grab it and head off to anywhere and still be able to take notes, read feeds, blog, write manuals, perform remote-control support as needed all in a 2 pound package.
Guess we’ll find out more about it this week. While mentioning it to Amy, she pointed out how nice it’d be to have a smaller device for herself to be able to use around the house and such. The interesting part was that after pointing out all the “deficiencies” in the device, like no storage space, slower processor, Linux instead of Windows, small screen resolution, etc… she was still really interested in the device. We’ll be off later today to try a hands-on with one to see what she and our daughter think of them.
At any rate, using nLite, I’ve built a small Windows XP build (533MB installed)that may fit nicely even on the extremely storage challenged Eee PC 2GB Surf model. Personally though, I’m interested in looking at getting Ubuntu loaded on it.
Anyone else have one, or thinking about getting one? I’d love to know your thoughts on this super-inexpensive and uber- portable device.
Dec 20, 2007 | blog
Some of you know that I have no hesitation to re-format my system and install whatever version of OS that I influenced by at the time. Well, this time I really took the opportunity to re-build my laptop from the ground up.
The opportunity was created by some hardware purchases, a RAM upgrade to 4GB and a 250GB USB HDD. I was running out of space and wanted to get rid of the original dual partitions that were configured at the factory. The laptop (Acer Aspire 5610) came with two 70GB partitions on it’s 160GB HDD – and I hate having to split things up.
So with the new external, I backed it all up, wiped the disk, created the new partition and installed Vista Ultimate back on the clean machine. No Acer software, no other "value adds" that end up causing problems. And finally got a change to take a snapshot of the cleanest Vista install I’ve done to date.
So, I’ve now spent the last 30+ hours rebuilding all the additional software and tools that make up my "kit" for what I do, and there is still probably 10 hours of configuration work left. Yes, I have a lot of software, tools, utilities, tools, VMs, tunes, scripts, and such that takes a lot of time to configure.
The best part, for what I do, is that I have over 120GB free just for Virtual Machines which I use for a substantial amount of testing and proof-of-concept. Along with the extra memory, I just became much more productive in this area.
Anyway, this is the kind of IT geeky stuff I find interesting. Later!
Sep 17, 2007 | blog
Here is an example of when the automatic update feature that is increasingly being enabled on software and drivers is a headache. Driver stability.
My "new" laptop (I bought it in May), has a built-in 1.3MP WebCam that utilizes the Logitech QuickCam firmware. That’s great because it’s recognized by the Logitech drivers and all the advanced functionality that their software brings. Now the bad thing about it is that the latest Logitech software seems to be less then perfect.
The camera picture will lock up and the camera will "turn off". This sometimes will be accompanied some time later (minutes to hours) with a complete, spectacular system crash, complete with blue screen (yes, it still exists) with dual outputs for both cores since it’s a Core Duo.
Pretty neat – hadn’t seen the dual-core dump, but I’d rather have the camera function like it should. This event simply underscores the necessity of stable drivers for any operating system, and that there are enough possible combinations of hardware that it will become nearly impossible for a hardware company to be able to completely test them all.
I’ll be checking into rolling back to older software to see if that solves the problem. It just shouldn’t happen in the first place though. One more reason I’ll be checking out a MacBook next.
Technorati tags: System Crash, Vista Blue Screen, Logitech WebCam Drivers, Logitech Driver Crash
Sep 5, 2007 | blog
Blogging bud Kent Newsome talks about the new computer he picked up this week, and it just occurred to me how many people I know did PC replacement this year. This spring I bit the bullet on a new laptop, three friends replaced their systems and in August, my father switched from a desktop to a laptop.
Well, I guess it’s not that many, but it just seemed like it. As for my laptop, I’m pretty happy with it, but will definitely make sure that my next one has higher resolution, Bluetooth, Firewire, and 3G built in. Mine is pretty good, but those are just learning’s to for the next system.
Anyway, kudos to Kent on the new PC – glad it’s quieter. 😉
Via: Newsome.org – Following, Lazily, in the Footsteps of Giants
