Digital Blade, LLC

3G Coverage Maps

Terry — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:42:20 +0000

Looking for 3G coverage maps from the major carriers?AT&T: www.wireless.att.com/coverageviewer Expanding network support for 3G speeds, also supports FLO television which is digital TV over UHF channel 55.BTW coverage.att.com is an interesting site although it’s more an ad than useful tool.Sprint: coverage.sprintpcs.com Starting to roll out EVDO Rev A in some markets which is even faster.Verizon: reallylongurlsojustclickhere Ton’s of coverage obviously. Supports VCAST technology (same as AT&T’s Flo)T-Mobile: coverage.t-mobile.com T-Mobile is still at the very beginning of rolling out a 3G network so the majority of the time you’ll be operating at EDGE speeds.

Laptop Wont Turn On

Terry — Fri, 24 Apr 2009 16:04:34 +0000

Scenario: Laptop went into standby or hibernation mode and now won’t turn back on.
Symptoms: Laptop power led is lit, indicating it is getting power from the AC adapter, but the laptop appears dead or there will be fan noise, but the display is blank and the system will not respond to the usual action of opening the lid or pressing the power button to turn it on.
One Solution: You need to do a hard reset. Try GENTLY pressing the power button and holding it down for 10-20 seconds. You may hear the fan turn off or the hard drive shutdown. If the system doesn’t respond to the hard reset, try removing the battery, wait a few seconds, and then reinstall it. Count to 30 and then press and release the power button.
If this doesn’t work, please consider calling us to discuss onsite service in the Charleston area.

3G Network’s On 2G Foundation

Terry — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 05:05:34 +0000

Interesting article about new 3G Cell networks. Upsides versus current downsides.

Unfortunately, they are faster but can be less reliable. Also, they often reduce battery life compared to older networks like Edge.

Here’s the link

Browser Usage Stats

Terry — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 04:12:20 +0000

Statcounter is a service used by webmasters to track how many visitors come to their site, it’s what I use here at digitalblade.com. According to Statcounter, they track over 4 billion page loads a month. They have just introduced a new free service that provides statistics on browser global market share.Statcounter’s main site Statcounter Global Stats site

Avoid The Mobile-Pre USB Latency Issue

Terry — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 19:03:30 +0000

I own a Mobile-Pre USB, this is a great little box that connects to your computer and provides the following inputs: 2x XLR(with phantom power), 2x 1/4″, 1/8″ Stereo Mic. You also have 2x 1/4″ out and a 1/8″ Stereo out (for monitoring) . The sample rate can go up to 48khz (better than CD quality). All while running off a USB cable with no other power required.

One of the issues that I encountered was a significant latency between speaking into the mic and what I heard in the headphones. If you search Google, this is apparently a pretty common problem.

My first attempt at using the Mobile-Pre USB box was with an older laptop running XP. The initial results were dissapointing. I had the latency issue so I couldn’t monitor my levels live, I had to record and then play back. I also was unable to use Audacity, it simply didn’t see the mic I had hooked up. I found if I installed the ASIO4All driver and then used the version of Ableton Live 6 that came with the Pre USB I got pretty good results.

Recently, I was installing XP into a partition on one of my desktops. I thought I would try an experiment. After installing XP and only the most basic drivers it needs, ethernet, video card etc, I installed the Mobile-Pre USB driver and then Audacity. Audacity worked right off the bat, and the results were fantastic. NO LATENCY AND NO DISTORTION!

I would advise anyone who has one of these devices that they are capable of very good sound. Due to the fact the Mobile-Pre runs off USB completely, it’s great for laptops. It can operate with no latency without special drivers. Issues to consider are the amount of ram in your system and CPU, more and faster are always better. I believe that the issue I was encountering with my laptop is the typical Windows issue that over time there is a general slowdown in performance that can really only be alleviated by a fresh install of the OS.

BTW, when I say No Latency, I really should say no detectable latency. Technically there may be a few millisconds, but subjectively I am not hearing it.

Windows XP running slow even in safe mode

Terry — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 06:39:53 +0000

I ran into a computer the other day that had suddenly started running extremely slow. One of the clues to the problem was that the slow performance happened even when the system was booted in safe mode, this mode was specifically created to allow a system to be booted in a minimal configuration so modifications could be made to the setup. This pointed the problem in the direction of being a hardware issue. It turned out the BIOS had a setting for a CPU Compatibility Mode. This is a mode that turns off some of the CPU functions for compatibility with certain older software. Setting it to the factory default of “off” and rebooting immediately fixed the problem.

Dead Emachine

Terry — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 06:46:18 +0000

I had a client whose Emachine died unexpectedly. Four years old, 1.3ghz Celeron, 512mb dram and a dead power supply. I advised them that it was probably not cost effective to put a lot of time/money into resucitating it. I removed the hard drive and installed it in a external enclosure. Luckily it powered up and I was able to get the data they wanted off of it and burn a DVD. They’re going to get a new box and use their existing monitor with it. Lesson – Backup your data!

Random XP Shutdowns

Terry — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 05:29:12 +0000

Recently a client called because their system was randomly rebooting while they were using it. If a problem happens every time you perform a certain act, like run a program, open a file, turn on a piece of hardware, etc, it can be reproduced. This allows you to eliminate possible causes. But if a problem just randomly occurs with no apparent cause, this is typically harder to fix.

This was a Celeron system with 256mb of DDR in the form of 1 Dimm. This is a really low amount of memory for a Windows XP system. XP needs at least 512mb to run reliably and more like 1gb to starting running well (more than this will only lead to minor performance enhancement unless running memory hungry applications). The initial recomendation was to install a 1gb Dimm. This improved performance by reducing the computer’s reliance on virtual memory.

The client contacted us la few days later and told us that while the computer was faster, it was still randomly rebooting. We returned and decided that the system could be suffering from overheating issues. The CPU fan was removed and a considerable amount of dust was blown out. The existing heatsink grease was wiped away, replaced with fresh grease, and the heatsink was reinstalled. The rebooting issues seem to have been resolved.

Acer Aspire One

Terry — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 15:43:58 +0000

These are very cute laptops. they’re in the category of Netbooks..small, lightweight, cheap. The one I used was blue, they’re also available in white, black, red, brown and pink(!). Typical configuration is 1gb of ram and a 80-120gb hard drive. No optical disc built in but, ask yourself..do you need to carry one with you all the time? Remember, this is meant to be a second computer, so your primary machine would normally have a DVD/CD reader/burner. The Aspire One also has multiple USB ports, a multimedia slot for memory cards, Wifi (802.11G).

For approximately $349.00 you’ve got a great computer for the Web, listening to music, watching videos and email.

We Finished A New Charleston Website

Terry — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 22:09:22 +0000

Digital Blade, LLC just completed a website for Carolina One Auctioneer Gregg Napier. The site is based on Drupal and was designed in a way that allows Gregg to maintain the site and add new content on his own. We believe that out clients should have control over their information because it’s an asset just as much as any physical object. The site is located at www.charlestonrealestateauctions.com. Please visit it and tell us what you think.