Stakans Tech

Easy backup of your mobile photos

2014-08-24T12:33:00.001+02:00

Are you worried about photos on your mobile getting lost? Do you have good backup? Well, Google have got some good and free help for this. And the best part, it happens without you doing anything about it. You take the pictures, Google take care of the backup.

This is the steps:

• sign up for a Google account

• start using Google+

• instal the Google+ app on your mobile phone

• when asked, gain the app access to your album

Google will now take backup of all your photos in the album, and also automatically backup any new photos after you take some new. You will then have the photos in the Google+ app, and can share or copy as you want. If you delete photos from your phone, they will not get deleted from Google.

One tip: Use wifi the first time because if you have a lot of pictures it will be a big amount of data. And over 3G it may cost you some money.

Solar project update

2014-07-27T10:16:00.001+02:00

I had to move the hole thing because of to much power loss in the cables (to long cables). I have also set up a new panel and made some modifications on the frame for the panels, so now I can adjust the gradient to get more energy from the sun.

I have also made a connection so I can charge my phone from the system:)

The battery bank is now 239 Ah in case of some days with bad weather.

To save power I have installed a light sensor to control the lights I have on the outside of the house. There is also a timer to shut down the power for those lights in the middle of the night (no one is out here at that time)

The system works great, but I need more power. So next step will be a wind generator.

Upgrading iPhone 3G to 7.0

2014-02-10T21:55:00.001+01:00

Well... not exactly iOS 7, but pretty close. I'm tying out whited00r 7.0 for iPhone 3G.
I have earlier made my old 3G to a child safe phone, and it has been used very much by my now 4 year old son, and it has just been passed by to my 1 year old son.
I'm not sure if it's just me getting used to my iPhone 5 or if the 3G has started to get slower and slower. After some searching I found Whited00r, and it looks amazing. So I'll try it out, and I'm still going to make the phone child safe. I will not have my kids phoning emergency.

Step 1:
While downloading Whited00r, I'll make a backup of the iPhone with iTools. I choose iTools because I then can take backup of all files, even documents of apps. Since my kids love to use Mxtube, I have to make a backup of those videos and settings also. The cameraroll is also important! (My 4 year old has taken 770 photos with the phone...impressive!)
For MxTube: The videos is located at /Var/Mobile/Media/MxTube and the settings (VideoLibrary.plist) at /Var/Mobile/Library/Preferences/

Step 2:
The files from Whited00r is a .zip, so this need to be unzipped. Inside is all files needed for upgrading the phone.

Step 3:
Use the Redsn0w application and enter DFU-mode. Let the computer install the needed drivers.

Step 4:
iTunes will tell it found an iPhone in restore-mode. Hold the Shift-key and click restore-button. Browes to the Whited00r .ipa file, and iTunes will start upgrading (or restoring) the phone.

To be continued...

Blue&Me

2014-02-08T22:49:00.001+01:00

My Fiat 500 is a 2011 model, and has the second generation of Blue&Me.

I have just updated to the latest version, and the update went very well. Easy to follow instruction on Fiat's website for Blue&Me.

Have tested the functonslity and it is very easy to use. Some problem when I use the "Call" function, but that might be because my pronounce of name is a bit different then standard English. But the phonebookfuture is working, so I use that.

I have an iPhone 5 and it syncs without problem.

I have also installed EcoDrive, and this I will tell more about later. Just some more testing to do.

Disco in Finland

2014-02-08T22:06:00.003+01:00

Not so much tech, but a bit funny.
Enjoy how they learn to dance disco in Finland;

My solar power project

2014-02-08T12:00:00.001+01:00

Just started a project where I want to test out solar power. A cheap solar panel that provide 6W is mounted on the south wall of the house.

I had two 12V batteries from some other project, each on 7,5Ah.

All is wired up in a cabinet that I also had from before, and a cable is connected to the outdoor lamp which is fitted with a 12V lamp of 3W.

The controller is bought on eBay. The controller can handle up to 15A.

To do:

* check both batteries (drain is to fast)

* consider a second solar panel (double the effect)

* make nicer wiring

* find other "free" enery sources

Update and more pictures will come.

Update 1:

Checked both batteries, and one is bad. Haven't got a new one so for now just one is installed.

Have also made som rewiring so the size of the cable is the same all over.

Still not so nice inside, but that will be sorted out later.

What is working after iOS 7 Jailbreak

2013-12-30T09:51:00.003+01:00

After the jailbreak of iOS 7, not everything from Cydia is working. So insted of trying your self, here is a list that keeps updating after input from other users. Feel free to contribute you too.

(This list is not made by me, I'm just using it as a helpful tool)

List of Cydia tweaks and apps

Bidroop invite codes

2013-08-08T21:57:00.003+02:00

Bidroop is being popular and it's starting to be more and more important to join while it's still fresh and in closed Beta.

For those who is interested I have collected some invite codes. I will monitor and change to new after they are used, so it will (almost) always be fresh and working codes here.

1) wHaknGZF

Curios? Check out www.bidroop.com

External DVD

2012-08-04T13:49:00.001+02:00

If you do not have an external DVD or CD driver, why not build your own?
This is my simple sullotion (works even with harddiskdrives, IDE and SATA:)

Favorite YouTube video week 29

2012-07-20T22:35:00.003+02:00

My favorite YouTube-video for this week is a video about the worlds smallest V12 engine. How this gay manage to do this is amazing for me, but I'm very fascinated about it.
If I could, I would like to make one of does my self. But i know it is impossible...

My collection of retro computers

2012-07-19T22:14:00.001+02:00

I have a small collection of retro computers, and som game consols and now I wil start to give you some insight in what I have.
Just startet cleaning the TV room now to get more space for my computers, and also an opportunity to use them on a easy way. Today they are al located at different places in the house, and this is not a good situation. My girlfrind is not happy with this.
My collection is:

Commodore 64 with cassete player
Amiga 2000
Amiga 3000
Amiga 500
Amiga 600
Amiga 1200
Amiga 4000
Amiga CD32
Commodore CDTV
Nintendo NES
Nintendo 64
IBM 286
Lots of 486's, differnt brands

Also have some more game consoles, but this I do not category as retro right know. But they will be.
Included with all this maschines I also have som equipment like software, hardware (accellerators etc), joysticks, mouses and so on.

The first project now is to get room for all this, and then it shal be connected to the home theatre system. This will be a challenge but I like this stuf so I think it will be fun.
I will continue to post when thing get at place. There will also be pictures, so stay tuned!

Do not blow into your NES-cartridges

2012-07-19T22:01:00.000+02:00

It has "always" been common to blow into the cartridges when there as been problem with game not starting. It's usualy effective just then, but it's not a good thing to do after some time.
The reason is that when you blow you blow some of the dust further in to the cartridge. You also get a certain amount of moisture and this causes more dust to get stuck to the contact plate. After a wile this dust will get to the connector inside your NES and this will be "damaged". If so happens you have to replace your connector. This is an easy job to do, so not worry. But when you have replaced, itæs a good thing to know that your games are clean som your connector will last longer.
To clean your games, just get som "clean" alchol and some q-tips. Do not use to much alchol because it's just to get the q-tips wet. Clean both sides of the contact plate and make sure not to get any of the cotton from the q-tips stuck on the plate. It drys quickly, so you are good to go just aftre finnished cleaning :) Happy gaming!

Child safe iphone

2012-07-17T23:37:00.001+02:00

When I bought a new iPhone I was wondering what to do with the old 3G.
Then I thought I could give it to my 2 year old son.
After a fresh jailbreak and some tweaks it was a child safe phone, with no posibilities to ring or send sms. So no emergancy calls either.

Having an old PS2 EyeToy cam laying around?

2011-06-02T20:06:00.000+02:00

If you happen to have an old EyeToy cam for the PS2, you can use this as a webcam for your Pc. And the quality is good as well.
When you plug your EyeToy cam to your computer, it will automaticly start searching Windows for drivers. But it will not find any. Go to your Device manager and locate you EyeToy device. (It should be marked with an questions mark.) Depending on the name of the cam, choose the correct driver from her:
Logitech driver (link updated 30.12.13)
Namtai driver (link updated 30.12.13)

Download the correct driver to your computer and unzip (remeber location). Now go back to your Device manager and right click and pres Properties, Drivers and Update driver. Do not let the computer search Windows Update, but brows to the destination where you unziped the driver.

You will get some errors, but they are noe danger. At the end you must pick 50 or 60 hertz update. Read in the description in the window what to choose.

I have testet and found both cam and drivers to work on Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows Vista and Windows 7.

Back!

2011-06-02T18:11:00.001+02:00

The blog is back! A year has past, and it has been a stresful year. But soon now I will start posting again. This is the first just to say I'm back.
By the way, I'm now blogging from my iPhone, and it works great!

An iPhone 3G is good enough

2011-06-02T13:40:00.001+02:00

I have an iPhone 3G and happy wiht this. I'm not sure why "everybody" want's the new iPhone 4, beacuse the 3G can do almost everything like the 4.

The iPhone 4 has of course more CPU, more RAM and a better display, but that's becuse it is a newer model though.
If you do the right things you can have an iPhone 3G that can have folders in the iOS, use multitasking (i can manage to have up to 6 apps running at the same time) and have a video recorder for the cam.
The downside with the 3G is the low amount of RAM. It can be a bit slow sometimes, and you need to have a watch on your memory status. The positive side though, is that the iPhone 3G now is very cheap :D And that's good enough for me!

I will tell you more about how to get this to work, but if you want to have all this opportunities you must jailbreak your phone. It's a simple operation, and if the correct instruction is followed it's completly safe.
I will make a guide for this, but new software is made all the tiome so it's not so easy. But it will come.

How to stream from Spotify to Wifi-radio

2011-06-02T13:17:00.003+02:00

If you have a Wifi-radio, you can stream music from Spotify (or iTunes) to the radio. That means you can have your Pc in your office or something and listen to your music were ever you have your radio. I have a Pinell radio in the kictchen.

How to do this:

First you must have a Pc with Windows, Spotify, wireless network, and a wifi-radio.

a) Close Spotify and/or iTunes. Make sure you exit the program.
b) Locate your program folder. This is usually C:/Program files/Spotify/ and C:/Program files/iTunes/
c) Download DSBridge from http://code.google.com/p/dsbridge/. You need the files "DSound.dll" and "dsbridge.ini". Put these in your Spotify and/or iTunes folder. (You might need to make admin privileges to do this if you use Windows 7)
d) Download Lame MP3 Encoder from http://www.free-codecs.com/Lame_Encoder_download.htm.Here you need the file "lame_enc.dll". Put this in your Spotify and/or iTunes folder.
e) Start Spotify or iTunes and play something. You will now se a new icon in your tray, a colored ball. This shows that your streamserver is active.
f) If you have an Internet Radio, go to your Internet radio portal page and find something like My added station, My favorites or something simular (See the instructions for your radio to find the adresses)
g) Find your computers IP adress by click on Start and then type 'CMD' in the search bar and press enter. In the new window, type in 'ipconfig' and press enter. Your IP will be something like 192.168.1.XXX.
h) At your Internet radio portal page, add a new station and call it Spotify or whatever you want. Type in your IP and the port for the streamserver. The port is 8124, so your IP shal look something like http://192.168.1.101:8124/ The format is MP3 if you have to set this. Save your settings
i) Make sure your WIFI radio is at the same network as your Pc. Find your new added station on your radio and you are ready to go! I have to make sure the music is playing before entering the radio, but this might not be a problem for yoy.
If you have a wifi-radio without internetportal, you should have te opportunity to manual enter the IP for your streamserver direct in the radio menu.

EDIT: If you're having problem, it might be the firewall causing this. Either on your computer or in the router. See this for how to open ports and forward on routers: http://www.wikihow.com/Set-Up-Port-Forwarding-on-a-Router

Happy listening!

New new new

2011-06-02T12:38:00.000+02:00

Well, yesterday I started this blog without actually any reason at all. Thought it was great, and went to sleep. But this morning I figured out that I want something else with this blog. So, today I will remove some old post, redesign the themes and make new post.
From now this will be a more technical blog. iPhone, Mac, PC, Amiga, Nintendo, selfmade stuff....I will cover as much as I can. But, it will take some time though. So be patient :)