PhosTech

LensHero

2010-12-22T14:11:00.002Z

So I stumbled across this resource today and wished to pass it along. For anyone interested in photography, you will have the ideal lenses that you aspire to own, though simply can't afford (at least for now!). The time in between is spent looking for quality alternatives to allow your craft to grow, to challenge you, or to open you up to new styles of shooting.

Herein lies the issue - there are a lot of lens manufacturers out there, some better than others, some with undeservedly bad reputations based on times long ago and not relevant by today's standards, and equally poor lenses from traditionally great manufacturers. The issue of quality, price and the experience of those who have used the lens can be difficult snippets of information to find in reviews on the web. Sites like dpreview.com cover so much information it can be difficult to narrow choices down when you have no particular starting selection in mind. The answer? A start-point. A place to offer you the choices that you can then later delve into the specifics with detailed reviews.

This is where LensHero comes in; with this resource you can input your camera type, set the slider to the maximum price you're willing to pay and choose the style of lens you're looking for (or all, if you have no idea) and LensHero will present you with your possibilities, including user reviews, the price in your local currency (provided you're from the US/UK/Canada/Germany/Denmark/Sweden/France). It's a great site, and certainly one I can see myself using in the future to drum into my options.

There are two main downfalls however. Most of the reviews are short one or two liners and stem from B&H in the US, the same place that the purchase link directs to irrespective of what currency you have selected on top. Thus this resources is not a great purchasing portal for anyone outside of the US unless you're willing to pay a premium in currency conversion and customs charges. Similarly a few quick searches online shows that there are cheaper prices for the same lenses available - but as with anything online this depends on where you're willing to buy from.

I think for now, this is an excellent site that offers users a stepping stone of lens options that can be explored in greater depth on the review sites before settling on a final option to purchase - and where you do this will depend on what resources are available in your respective countries. A great start and a site I am interested in watching how it grows and expands.

http://lenshero.com

Food for thought in a world of diversity

2010-02-21T14:08:00.001Z

Med Elective

2009-04-01T04:55:00.001Z

*NOTE* I will update this post as soon as possible with more pictures – very slow internet here, and most of my pics are in RAW…

So here I am on a medical elective; basically mandatory medical work anywhere in the world. Vanuatu was my choice, and I certainly don’t regret that. Getting here however was not the easi est route. Leaving Heathrow on the Saturday morning I had the pleasant surprise on boarding my BA flight to LA of being upgraded, thanks to a neighbour of my mother in Ireland who usually works that route but had written a letter to her colleagues to look after me as she was not there to do so. Very kind and completely unexpected, and it made the 11hr journey much more palatable. Upon arriving in LA I had the fortune of being paranoid about baggage to find that international check-through was a manual affair, completed by the passenger. After ensuring my baggage was not lost en route I had 6hrs to kill before my next flight. Attempting to follow the conflicting and somewhat unhelpful and slightly rude advice of the airport “information/advice” staff I ended up in a fairly run of the mill boring old mall. At least it gave me the opportunity to eat and kill some time before making my way back to one of the most boring, and truly sub-standard airports in the developed world. The 14hr flight to Auckland was with Qantas, and although much more cramped than the previous BA flight (ala upgrade) it certainly could have been worse – although I was at the back of the plane where it was considerably louder than I had hoped and sleep was seldom. Upon arriving in Auckland there was a mad dash through immigration and check-in to get a travel companion on to a connecting flight to Melbourne, however I myself had 12hrs to pass so instead found some breakfast in the airport, grabbed a shower, stowed my luggage in left-luggage and sussed out NZ SIM cards and rental cars for when I get back to NZ in a few weeks for a little bit of travel as I head down from Auckland to Christchurch to fly back out through LA and eventually to London.

Once finished with these errands I made my way into the city centre on the shuttle bus, explored a few shops and then met an incoming travel companion later on for lunch and eventually passed the afternoon sitting in the park by the university. Onward then to Sydney, where I was met by an old friend/distant cousin at the airport, and after some further gatherings of accompanying Med Students moved on to the Railway YHA hostel in the centre of town. I dumped my stuff in the room then drove with my friend to one of the peninsular points across from the Sydney Opera House at night, sitting on a bench admiring the view, watching the wildlife (flying foxes, possums, bush rats etc.) and catching up on old times. I had a few days stop-over in Sydney and used the time to explore some of the sights including the opera house, harbour, aquarium and Chinese Gardens.

Leaving Sydney for Port Villa myself and my two companions were met by a minister for health of Vanuatu at the airport. Our landing had been delayed as the pilot had been unable to contact anyone at the tower in order to turn on the landing lights on the runway. This was rectified after some circling by calling a “company” who then went to the airport and presumably woke the staff up! After landing there were also whispered rumours of a cow on the runway too. Stepping from the plane I was hit squarely in the chest by the sheer humidity, rather than a simple dry heat, and a sleepless night was spent in the very hospitable ministers home. We returned to the airport early the following morning for our flight to Luganville on Espiritu Santo in a 12 seater prop plane, reaching a maximum height of 10,000ft. (I could see the dials as I was in the first row – there’s video too….). The one hour flight led us to Luganville where we were picked up by a tour company bus and brought to our home for the next few weeks; Beachfront Resort. Although most “Baby Docs” stay at the hospital, our contact had not returned e-mails or calls and with the looming stress of exams we had booked private accommodation, making a decent deal in the process. This seems to have been a good plan, as we not only have hot water(actually unnecessary in the heat) but also clean towels and sheets every day, a fan in the room (no a/c), the beach on our doorstep and a decent continental breakfast every morning. Although since being here it has become evident that we could have in fact simply turned up and all would have been fine at the hospital anyhow. Our first morning consisted of a walk along the beach, then a meeting at the hospital with our contact after unpacking and devouring some breakfast. It was now Thursday morning having left the UK on the previous Saturday morning – 5 days worth of travelling. The other baby docs were away on a trip that day, so we were left to our own devices before our first lesson in Bislama, the local language, on the morning of Day 2, where we met the remaining baby docs, and briefly some that were leaving that day.

The following days were spent in a flurry of activity. Some simple medicine and orientating ourselves with the hospital, finding our way around the town, sussing out Diving details and making contact with the good people to know (Aquamarine boys, various bus drivers, phone numbers of amenable taxi drivers). Over the weekend we made a trip out to Oyster Island, passing the foundations of an old US military hospital and air strip. The boat was summoned by banging a cylinder hanging from a tree, and we were greeted on the island by a fantastic buffet of food before electing to kayak the hour trip upriver to the Blue Hole – a spectacular spring of fresh water. The best part; climbing the overhanging tree like the local kids and jumping the 10ft into the hole. Our kayaking trip however was through intriguing jungle in tropical rainfall. The return journey passed more quickly, and after a short break we walked across the island to go snorkelling in some spectacular reef. Apparently there are some WW2 plane wrecks in the waters where pilots didn’t quite make it to the airstrip following their dog-fights elsewhere. In the distance and surrounded by cloud was the spectacular sight of a shrouded volcano – although it depended who you asked whether it was dormant or extinct. Either way less threatening than the other 7 land based active volcanoes, and 3 submerged in the area! Returning to shore via boat in the dark of night afforded good opportunity for stargazing, highlighting the Milky Way wisping across the sky, the southern cross and the good old stable of Orion and his belt, albeit somewhat more horizontal than what may be considered normal up north at this time of year.

A few other highlights over the first few days:

BBQ at the beachfront and the Edinburgh Girls organisation
Kava with Rob at Mangos
Pizza with the girls and the Pigeon rant (video imminent…)
Discovery Dive at aquamarines and beginning the SDI Open Water Diver course

On the Monday, 3 new arrivals from Oxford made their debut, to which their initiation was at Mango Kava’s, followed by dinner at the Mamma’s huts down by the open air 24hr market. Unfortunately it was at this point that my wallet slipped from my pocket (at Mango’s) and was subsequently stolen from where it lay. Subsequent late night searches were fruitless, although with Rob’s reassurance I resisted the urge to cancel my cards, and instead made the requisite statement to the police in the morning for my insurance to remain valid (PC Peter and the tiny room), and hoped for the best.

It was on the Tuesday morning that the now 8 of us travelled north along the islands coast to Lannoc Beach, where we spent the night (good fortune; managing to strike a deal with the manager to get the dorm with mozzie nets for 5000vatu total, rather than each, including breakfast in order to escape the tiny tents with falling coconuts overhead!). Much of the day was spent playing “Lester” catch with the rugby ball on the beach, sand Pictionary, reading and then digging into the fantastic open air spit roasted chicken (for myself and KT) and pig for the others. In the candlelight be played various games of truth and lying mostly over grapefruit cocktails, before retiring to bed (6 legged spider, mozzies, giant dead spiders). At 5.30 the next morning I was woken by banging and chanting from a nearby village, and was led to believe that it was related to a burial ceremony due to take place. After a shower, stroll along the beach and some breakfast it was time to pack up and make a move to Champagne beach – completely undisturbed golden soft sand, crystal clear warm waters, and beautiful coral all around.

A big BBQ on the Friday night totalling 8 Baby Doc’s at the Beach Front Resort, followed by free-flowing alcohol & movie night watching 21 in the rec room. The girls prepared some great salad and kamala chips & dressing to accompany the spread of Chicken, Steak and Fish that myself and KT mainly prepared on the grill.

The following morning we all piled into the flatbed of a pick-up truck to head out to Mama Leonie’s Village where we had been kindly invited for lunch. Mama Leonie is one of the Hospital Mama’s – she makes the food for the patients and looks after the Baby Doc’s very well. We were invited for a picnic on the beach (on Sat 20th), which involved a lengthy journey down some interesting and bumpy roads. About two thirds of the way in the truck punctured a tyre, and whilst waiting for a spare to be transported from somewhere nearby, we proceeded to feast on grapefruit and make our way on foot down the road until the repaired truck picked us up a bit later. The journey was interspersed with hunting tales, singing and dodging low lying branches whilst clinging on to the edge of the truck (the back of which was held together with baling twine…). Upon reaching the end of the road we walked around through some jungle, waded across a small stream and waited on canoe to bring us across to the island housing the village, as the tide was in. Lunch was freshly cooked on the beach, and tree branches erected around us for some shade from the scorching mid-day sun. Before lunch we swam around playing games with the local children, all forming different parts of Mama Leonie's extended family. After lunch we trekked through the jungle fending off mozzies with bunches of leaves, to finally reach the village and be shown around. We returned at the end of the day shattered and well fed!

The following day with nothing particular planned we all headed out to Million Dollar Point – an area at the tip of Santo where the US Military dumped all of their equipment into the Sea at the end of the war and blew it up with a mine.They had offered it to the Vanuatu government at the time, however at a price. Unable or unwilling to pay, this was the US’s solution. Seems a waste to us, but it certainly makes for an interesting afternoon snorkelling. With bits of bulldozers, vans, containers, bottles, weapons, building materials and countless other treasures down there, over the decades the coral and marine life has happily adopted it as home. The most exciting finds of the day however had to have been the stingray and octopus. Later on a game of Frisbee turned into an hour long game between one of the girls and all the local kids in the sea whilst be looked on and wrote messages in the sand. Jean the driver needed some attention as in his short swim he had been stung by a jellyfish quite badly. Making sure he was alright, we later got him some antihistamine cream and tablets along with some pain relief to take the edge off. I later stopped by Aquamarine (about 18h30) to see Rob, as we were off on a quest to get my wallet back – stolen 6 days previously from Mango Kava’s. This involved bringing some local backup – Ni-Van friends of Robs’, followed by random journeys into settlements, participating in 2 sorry ceremonies requiring the consumption of strong Kava, keeping good to my 5000vt reward and somehow involving the use of “custom” – which should apparently not be talked about. The end result however, was the return of my wallet, intact with all cards present and accounted for (and unused), although all cash was of course nowhere to be found. None the less, having access to my money was certainly a welcome change!

Later that night was a going home party for Natalie & Louise, leaving over the next couple of days. The theme was a “Shnoga” party – togas and snorkels… This was held at Deco Stop, and there are plenty of photos to attest to it. After dinner the remainder of the night was spent playing various card games at the Baby Doc Mansion (favourites: Cheat, Uno and Go Fish – none of them knew how to play poker), played in teams representing countries, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England. The following morning was spent in hospital, before we all escorted Natalie to the Airport where she gained the title of first girl to every cry leaving Vanuatu on elective. With dinner at the Mama’s that night, she was quickly followed by Louise the next day taking the title of second girl to cry, following a relaxing afternoon at Deco swimming in their pool and chilling with their smoothies.

Wednesday and Thursday were busy days in hospital, with a mix of medical rounds and clinic. On Thursday morning I delivered a healthy little baby boy into the world, after marvelling at the fortitude of the women giving birth here; very basic conditions, no formal monitoring other than a pre-partum BP check and Ultra-Sound check of foetal heart rate, no fluids, no pain relief, and no support. Family don’t attend the births, and nobody seems to record the moments – cameras of any kind seem to be an alien concept here. The only person present at the birth is usually either a Nurse or Midwife – depending who is available at the time. Thus my presence was well received, and allowed me to monitor the mothers recovery post-partum in addition to the baby’s. New Mothers lay on the table for a few minutes after the event before hopping off and hobbling back to bed, where they are joined soon by their freshly cleaned baby ready for its first feed. Oxytocin and alpha agonists are available if necessary, but used sparingly and I have yet to witness any pain relief, even local anaesthetic when doing sutures. Friday gave me another delivery – a baby girl – the mother asking me to name her; quite an honour (both of my deliveries had their cords wrapped around their necks – the first baby was also incorrectly orientated and required me to rotate it to allow for delivery – but all delivered uneventfully after rectifying these and were healthy babies). Another Baby Doc also delivered on Friday morning however my attentions had turned to a baby in distress that had been seemingly left in the delivery room and relatively ignored. A quick assessment told me that she was in respiratory distress, and had signs of recession. After giving some anti-biotics, Vitamin K and Hep B inoculation I went in search of a Paediatrician for confirmation and assistance. It was at this point I finished my day, leaving the newborn in the hands of the paediatrician, and began my diving course. Sadly on exiting the water I learned that the baby had arrested during the afternoon, and efforts to resuscitate had failed, through a mixture of inadequate equipment, lack of drugs altogether, and dubiousness of expiry dates on available drugs, as well as inexperienced staff to deal with neonatal emergencies. It was a frustrating evening, realising that the outcome was almost inevitable regardless of what procedures were employed and by whom, simply due to the lack of resources to manage such situations – for example, had the little one been resuscitated and survived there would be no intensive care/therapy unit to monitor and manage her. Not to mention the lack of 100% medical grade oxygen, the hospital having to settle for 86% max, shipped over from Port-Villa. By chance we had a photo of the baby from the morning, so Kym and Ben at Deco were very obliging and allowed up to print it so that we could give it to the mother. Although debating whether this would be appropriate, a Nurse assured us that it was a nice sentiment, and the mother would like to have it. Checking again with the family if this was alright, we presented the picture. Though thankful and strong at the time, walking away we could hear the mother sobbing.

I should explain that medicine here is quite limited, the hospital making do with donations, out of date equipment and drugs and relying on the French Government to complete an extension. There is X-Ray, Ultra Sound and basic blood and urine biochemistry available, but not much else. The operating theatre faces the same limitations, not to mention the sparing use of the A/C! In terms of staff, there are not many doctors permanently resident at the hospital, although some occasionally visit for a week or two at a time from either Villa or Australia. Normally present are 3 Cuban doctors forming an exchange for 14 Ni-Van nurses etc. who have gone to Cuba to study Medicine, 3 Chinese doctors here for 2 years (often making questionable decisions, speaking no English or Bislama), a Pilipino Dr. here for the past 25 years and a few other Ni-Van doctors who seem to be very good at their jobs. Apart from maternity I have had some interesting medical experience here in Santo, particularly:

Medical and Surgical ward rounds;
- Dr. pressing on liver, then saying “Spleen Sore”
- Dr. referring to patients as numbers rather than names
- “Psychiatric” room with a Gaol door, containing a patient with extensive 3rd degree burns receiving no fluids or attention – described to me as “epileptic and mental”
Dr. Anna’s paeds clinics
- One of the Cuban Dr’s – a great laugh and loves her work which shows. Gets you involved right away and invites you to Rural Health clinics.
Dr. Armada’s HT/Diabetes etc. Clinic
- Many blood forms, BMs, BPs to be done in here, as well as drawing out a world map to explain where Ireland and the UK are, and our route to get to Vanuatu.
A&E
- A small little room, seemingly capable of dealing with very little and consisting mostly of a place to take vitals and perhaps put up fluids, as well as taking a history. Although it did have an AED in the corner, along with an older style biphasic defib – lovingly labelled as a “Debribrilator” :P
Paeds surgical and medical ward and round
- Lots of sick children; haemophilia, pneumonia, malaria & TB.
Out Patients Department
- Running OPD clinic with Pilipino Dr. and conducting hx and examinations in Bislama (ish), prescribing drugs and ordering tests (countless Malaria bloods, some XR’s, urine tests etc.). Saw more than 20 patients in a row including 2 criminals and having to admit a psych patient (not the one described above).
Delivering little baby boy & girl, and naming the girl :)
Rural Health Clinic
- Turning up to find no patients, with the option to sit and wait all day with Dr. Anna or head back to the Hospital to make ourselves useful – chose the latter.
Bushman Consult
- Passing through a village on the way back from Millennium Caves we were called into a hut to see a man with sudden onset leg pain, unable to weight bear with no Hx of trauma and seemingly no risk factors, although he had very pronounced gynecomastia and was significantly overweight, not to mention Kava… After Hx and examination our differentials favoured Sciatica or Femoral Nerve stretch/entrapment, although a DVT could not be ruled out. We administered some pain relief (er… 2 Paracetamol) and suggested careful monitoring with a trip to the hospital if there was no improvement or the condition worsened.
MTP examination at Millennium Caves
- The above followed on from my previous examination of Lester’s (the main contact for the elective and a nurse at the hospital) first MTP on his left foot, having potentially (and seemingly) fractured it. It has since improved somewhat and may be a small or stress fracture, or indeed tendon/soft tissue damage from over stretching it in the river against a rock. I suggested an X-Ray, but in Island time it has yet to happen!
Outdoor interpretation and advice
- A Fijian man working in town had broken his ankle playing football, and requested my opinion and advice. Reviewing his XR now 2 weeks since the accident the bone was non-displaced and appeared to be knitting well. I advised him that he would need a new cast for at least 3 more weeks possibly 4, although for some reason here they had started with a full cast and were moving to a back-slab now, rather than the more usual way of doing it the other way around! I told him that he should start to put a small amount of weight through it 4 weeks post accident. Having gone through a similar injury just over a year ago, it was something that I understood how aggravating and debilitating it can be, but also could demonstrate that it does indeed heal well.
Surgery
- Spending some time finding an operation taking place, finally observing an appendectomy of a young man. The A/C is literally turned on at the last minute and off as early as possible, to combat the high price of electricity here. An open procedure, it was uneventful and performed well, although whenever suturing was being done below one surgeons standards he proceeded to strike the others hand with a forceps!

Although checking regularly in Maternity over the weekend on the off chance of making some more deliveries, most of the weekend was spent diving, and on Sunday (29th March) I qualified as an SDI Open Water Diver. Generally throughout the world this limits me to 18m of depth, however in Vanuatu the law has a more liberal interpretation, and provided we were guided we were able to make a much deeper dive to the USS President Coolidge wreck, going to 30m deep along the deck, over the collapsed promenade deck and back along the side of the ship to the bow. The entire wreck is 200m long, lies on its side in the sand and ranges from about 20m depth at the bow to 70m at the stern. It is very well preserved, with virtually no artefacts “salvaged” by divers as all dives are guided and no one is allowed to remove items from the wreck – so lots to see (including an eel at one point, lots of lion fish, gas masks, 3 and 6inch guns, live shells and spent shell casings, cooking pots, typewriters, rifles etc). Enjoying that dive so much, I elected to return that evening for a night dive. This was probably one of the best experiences (non-medical) that I have had here. It was just me and Rob, one of the Dive instructors, and we entered the water as the sun was setting to the west spilling a beautiful orange into the sky. Descending along the rope connected to the bow we entered the first cargo hold and explored for a while. We continued by swimming through a corridor into Cargo Hold 2, a larger hold with a ladder above us from which we hung in complete darkness with the torches off in order to watch the mesmerising flashlight fish around us (sparking and glowing like little laser flashes in the dark). Torches back on we explored the hold for a bit before I followed rob through a narrow opening (where some of the ships structure had collapsed) into another corridor leading to an area containing the decaying remains of the ships Willis jeeps and other vehicles that had been in transport at the time the ship struck the mine. Again we switched off our lights floating in space within the ship watching the fish in the dark. We ended the dive by travelling up through the wreckage from within and exiting via one of the salvage cuts along its side, before exploring the side of the ship and watching the change in life between night and day (some fish sleeping, others hunting, lightning clams which electrify when the torch is shone at them, countless prawns and crabs scuttling about). During one of out decompression stops towards the end of the dive we came upon a rather large octopus, which we proceeded to track around and around this one particular rock as it changed colours between grey, red, brown and bright electric blue, clearly fed up of our presence in his home! Upon surfacing into the black of night I looked up and was presented with the perfect southern hemisphere sky – countless stars, twinkling away, the wisps of the Milky Way streaking through the sky, along with the International Space Station tracking its way across the sky (at 19h12) (and the odd shooting star). It was a stunning dive on a fantastic night to round off an already pretty inspiring day, and certainly worth doing regardless of the eerie descent in the murkiness leading to the bow of the ship.

All in all that brings me to today – we are preparing to leave on Thursday, making our way to Tanna (another island in the archipelago) where part of our journey will take us on a trek up the side of a live volcano. This morning was spent at the hospital taking photos of every square inch, helping out a few patients, chatting with the pharmacist for a while before going to the Dive shop to complete my TDI Nitrox course. So as of this evening I am now a qualified Nitrox Diver and Open Water Diver (between SDI and TDI), have 2 tropical wreck dives under my belt at a 33m depth, not to mention one being a night dive, and have had an amazing experience in Vanuatu both medically (particularly the clinics and delivering babies) and personally (the people, the places; millennium caves, million dollar point, Lannoc and Champagne beaches, Rural Villages, Oyster Island, the Blue Hole & diving from the trees, lots of snorkelling and the other baby doc’s I’ve had the pleasure of meeting).

Millennium Caves

2009-03-26T03:26:00.001Z

Yesterday was spent at Millennium Caves. This involved an early bus at around 8.30am, followed by a 45minute walk through some jungle, then a few local villages and finally the main jungle trek. This section generally takes 1.30hrs, however our group of Baby Docs managed to get through in just under 50mins, through a mixture of fast (careful) walking and faster (more dangerous) running/jogging. There are many sheer sections through mud, vines and river crossings, along with makeshift ladders created from wood and bamboo, nailed together and rained on for years, making some interestingly rotten…

Our speedy descent through the jungle was in an effort to beat the rain (which never fell) so that we could continue “safely” with the rest of the day. On reaching the cave mouth we submerged to waist deep to get in, dropped down a few more ladders and eventually ended up in the dark surrounded by bats and wading through rocky water, trying to find a stable footing in sandals (though some were forced to do it barefoot – and fell over plenty as a result). Our torches supplied a small orange globe of light at our feet, not particularly accomplishing very much. 30 minutes later we emerged at the other end of the caves, covered in guano, into a river. The next section followed lunch at the riverside, and involved some canyoning through very tight spaces in rocks to navigate around the Grade 5 water rushing past us just a few feet away. The decision was taken upon reaching the top of a huge boulder to jump the 20ish feet into the water below (just for fun) before climbing out again and continuing. Reaching the end of our trek through the canyon we were then presented with a beautiful gorge through which we floated with the aid of 2 rugby balls and some “dora the explorer” rubber rings. Needless to say we ended up playing rugby in the water, and chasing the myriad of fish, as well as taking in the scenery and floating under small waterfalls coming down from the cliffs above. The last section of river has two sets of rapids, which everyone else portaged around, however from my kayaking experience I new the first set were runable, so I set about swimming down navigating my way through the drops, rocks and holes – and catching up with our wayward rugby balls at the end.I emerged relatively unscathed, bar some minor grazes and scrapes. The second set were not so safe, so a portage was in order, after which I trekked back upriver slightly to jump into the flow at the base of the main rapids to build up some speed for the final one or two deep rapids remaining.

The final part of the day involved a sheer climb up the river valley to return to the jungle – this consisted of climbing up 3 small waterfalls using ropes and chains slung round bamboo roots further up the valley, and 3 more make shift ladders before reaching the top. After a long hard day the effort could be felt, but the reward of reaching the top was completely worth every minute. In the first village we rested, drank some water and ate grapefruit with coffee, before trekking onward towards the next village, last section of jungle and eventually the bus.

On our way out of the second village, we were stopped to provide a bushman consultation; a local with an acutely painful leg understandably taking advantage of the presence of 6 final year medical students. This being my second consult of the day (one of our party – not a baby doc – had potentially fractured his MTP joint in the river).

A long hard day – but amazing memories; sheer jumps, climbs, squeezes, darkness along with deep mud, sharp rocks and plenty of mosquitoes!

Baby Boy

2009-03-26T02:57:00.001Z

Today, in Northern Districts Hospital, Luganville, Espiritu Santo, Vanuatu, I delivered a healthy baby boy at 10.00am Pacific Time. This was my first delivery, and very different to how things work in the UK; No IV, no pain relief of any sort, no monitoring except manual BP a few times throughout, no fluids, no support! In the delivery room it was me, one midwife and the mother to be – no one else from beginning to end. The baby was big and needed to be turned through 90 degrees, the cord was also around his neck, however I managed to rectify these issues and delivery was quick.

Sorry for the lack of updates recently – internet is sparse, slow and expensive!

Home Server: machine_exception_check BSOD

2009-03-04T08:39:00.001Z

Anyone any ideas?

I’ve been getting this BSOD constantly on my Home Server and can’t narrow down the cause. This is what I have done:

Run a memory tester for 5 or so passes – no problems detected.
Reduced voltage to the memory, dropping from 800MHz to 533MHz.
Run thorough Chkdisk on hard-disks a couple of times – all fine.
Checked memory seating, disconnected all cables and reconnected.
Replaced PSU as had been making noises and suspected it. This lulled me into believing it was fixed, then BSOD’ed a few hours later :(

There has been no addition of new hardware, no new software installed – no changes basically except to adding more data. There are 5 HD’s present, 3xSATA and 2xEIDE running from a controller card. WHS console also reports all 5 disks as healthy.

I am so tempted to do a reinstall, but given this BSOD is usually hardware related I am hesitant as it may be wasted time.

Wrong time for things to go wrong...

2009-03-01T22:42:00.001Z

So here I am, 3 days before my clinical exams, 5 days before a "formative" written, and equally 5 days before making my way to Heathrow airport, where I will spend the night in preparation for an early Saturday morning flight to LAX, whereby I will then connect to Auckland.

So, in the past few days my trusted time keeping companion - a Tissot PR100 Divermatic - has effectively given up, no longer managing to maintain any capacitance over the course of a few hours, and failing to keep good time. In fairness, this was bound to happen as it is now 8 years old and has long been overdue its second service. Given the cost of repair, the fact that it would take about 8 weeks in Switzerland and that I go away in a few days, I have instead had to purchase a new timepiece. I have settled on a Seiko SKX009K2 diving watch, which needless to say will have its pedigree thoroughly evaluated on my travels!

Second in line to give up has been my Home Server. Following a string of exception BSOD's, it is now refusing to boot. From the signs I have narrowed it down to a PSU failure. At literally just over 1 yr old I am disappointed in the NorthQ PSU, however given it is a server on 24/7 and components can fail at any time I have accepted it, moved on an ordered a CoolerMaster PSU to match the case it powers. In the mean time I have contacted the retailer to see about warranty status. Seemingly the discs are all still in working order, and the memory appears to be error free, so hopefully all will work well with the new PSU as it would be a handy location to upload pictures and videos to whilst away.

Add to all of this I still have to make a list for packing, not to mention the packing itself (always my least favourite part of any trip) – all interspersed with the stress of exams. So far the vaccinations are up to date, the anti-malaria tablets in hand amongst others, and as far as I know I have everything I “need”. I guess time will play out its course over the following days and I am sure everything will work out as it should.

If time allows I will update this post with a picture of the new watch and the (hopefully) working server. And perhaps a post about the equipment I will be taking away with me for the next 7 weeks.

Sanyo Xacti HD700

2009-02-16T03:33:00.001Z

I have been playing with this little HD camcorder for the last few days, and I thought I would give my impressions of it here.

First off I should explain why I chose this camera over all of the other HD cam’s available out there; size and value. I was looking for a small camera I could carry around in my pocket when I am away next month so as not to miss those incredible passing moments. I figured given the time I might as well go for HD.

A few choices were then presented – top of the list was the Creative Vado HD, followed closely by the HD offerings from Flip and Kodak. The Kodak is readily available in the UK at around £99, the Flip HD is not yet hear, and the Vado is currently pre-order for ~£200. Importing a Vado from the US was best priced on Ebay equating the the eventual UK price. That does however spring up the risk of customs charges, dodgy sellers and long shipping times. So what to do? I began looking at other options and found a new unused HD700 on ebay, from a UK seller totaling £140. This gave me optical zoom, and the option of expanding the storage using SD cards rather than built in flash memory as well as still camera options (not a priority as I will be carrying around my 20D).

Was it worth it?

So far yes, it’s pretty much what I expected. It is smaller than the Kodak lengthwise, however the bump around the optics means that it is noticeable in your pocket, but not in an unbearable way and if you’re using a camera bag anyway its slim handle area means it slots very nicely into small spaces. Additionally I have a 5x optical zoom (lets ignore digital zoom as its quality is so poor and pointless without using a tripod) and full manual control over the way my video is shot. It’s very comfortable to hold and much lighter than expected. Build quality is certainly not on a par with more expensive offerings from Sony or Canon, however for the price, size and weight I feel it should stand up to normal wear and tear relatively well – even if it is a tad “plasticky”. I should iterate here that it is a 720p camcorder, not 1080i/p, however that suits me fine. I won’t be shooting the worlds most amazing or riveting footage, it’s more for a memory diary of my travels than anything else and it will of course save me precious space. On the highest quality setting the camera reports between 3.5-4hrs recording time with a 16GB SDHC card, and 5-5.5 on the next one down (still HD), which overall is pretty decent. Battery life is expected at around 3hrs, however with the small amount of playing I have been doing with it with numerous power cycles, stills, short movies etc. I have yet to need to recharge it – so it should last a few days of continuous light use I would imagine.

The camera came with a myriad of cables including HDMI, however it can be brought travelling with just the A/C adaptor, provided you have an SD reader on whatever computer you are transferring to (otherwise you’ll need the docking station with you, as there is no mini-USB port on the camera itself).

Below is a sample of a quick video shot on the camera using the fully automatic settings (and iirc not on the highest quality – not sure on that one) in the dark capturing falling snow. I think for my needs it will do nicely as a runabout camcorder, and I will feel it was worth it if it lasts over 18 months of plentiful use. As other reviews have commented – low light use seems to be sub-par, producing some grainy results, however I anticipate most of my videos being shot with reasonable lighting conditions – anything else I will equate to “atmosphere”…

Snow in HD from irishandrew on Vimeo

Microblogging Explosion

2009-02-08T23:01:00.007Z

Micro-blogging (particularly Twitter) has had a lot of press recently in the UK, with more and more people signing up to see what it's all about. This probably means that this little explosion in users will die out soon, and level off a bit later. This has stemmed from Stephen Fry's appearance on Jonathan Ross's show - both of whom regularly tweet.

Is this a good thing? Yes, I think it probably is. Up until now services like Twitter or Friendfeed were the realm of early adopters/geeks, or people with significant presence on the web. But the concept of what they're about, and the easy choice of anonymity should the need appeal makes them wholly more approachable and desirable to the casual end user. Even better is the lack of maintenance needed to keep an account going - couple this with the interactivity or socialising between users and you've got a very simple attractive service with much less dedication required when compared to maintaining a fully fledged blog or even keeping up with Facebook.

The iPhone has gone some way to promoting services like Twitter too. Most people I know don't own an iPhone - they're just not productive enough. Those that do though undoubtedly have a great web-based platform with a whole host of talented developers that have seized the opportunity to write for these services. Less elegant solutions are available on practically every platform, even down to the simplest form of simply loading up the web browser or SMSing the service with your update. This access has caused services like Twitter to really open up the world of public journalism with news stories hitting these networks early, often from the scene long before they hit the mainstream media networks (just think about Mumbai and the Hudson River crash).

So what about all these new users? Will they last? No, not all of them - many will log in to see what it's all about, then either not get it or not care enough about it to keep using it and disappear over the next few months. Others will linger on for a while, lurking in the background before one day spending some time with it and ending up hooked. The rest will be hooked from day one :) In the end though, the overall result is that even for people who have never logged on to see or use these services the awareness of them has been seeded into the collective knowledge of the general public. They have graduated to legitimate services.

New Look, New Start

2009-02-08T15:57:00.006Z

So this place has been stagnant for quite some time now, and the simple reason for that is my chosen career - I'm a medic, and so spend quite a bit of time snowed under. It's time to rectify this however, and with this new start comes a slight change of direction too.

The blog will remain a focus of technology, and I may get to post some musings on my experiences with Windows 7 so far in a bit, but I will also be mixing in my own personal posts, and in particular in the next few months medically related posts. You see, in early March I am flying off to the South Pacific with a couple of friends to work in a hospital in Vanuatu (see below) for a few weeks, following which I will be travelling around New Zealand. I am planning to take an inordinate amount of photos, and should my video camera ever arrive plenty of HD video too. I'll likely be testing out Vimeo and YouTube's HD offerings for this, and I've been a long time Zooomr user/supporter so should I have decent internet access I will be uploading plenty :)

Other tech employed on the trip will be my trusty little Fujitsu 1510d - now very competently running Windows 7, faster than XP ever was on it's limited frame, and hopefully a Super TrackStick to overlay a trip map into Google Earth at the end. My trusty 20D with newly cleaned sensor filter and a super wide angle lens will take care of most of the imaging.

So, I look forward to posting my experiences here, from tech to personal and medical. I hope you enjoy.

View Larger Map

Caffein Tranquility

2007-06-06T19:11:00.001Z

Well, I’m sitting in my local coffee shop and contemplating the lack of free wifi in the UK. Don’t get me wrong – a quick look at the FON map shows me that there are even a few people in addition to myself sharing their wifi in my small town – however the issue is obviously coverage and range – 4 people in a town won’t blanket it, but I guess it’s a start! The rates over here in coffee shops tend to be extortionate – working out at over $10 an hour unless you use commercial hotspots often enough to justify an account (this is all ignoring the fact that the particular Costa Coffee l am in at this moment doesn’t offer any form of Internet access whatsoever...). It wouldn’t be so bad if 3G/HSDPA wasn’t also so expensive, however even though I’ve had a business account with Vodafone for the last 3 years and have gladly paid them countless crippling roaming charges I still get an incredibly limited data allowance before it begins to cost $2 just to check my e-mail. If you think contract is bad – on my second phone, a Pay As You Go Orange sim card, I spent £10 in just a few days (that’s nearing $20) on my Palm Treo pretty much entirely on web access when on my road trip to test out the Global Top GPSHUD unit (Review to fellow soon! :) ). It seems to get good data deals now I’d have to sign a new contract with another carrier-something I can’t do until my current one expires in 11 months. Besides, having been a contract holder with the 4 main carriers in this country hugely bad experiences will deter me from ever signing with either T-Mobile or O2 again.

In this always on connected era perhaps I’m longing for the ubiquitous adoption of WiMAX and the subsequent long range free network sharing a la FON... although I do appreciate those completely disconnected and silent moments and long for the days when l travelled without even a cell phone.

GPSHUD Review Unit Arrived

2007-05-22T10:21:00.001Z

The FedEx man came yesterday afternoon with the review unit of GlobalTop's GPSHUD SpeedMeter HG-100 - I've played around with it a bit and installed it into my car, and once I've had a chance to properly run it through it's paces I will post a detailed review along with plenty of pictures.

If there are any questions or query's you would like addressed in the review please post a comment below, otherwise I will do my best to give it a fair trial.

2007-05-22T10:08:00.000Z

Zooomr Mark 3

Looks like the latest incarnation of the excellent photosharing site Zooomr is gearing up to launch later today. It has been beset by a few delays, but from the looks of the walk through demo on their blog the wait will be more than worth it. Some of the new features are just excellent, and looks to blow the competition right out of the water.

I have been using Zooomr for a while now and some of my gripes with the interface have clearly been addressed, particularly the search function and the integration with other users. I'm waiting with bated breath to get to play with this when it launches to the pubic later on and can see myself spending a lot more time with it open on second display. A new marketplace allowing photographers to licence their images is a fantastic addition, and it will be interesting to see how this plays together with the more open idea of photosharing championed by the site.

I urge you to head on over to http://blog.zooomr.com and check out the demo - it's about 30mins long but is a great showcase of what to expect. Zooomr veterans will be thrilled at some of the new features, and for new users there has never been a better time to jump in and try it out.

My congratulations to Kristopher and of course Thomas for the work that has gone into MkIII, not to mention the sterling efforts of everyone (photog's included) since Zooomr's original launch.

2007-05-19T10:00:00.000Z

Zenum Opus Now Available for Pre-Order

The Zenum Opus finally became available for pre-order yesterday afternoon. The Zenum is currently available in the UK, US, Germany, Italy, Japan and the Peoples Republic of China. Their site (www.zenum.eu) directs you to eXpansys in the relevant countries; the current UK price comes to £480.66 including VAT (Tax) for the SIM Free handset. There were no partner carriers announced, and thus no pricing available yet. I would love one of these but unfortunately it's a little out of my price range, so I'll be sticking with the Palm Tréo 750 for now. If anyone can secure a review unit for me though I would be pleased.
No word just yet on the availability of the actual handset however; hopefully Zenum wont force their customers to wait too long.

2007-05-18T16:36:00.000Z

Review Imminent

Great news, I have received the tracking details for a review unit of some hardware that I have been hinting at recently. I will now reveal that what I am awaiting is the GlobalTop GPSHUD SpeedMeter (HG-100). I look forward to testing out the real world functionality of this device, and see how it compares to other bluetooth GPS receivers out there on the market. I will be testing this as a standalone GPS receiver with Google Maps and TomTom Navigator in addition to using it's unique heads-up display functionality on some road trips to see how it fares. Check back soon and I should have the unit, the review will then follow shortly with plenty of pictures!

2007-05-16T13:35:00.000Z

Zenum Opus Pre-Reservation

It seems to be coming up to the weekend of pre-orders, as I've just been informed that the oft considered vapourware Zenum Opus PocketPC Phone is available to pre-register for on Friday, May 17th. Since I last blogged about it it's specs have altered slightly to include Windows Mobile 6 Professional. Otherwise expect the following:

Sleek and slim form factor, good looks
QWERTY keyboard
2.5" TFT Touchscreen
GSM 900 (850)/1800/1900/GPRS(class 10)/EDGE
miniSD
128MB ROM & 64MB RAM
2MP digital camera w/digital zoom
Bluetooth, 802.11b/g, IrDA
Mini USB connector

The BT specification version is not known but I would hazard a guess of 1.2, also note the unfortunate lack of 3g (UMTS)/HSDPA. Otherwise a beautiful phone and one I might consider myself. No word on pricing - hopefully more will be revealed on Friday.

Check the link for pre-orders: www.zenum.eu

2007-05-16T13:22:00.000Z

Optimus Keyboard Pre-Order...

I've just been informed via e-mail that the long-awaited, ever delayed and heavily priced Optimus Maximus keyboard from Art. Lebedev studios will be accepting pre-orders on their site from Sunday, May 20th.

One downside; they estimate shipping in December 2007, so still a 7 month wait. Keyboards will be on a first come first served bases, with a projected total of 800 available to ship between December '07 and the end of January '08.

No word on pricing on the site itself yet, but previous reports were along the $1500 line, so expect it to be in the exclusive range of ~£1000+ when it eventually ships.

Incidentally, I thought the concept images looked a lot cleaner than the final rendering, but each to their own. If I ever manage to procure a review unit you'll be the first to know, however I wouldn't hold your breath!

2007-05-15T12:18:00.000Z

Windows Home Server Update

I have been running the April CTP of Home Server for a few weeks now, and thought it was about time to give my overall impressions in comparison to the previous build. First off the bat, it's functioning much better that the last build. I initially only added my laptop with the Connector software as with the previous build, but instantly I could see the improvement; all scheduled backups over WiFi have completed successfully - including the initial long backup - without failure. In the last build the scheduled daily backups never worked over wireless for me, and many manual backups failed. With the positive results I added a few more systems with variations of OS's. Right now the server is backing up my Vista Ultimate laptop, Vista Business tablet and my housemates XPSP2 laptop. The XP system gave the only trouble, failing to perform the initial backup over wireless 8 times, but succeeding first time over wired ethernet - taking only 40 minutes. This might be down to the wireless card inside the laptop, however it was positioned 2 metres away from the router...

I have yet to add my HTPC to the mix, however I have allowed it access to the shared folders over the network and it is happily streaming media from the server. Occasionally when firing up a file it needs a few seconds to adjust, or a restart of the file but once it's going it streams perfectly without stuttering. The initiation issues will most likely be down to the fact that I have been forced to connect my HTPC over 802.11g rather than having it directly wired into the network this year. It still performs admirably however.

There are a few welcome cosmetic changes, and the initial out-of-box experience (OOBE) has been greatly improved. Set-up has been simplified slightly, and there is now an included UPnP setup for your router to create a windows live domain and allow access from the internet to your server (protected of course). This allows access to the files on your systems, control of backups and if remote desktop is enabled on your system will allow you to pull up the desktop of any attached (and switched on) computer connected to your server from anywhere on the net. This didn't work on my router, but that may be due to having two connected in series, and I have set them up very specifically. Also one of them runs a custom version of linux rather than the stock OS, so manual configuration is necessary in my case. The help files are still a little space and some elements don't flow together very well, but I'm sure that will improve as time rolls on and we approach Beta 3 and the release candidates.

Add-ins are a nice new feature that allow developers to create plug-ins with the SDK to enable some new features on the server. This seems to be a concession by the WHS team for more advanced/power-users that have been crying out for more functionality beyond the 3 elements WHS already provides (remote access, automated backups, central storage).

The main negative of this build I have encountered is that it seems slightly more unstable than the previous version. I have just needed to restart the server per the request of the connector software to reinitialise the backup service. This is the first time is has told me such a message, it is more frequent that the server loses all communication with the network and cannot be accessed without a hard reset. This seemed to occur following an automatic update that was downloaded for Small Business Server - the base on which WHS is installed - however I couldn't confirm this and recently the server has been working fine (Sods law). Today's communication error is the first in a while, and even then I could still access the server both through the shared folders, remote desktop and the connector software; only that backups weren't functioning.

The initial installation didn't offer the "upgrade" that it should have - this would preserve the data already stored on the server along with existing backups. This is likely due to the previous installation failing to the point of multiple blue screens prior to the installation of the new build. Following a clean format and installation of the April CTP I experienced about 2 more blue-screens, but since then nothing.

All-in-all it's a great evolution from the previous build, and I am excited to see what more lies in store for us in the next. I'm sure, like this time, I will be pleasantly surprised.

2007-04-28T12:21:00.000Z

Getting back to the swing of things...

My career is now saved, if temporarily on hiatus for the moment. This means that I can now get back down to testing what I can and blogging about it. I am just (finally) about to install the Home Server April CTP, and yesterday went ahead with a new LH Server install. I have also just returned from a short break - after finding out for certain that all will be well, I disappeared to Stockholm for a long weekend break, then a few days after returning from that jumped back over to Ireland for a week to see my family. Will the harsh time tables and high stress I haven't had the time to do these things for a while. Hopefully I will have some more news and musings for you soon, so stay tuned.

Oh, and as for that review; as of yet I have not heard back, I will e-mail again today and see what is happening.

2007-03-25T11:41:00.000Z

Review

I promised a review of something exciting a couple of weeks back - I received word from the developers that they had put in a request for a review unit for me, however I have not heard back from them since. The device was showcased at CeBit so I expect to hear something more soon.

I can tell you that it is in the GPS family, and should bring tech that was previously available only on high end cars to the average consumer, but we'll have to wait and see until the reviews (hopefully including mine!) start rolling in.

2007-03-24T13:25:00.000Z

Apologies...

I know there's been a lack of posts here lately, but I've been fairly busy trying to save my career. Unfortunately that's not going too well at the moment.

Anyhow, I thought I'd just post a couple of pics from the last few weeks. Below is the beta kit from Windows Home Server - it arrived in the first few days of March - I wasn't expecting it, as I had already downloaded and burned my own discs, however it's nice :) The last few OS beta's I've been a part of didn't send media unless it was requested, and this makes me nostalgic for the good ol' days. I have piles upon piles of old beta discs from Millennium, Win 2000, XP and MCE, a few from Windows 98 too. All the server beta's I have been in since the Win2K side of things have been downloads only. Anyhow, made me smile. Also below that is a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate I won for taking part in the online developer launch of Vista - it arrived a couple of days ago. As you can see it's the proper disc, although obviously the box isn't the standard retail one. Active tech beta testers were given access to a download of the final code to create our own disc. One of my fellow testers created a very nice label which I burned using a labelflash drive - you can see that disc at the end :)

2007-03-04T15:01:00.000Z

Joost

I've been trying out Joost recently - hype on the net is pretty huge for this, but if you've been left out of the loop let me fill you in briefly. Basically this is an attempt to bring IPTV, or regular television programmes in other words, to people via the net. Install the software and you are launched into a custom/proprietary interface where you can choose from a (presently limited) selection of tv programmes. Its credentials are decent, being developed by the same people who brought Skype into the world, and it must be remembered that this is still very much in beta, though at the moment I don't quite feel it deserves all the hype it's receiving.

Is it worth it? Well, until some better content is introduced it has lost my vote - I'd rather run Media Center in a window or on a second monitor with regular TV shows or recordings/dvd's and not have to worry about network lags or drop outs, particularly if you're using most of your bandwidth. When there is a good connection the quality looks good, however I've only tested it on an 8.9" screen - Joost wont launch in Vista without disabling my Anti-Virus, and whilst I am behind a hardware firewall it's still not something I'm willing to do with an application using open ports, so I'm limited to my only remaining XP system - the tablet pc.

My second issue is the interface - it's horrible. Dark and dull, boring and uninspired. On top of that it refuses to respond to my touchscreen, and short of remembering the many keyboard shortcuts (as I'm uninspired by the software this is not a priority for me) the mouse remains the only interface control. I haven't tried it with a remote, but don't hold high hopes just yet.

Lastly, there are too many ads that occur in odd places, or (correctly) in between shows, which makes more sense. I understand the need obviously, the content does need to be subsidised, however I think a little tweaking in that area is important for the usability of the software when it goes public.

Hopefully some changes will be made to these areas by the next beta release, but I will keep you posted.

2007-03-02T02:03:00.000Z

"i'm"

If you're in the US and looking to do something good with all those instant messages you send, have a wander over here.

Don't worry - all you have to do is put a special emoticon in your name, and chat to your hearts content. Sorry for all of us outside the US, however you can still add the emoticons to your name for the causes you'd like to support, and spread the word to all your IM friends in the States - get them to put it in their name then keep bugging them to chat :p The more they chat, the more advertising money goes to charity.

2007-03-01T22:39:00.000Z

Review

In the coming weeks I will (hopefully) have something new and exciting to review on the site. I wont go into details just yet, but keep checking back :)

2007-03-01T22:25:00.000Z

Home Server Update

Well my first impression of Home Server is mixed. I like the interface although I feel it needs a fair bit of work. For the home consumer environment I don't think all of the features are obvious enough. Additionally it has so far failed to backup any of the systems I have tried. Obviously the first backup takes the longest as subsequent ones only backup the changes but so far after leaving my systems on all night every backup has either failed to start at all or been interrupted during the process sometime. On top of that the connect software failed to install to my tablet pc running XP TPCE 2005, so I've only been able to test it on Vista systems so far. It's fair to say however that in a week of use, I am pretty disappointed with it so far.

On the plus side though the access to the shares over the network occurs seamlessly and streams relatively happily over the network to media centres or laptops to WMP. Also the visual representation of the data allocation via the pie chart is a nice way to handle it, although the graphics need some refinement overall I feel.

Anyhow, once I have sorted the MCE hard-drive situation I will give the Server a better run on more systems and let you know how it copes. I do hope that in future incarnations of the software there are a few more functions available to home server, otherwise I have a feeling that it will be an overpriced NAS that won't get the market share it either deserves or could have - they just can't drop the ball on this one, and if that means delaying the launch then I feel it should be done.