Nybbles and Bytes

It's time for change... Seeya Cell C, roll on Melon Mobile!

2024-01-17T23:17:00.002+02:00

Many moons ago, in the region of 20 years or so, I abandoned the MTN ship and made the jump to Cell C. At the time, Cell C were a fresh alternative to the reigning cellular networks in South Africa.
They offered something that MTN could not - quick support and a seemingly willing approach to assisting clients.

At first, the honeymoon was bliss - Cell C was great, and I was happy to have jumped ship.
20 years on, and the picture is far less rosy.
Cell C still doesn't offer 5G data services, their support staff are often rude, their coverage is sketchy and they don't even operate their own cell towers anymore.
Recent headlines also paint a dire financial picture for the company in coming years...

After growing tired of their incessant calling to advise me that I am due for an upgrade, I started trying to find alternative options with other cellular providers...

Enter Melon Mobile - an MVNO (Mobile Virtual Network Operator), which runs off the MTN network.
After seeing their ads on Instagram, it became apparent that their approach was in stark contrast to the well-established contract-based cellular mindset that we have all become used to.
You see, Melon don't do contracts - it's all month to month, and their pricing is super competitive.
You can opt for a free trial, but I signed up for their R199 Summer Promo, which gets me:

5GB data
500 SMS
UNLIMITED Voice minutes per month

...on a month to month basis, for R199!
So I'm not stressing about a 24 or 36 month commitment here. My commitment issues are sorted :)

Here's where the deal gets really sweet. Instead of going into a store in a crazy busy shopping mall, waiting for a consultant, figuring out what you want to sign up for, producing reams of supporting documents, payslips, bank statements and blood samples... and finally hopefully ending up with a new cell package, you just download the Melon app, and do everything in there.
For me, it took all of 20 minutes, including RICA (which Melon do via Whatsapp).
A really nice touch here is the option to sign up for a free eSIM (if your phone is compatible, otherwise you can order a normal SIM card).
For the uninitiated, an eSIM works just like a physical SIM card, except it downloads and installs directly to your phone - it's essentially a digital SIM card. Nifty!

The Melon app showing plan and payment options

Super clean, uncluttered UI = easy reading

The entire setup and installation can be done from the comfort of your own home, in less than 30 minutes... and yes they can port your existing number as well :)
Need support? Hit them up on Whatsapp and a real live human being will reply within minutes, ready to sort out any queries that you may have.
Compare that to the 25 minute hold time that we are all so used to on other cellular networks...

I've now been on the Melon Mobile network since early November 2023, and if these first few months are anything to go on, they are onto a seriously good product.
Coverage has been excellent almost everywhere - I no longer get dropped calls, and I can actually experience properly decent data speeds.
It would be wise for other cellular networks to learn a thing or 2 from Melon - after all, why should we be locked into cell contracts for several years, all the while putting up with shoddy service and exorbitant pricing?

Still not convinced?
Why not download their app below and take their free trial for a spin ;)
I'm guessing that you might be pleasantly surprised...

Re-visiting my most successful blog post ever - How to synchronise your Tissot T-Touch...

2023-06-17T11:31:00.000+02:00

I've been running this little blog on the side for a while now.
Back in September 2009, I decided to kickstart it by jotting down bits and bobs about IT, techie stuff, and pretty much anything else that grabbed my interest.

Being the lucky owner of a Tissot T-Touch timepiece, I wrote the post below for the benefit of other Tissot owners who ran into the same synchronizing issue that I had:

https://nybblesandbytes.blogspot.com/2010/02/how-to-synchronize-your-tissot-t-touch.html

Little did I know that the post would be extremely well-received, to the point where it peaked at over 4000 views in a single day, backed by many thankful comments from readers who had resolved their issue, thanks to my post.

So here's a little throwback to that most popular of posts ⌚👍🙏😊:

The Tissot T-Touch is an awesome timepiece - the touchscreen simply blows minds wherever it goes, and the watch certainly looks the part!

Only problem is that when something goes awry with the T-Touch, not many people know that you can perform a process called "synchronizing". What this basically does is allow you to get your analog and digital sections of the watch back in sync with each other.
De-synchronization can occur due to exposure to a magnetic field, from devices such as cellphones, speakers etc.
Symptoms of de-synchronization include:

- the time being different between the analog and digital sections of the watch
- the hands of the watch no longer line up to the selected function on the dial, when selecting them using the touch screen
- compass alignment is off. e.g. the hour hand may point South, while the minute hand points East.

The synchronization is pretty simple:

- Press the center button marked "T". The watch should beep once;- Touch the center of the touch-sensitive face until 24H Cm appears in the digital LCD display;
- Press and hold the center button marked "T" for approx. 5 seconds. The watch will beep once and then again a second time, after 5 seconds have passed. The digital LCD display should now read SYNCHRO;
- Press the upper button marked "+" to move the minute hand until it is positioned exactly at 12:00;
- Press the lower button marked "-" to move the hour hand until it is also positioned exactly at 12:00;
- When both hands are aligned together and pointing directly at 12:00, press the center button marked "T" to save your settings.
- Your watch is now synchronized, so no expensive repair work is required!

If you need decent wireless earbuds, these are them...

2023-01-10T21:07:00.001+02:00

During the dark, dire days of Covid lockdown, one of the biggest changes was the move from office-based to home-based work.

Microsoft Teams and Zoom are now the order of the day, much to the delight of workers who would otherwise have to commute long distances to attend meetings.
Thanks to the advent of such technologies, we can now spend less on petrol, avoid frustrating traffic jams and save hours on transport to and from places of work.

On the flip side, we need semi-decent equipment in order to be able to communicate with the world from behind our remote workstations. Aside from computer hardware, we need headphones and microphones that can deliver high quality audio all round, so that we can hear and be heard clearly.

This was my main motivation when I set out on a mission to find a pair of wireless earbuds - a simple solution for when I needed to hop onto a quick meeting or take a quick call on the go.

My initial (brief) research led me to a fairly decent looking pair of SonicGear TWS3 half in-ear earphones.

I prefer the half in-ear flavour of earbuds, since they don't fully sit inside the ear, allowing you to hear some ambient noise. It's a personal choice.

After some testing, it became cruelly apparent that people could not hear me at all when I used these earphones - the audio quality was ok for me, but the microphone quality was really poor.

Onto my next (failed) experiment - a pair of Volkano Scorpio in-ear wireless earphones. These had better audio than the SonicGear, but suffered the same dire microphone performance.

What's the point of wireless earbuds if nobody can hear you when you call them?

After returning the Volkano earbuds, I decided to dig a little deeper into the black hole world of wireless earbuds - there are just so many brands and different technologies on offer in this space.

Finally, I happened on something which seemed to check all the boxes (in reviews at least).

I took the plunge and ordered myself a pair off Takealot, and then I held my breath... and boy did these deliver!

Enter the SoundPeats TrueAir 2 wireless earphones:

First off, these just have a high quality feel to them, first in the packaging, and then in the product itself.

They are presented in a sturdy case, which doubles as a charger for the headphones (providing a total of 25 hours playtime). As an added bonus, the case makes use of a USB-C port for charging.

Spec-wise, these pack a 14.2mm driver and use the AptX codec, which combined produce excellent sound quality (for any audiophiles out there - these are the best sounding earbuds that I have sampled).

Moving onto the real reason for my purchase - a set of headphones with a decent microphone for meetings and calls - this is where these really shine.

The combination of dual microphones in each earpiece, coupled to built-in noise cancelling technology, means that the person on the other side can hear you with crystal clarity, even in the presence of background noise.

I've had these for 6 months now, and they literally go everywhere with me.

Whether I'm in a Teams meeting, taking a call, or just listening to one of my decidedly eclectic Spotify playlists, these just do it all perfectly.

You can check out their full spec sheet here:

https://us.soundpeats.com/products/soundpeats-trueair2-tws-semi-in-ear-earbuds

As mentioned, I purchased mine on Takealot, but stock goes fast.

If you're in the market, these are highly recommended!

What are your lockdown "essentials", and what has lockdown taught you...?

2020-05-15T09:39:00.000+02:00

It's a brave new world that we're living in... like something out of a 90's sci-fi movie!
Now that the Covid-19 lockdown and quarantine are the temporary "new normal", we have been forced to adjust and change the way in which we live and work daily.

As someone who has been self-employed for 15 years, I'm quite used to working from home, but it's a bit different when you can't go out to see clients and colleagues at all.

It's also very strange to be out at the shops and be unable to see who you are shopping next to, because their face is covered by a mask - you can't even see if someone is smiling or scowling... how very odd!

As I'm sure is the case for everyone, I have found certain daily "essentials" to be very useful in getting through this unique time.
Here are some of mine - feel free to chirp in the comments :)

My Bose Soundlink Colour:

Ah yes my old faithful - who can do without a bluetooth speaker nowadays?
It also doesn't hurt that Bose are all about really good sound - despite the small physical dimensions of the Soundlink Colour, it produces excellent sound quality to satisfy my need for beats through the day... and night if I choose to work late :)

...which brings me to my next essential...

Spotify:

Whether I'm in my car, working from home or just doing something around the house, I always have a soundtrack playing in the background :)
Once upon a time I used to keep all my music on an external hard drive, until one day when I discovered the genius of Spotify.
Until then it didn't make sense to me to pay a subscription fee for music, but when you think of the pros - almost any track that you can think of, available 24/7, across all genres, and not having to worry about ever dropping a hard drive and losing all your data - suddenly R59 per month is really a small price to pay.

Add Spotify Connect which allows you to control your music from multiple devices, and it's a no-brainer :)
If you are a music lover and aren't already part of the Spotify universe, best you head on over to www.spotify.com, sign up for free and take it for a test drive.

Coffee:

I'm a coffee snob. It's that simple - I really enjoy a decent cup of coffee, and can you blame me?
So one of the things which has really helped keep things "normal" during a decidedly abnormal time, is my Breville Barista Express.

I was fortunate enough to become the owner of this incredible machine last year, and I have spent the last few months practicing and perfecting how to use it, resulting in these, which really do taste as good as they look :)

Of course the "perfect cuppa" is the result of a combination of which beans you use, which milk you use and a hundred other factors, plus of course personal preference, but it certainly helps not having to rely on coffee shops for a really nice cup of coffee :)

Oh and it saves a ton of cash...!

A garden:

We simply don't realise the value of having a garden until we've been cooped up inside for a prolonged length of time.

To be able to simply walk barefoot on grass and breathe in the (relatively fresher) air, devoid of the normal amounts of pollution... it does something for the soul.

Of course the economic downside is a real mess, but I think it's incredible how this period of forced isolation has forced us to try and get by with less.

Less stuff, less noise, less hustle, less bustle, less human interaction.

All in the name of staying safe.

Hopefully we are all able to come out on the other side of this thing a little bit more sensible, and changed for the better.

How everyday technology makes life easier - Spotify, Admyt, Banking apps, Tap to Pay, Google Maps and more...

2020-04-09T10:54:00.000+02:00

Technology moves insanely quickly nowadays.
I work in the IT field daily, and I often find myself having to play catch up as new tech trends emerge.
Older people that I meet often have a huge resistance to this change, and they often struggle to understand some of the ways in which technology can make their lives easier.

Let's touch on a few of these (some of these may be slightly less relevant under current lockdown conditions...:):

Spotify:

For me, Spotify is a huge part of my daily tech ritual. Sure there are other music streaming services out there (Google Music, Apple Music), however Spotify is just the one that I happen to prefer.
For someone who knows nothing about streaming music services, Spotify must sound like madness.
To have full access to over 35 million tracks on demand (available offline when I want), is truly awesome if you are a music lover like me.

Prior to my Spotify adoption of course, I used to be set on the idea that I had to have full physical control and possession of all my music - all of my .mp3 files neatly stored on hard drives.
The downside to this is how delicate hard drives are - one drop, and your data is toast.
Going even further back, it was CD's of course - all neatly stacked in the TV cabinet gathering dust in their cases, all the while accumulating surface scratches every time they were handled.
Jumping back to the days of cassette tapes and vinyl - well things were very different indeed back then.
You can of course still order vinyls nowadays - there is certainly something to be said for the sound quality that a decent vinyl can produce when played on audiophile-class equipment, but that's a topic for another post :)

Long story short - if you want pretty much any song, from any genre, available to listen to 24/7, on your phone, PC, Mac or tablet, then check out Spotify or one of their competitors.
Personally I like Spotify because you can control your music via multiple devices simultaneously, but that's just my choice :)

www.spotify.com

Admyt:

Admyt seeks to solve a very simple problem when visiting shopping malls - parking tickets.

Now we all know the process:- arrive, take your ticket, boom opens, and you're in.
Then when you leave:- rifle through your pockets to find the ticket, check if you actually have change to pay for parking with, hope like hell that the machine isn't out of change, pay for parking, take ticket, present ticket at exit, boom opens and you're done.
It's tedious at best.

Enter Admyt.
Admyt is a free app that you can get from Google or Apple's stores.
It allows you to load your vehicle and a credit card onto the app. Once loaded, all you have to do is pull up to a boom at one of the Admyt-enabled shopping centres (check locations here), and the boom magically opens.
You then receive an SMS to inform you that your Admyt session has started, while the app keeps track of how long your session has been going for.
When your shopping spree is done, hop in your car, drive to the boom and watch it magically open again.
Any parking fees due are then automatically deducted from your credit card.

Any questions?

www.admyt.com

Banking apps:

I remember the days when we still had to go into something called a "branch", if we wanted to do anything relating to banking :)
We had to fill out "deposit slips" and make payments with strange things called "cheque books"...
Nowadays it (almost) all happens on our mobile devices.
Payments, Transfers, Balance enquiries - almost anything can now be done on our phone apps in real time.
Sometimes I even perform transactions on the fly during my shopping - how much more convenient can life be?

I wonder if any millennials who read this will even know what a cheque book is...? ;)

Tap to Pay:

Here's one that often unnerves even the most tech-savvy of old school folk.

The idea that one can pay for goods by simply tapping your card onto a machine is so deeply unsettling for some people - I saw a lady in Woolies last month getting herself into quite a state, just because the lady at the till tapped her card to pay.
She insisted that she had "disabled" it with her bank, and therefore the lady who tapped it must be taken to task!
Truth is, if the card has the tap to pay symbol on it, then it is tap to pay enabled.
For a little peace of mind, most banks will allow tap to pay transactions to go through without a PIN code, up to around R500. Above that, and the machine will request a PIN code.

Google Maps:

This one truly is a cornerstone of daily survival, to me at least.
Google Maps, and GPS in general is something that we now take for granted to a huge degree.
When I was growing up, the name Map Studio was commonplace if you were venturing anywhere unknown.
Map Studio published (and probably still do) area maps of the large metropolitan areas, and this is how we found our way around back then.
If something changed, you then had to go out and purchase the latest edition of the area that you were interested in.

Today it is beyond simple.
Open Google Maps on your phone, type the address where you want to go, and your best route is automatically calculated, along with traffic info to ensure the quickest possible route.

How did we ever cope before such simplicity?

Evernote and Google Keep:

Trying to keep track of lists, to-do's, tasks and random factoids through the day can be a really challenging task.
We cannot truly multi-task (as much as we think we can), but we try to all the same - personally I find myself getting quite stressed out when several things are thrown at me simultaneously.
That's where a cloud-based note taking app steps in to help.

I've been using Evernote for years now - it allows me to take notes and sync them between my devices seamlessly, so that they are always up to date.
More recently though, I started trying out Google Keep - a lightweight app that does pretty much the same thing as Evernote. The key word here is "lightweight".
Evernote can get a bit cumbersome, and the web version is pretty slow to load.
Google Keep on the other hand is quick to load, and very quick to sync between devices - there is hardly any lag.
Update notes on one device, and the changes propagate to other devices almost instantly (assuming all devices are online of course).

Regardless which one you choose to make use of, a cloud-based note app should form a part of your daily tech tools, in order to better manage the multitude of things that will invariably be thrown your way.

So what is your tech-weapon of choice that helps get you through the day?

I'll follow this up with another post soon that deals specifically with lockdown related to the Covid-19 Pandemic, and the tools that we can use to adjust to this life-changing event.

Looking for a free website email form processor? Try Formspree...

2019-05-26T16:03:00.000+02:00

Web design is not my thing, mostly because the code messes with my brain too much, and my eye for good looking design is weak at best.

I therefore usually rely on clean, pre-built templates with some attributes that I can tweak or amend according to my needs.

That's all fine and good - I can end up with a reasonable looking responsive site, that renders well on desktop and mobile.

In the past though, I have had issues with my email contact forms and the processing that happens behind the scenes, once the Submit button get clicked.

Sometimes nothing happens.

Sometimes a cryptic error pops up.

Sometimes a success message pops up, but the mail submission is never delivered.

None of these are good things.

Thankfully, I recently discovered Formspree, which you can check out at https://formspree.io/

In a nutshell, all you do is point the action attribute of your form to their URL, and your form submissions will get delivered to your email address.

reCaptcha is automatically enabled as well, to stop all those nasty spam messages from flooding your precious Inbox real estate.

Their free plan requires no registration, and allows unlimited forms with a limit of 50 monthly submissions.

There are also paid plans, which you can view here.

Give it a shot - Formspree is a simple website mail form solution which is quick to implement and works really well.

Things I learnt in 2018...

2019-01-06T22:10:00.000+02:00

With 2019 now officially underway, I thought this would be a good time to jot down some of the lessons that I have taken from the past year.

A lot of the time, these lessons came in the form of daunting challenges, and only in hindsight did I realise what I actually gained from the experience.

Here are a few 2018 pearls that stuck out for me - some trivial, and some a little less so :)

Social media is not reality.

Social media can become a perceived reality, whereas it really serves as the perfect platform for escapism.

Anybody can post the following to social media, and a lot of us have done it:

Idyllic scenes of sun-baked beaches;

Selfies taken amidst utopian surroundings;

Ramblings of whatever sort, be it anger, joy, sadness, humour, or any one of a million other emotions that humans are capable of;

All of this is fine and good and what social media is meant for, but the fact is that we can never know the real truth behind anything that we see on social media platforms.

There is often no context, no background, no back story and no means of comparison.

What you see, is not necessarily what you get.

Viewing a perceived reality on social media also opens up a platform where we compare our own lives with the apparent lives of others that we see on social media.

Don't fall into this trap - the quality of your life does not depend on what others post on social media, be it positive or negative.

Be careful what you put out there.

A lot of people fail to realise the potential implications of posting the wrong thing on social media and chat platforms.

There seems to be a false sense of security that accompanies digital communication. People say things that they would never ordinarily say to someone in real life, as if they are somehow anonymous, protected or untouchable online.

The truth is very different. Once you hit the submit button, your post is out there for the world to see, forward, copy, like, retweet, or snap a screenshot of.

This is especially true for platforms like Whatsapp, where there are really no filters or moderating factors.

Just think of recent newsworthy incidents where content from supposed "private" Whatsapp groups, was forwarded to contacts outside of the group...

It only takes one person to hit forward, and the proverbial cat is most definitely out of the bag...

Think before you post.

Do not believe everything that you read, or everything that you are told.

I am not sure if fake news has always been a thing, but I sure as hell cannot recall anything even close to it when I was growing up.

It's as if the internet has suddenly become this fantasy land where anybody can become an instant journalist, as long as they purvey a story (true or false, doesn't matter) which is juicy enough to be lapped up by gullible souls the world over.

There are people online who make it their sole purpose to get up every morning and just create pure drivel.

The question is why? Perhaps a sad attempt by the drivel-creator to garner some attention in an otherwise desolate existence?

Who knows - the fact is that people lap it up, and they spread it faster than the The Black Death.

Some fake news is annoying, but otherwise harmless. Move along, nothing to see here.

It’s the other kind of fake news that really ticks me off.

The kind which has the potential to cause serious damage.

The kind which stirs up turmoil in political circles, and attempts to sow discord among peace-loving folk who want nothing more than to co-exist in harmony.

We see it in fake news articles on Facebook, or circulated on Whatsapp groups, where a clear political or personal agenda is being pushed by a specific group.

What the fake news authors seek here, is a knee-jerk reaction from gullible victims who prefer to immediately vent and rage in reply, rather than spend 2 minutes, fact-checking the BS that they just ingested.

Instead of applying some quick logic and quickly snuffing the flame, the fake news BS bomb is then rapidly forwarded, copied and pasted to every contact in existence.

IKAG is becoming a place where people request the impossible, for free.

Ahhhh IKAG.

I remember when I was first invited to join this wonderful group.

What a great concept!

Now if you don’t know what IKAG is, it stands for “I know a guy”, and it exists as a group on Facebook where you can post requests for service or product referrals, from other members in the community.

It’s great because it’s word of mouth, so the referrals are largely based on personal experience.

Of late though, I have found that a lot of IKAG posts read something like this:

“Hi IKAG,

I need someone who can do / supply (insert item) URGENTLY!!!

Must be excellent. No Chancers. URGENT DEADLINE. Low budget. Cheapest bidder will get the job. BUT MUST BE BEST QUALITY AND ABLE TO DELIVER BEFORE TOTALLY UNREALISTIC DEADLINE!!!

TO POFADDER!!!”

Ok ok so that’s a slight exaggeration… :)

My point is that IKAG needs to check itself, before it devolves from a truly useful online service, into something where cheapskates seem to think that they can make unrealistic demands on suppliers who are desperate for business.

Sure, specify a deadline or outline a budget, but don’t be silly about it.

Expect to pay a fair price, and expect a realistic turnaround time.

If it happens sooner or cheaper, bonus.

There is always shit to be done.

Pretty self-explanatory this one.

In my experience, no matter how hard you push, no matter how many tasks you tick off your to-do list today, no matter how many clients you see in a day, no matter what it is that you are busy with… there will always be more stuff to do.

If there isn’t, then it’s really just a case of priorities I guess – there will still be stuff, but it just isn’t as important as the stuff you just did :)

This one always hits me just as I am about to go on leave.

I usually have a list of priority tasks that need to get actioned, and I get through them all, as far as is practically possible.

Then, just as I think that I am on top of it all for once, and that I have completed all my to-do’s before I make my escape, another one / two / three… jump onto my list.

What usually ends up happening is that the extra tasks that try and jump the queue and barge onto my list, usually have to wait until I return because I simply have no capacity to complete them.

…and you know what?

They get done when I return, the world keeps on turning and business goes on as usual.

I think the trick is really in prioritising, and accepting that you will never truly have an empty to-do list.

Do not rely on weather reports…

I have come to believe that meteorologists are entitled to a seriously generous margin for error :)

For example, if the weather prediction for tomorrow is 26℃ with a 60% chance of rain in the afternoon, but in reality it turns out to be 32℃ with not a single drop of rain, well then I guess it’s just the weather and nobody can really predict the weather now can they?

But wait a second – our weather predictions are based on synoptic charts and scientific data which by now, surely in the year 2019, should have a fairly high degree of accuracy?

I can safely say that a large proportion of the weather predictions that I looked at in 2018 were either 100% incorrect, or when consulting multiple different weather services, greatly conflicted in their predictions.

There are paying jobs attached to this, remember – people earning salaries to produce data that we depend on, in order to plan our lives around the weather.

Perhaps there should be T’s and C’s in tiny print at the bottom of every weather report which state…:

“The views and opinions expressed in this weather report are not meant to be interpreted literally or used for any practical purpose at all. They are merely a guide and prediction of a potential future weather condition which may or may not occur in your area. If we are entirely wrong in our predictions, we take absolutely no responsibility at all, since nobody can really predict the weather anyway...”

Do not respond emotionally.

This one has actually served me rather well in the real world.

There will come a time when for whatever reason, someone will jump down your throat about something.

It may be work-related. It may be a family thing.

Whichever it is, your response to the situation is critical.

Our immediate response to any attack is defence.

We may feel emotions of rebuttal, and automatically find ourselves in a defensive stance, where any immediate response would almost certainly be an emotional one.

The trick here is to wait. Simply wait. Feelings of anger and defiance make this difficult, but give it a chance.

It may be 5 minutes, or for you it may be 10 minutes, 15 minutes – whatever works for you personally.

Give yourself the time to allow the emotion to wear off, after the initial incident.

Try it out next time you find yourself in a tough spot like this – after a period of just waiting, without responding, you may find that your logical mind has started to take control again.

Once logic kicks back in, and with emotion out of the picture, your response will most definitely be a thousand times better than if you had responded in pure emotion.

Of course, if you are just taking a constant beating like a punching bag, well that’s not ok.

You have bigger problems to sort out then :)

Here's to a 2019 full of only the very best things that life has to offer!

Take your leave, and just disconnect from all of the things.

2018-10-30T15:55:00.000+02:00

I work with a lot of people who are stressed out a fair deal of the time.
Working in Jozi will do that to you - the pace in this city is fast, and we all want to try keep ahead of the game and stay on top of things.
As much as we try however, the truth is that this very often isn't possible or realistic.
We run the rat race marathon day in and day out, chasing deadlines as the month end debit orders come crashing in relentlessly, wave after wave.

It is very easy then to get lost in this cycle.
Days blend into weeks.
Weeks blend into months... and here we are, with just 2 months left in 2018.
It's amazing then to see how many people just haven't bothered to take their leave this year, or sometimes even for several years.
The work-home-work cycle becomes so hypnotic and repetitive, and many people find themselves stuck, and seemingly unable to make a change.

This just further exacerbates the problem, as an expectation gets created of how that person values their leave (or doesn't).
I have also found that the longer one waits to take leave due to them, the harder it becomes to actually take the leave, and make a clear break from the working world, even if just for a few days.
This break though is actually super important, even if it is just time spent at home, away from the daily grind.
Have you ever been working on something intense - a project perhaps, or a complex job, and after a while it starts becoming more and more difficult to focus?
The same thing happens with work in general - the longer you go without leave, the more cloudy things become.
You may think that you're doing just fine, but from the outside things may look a little different.

So next time you take a few days off, make it meaningful.
Bite the bullet, and take a week or 2 if you can. See how your perspective has shifted when you return to the workplace.
You may well find that things which looked a certain way before leave, now look quite different with a fresh pair of eyes.
Sometimes problems that you were having difficulty resolving, find their solutions in this way.
Daunting mountains are sometimes reduced to molehills.

A key component here though, is to disconnect as far as possible.
This is especially challenging today, in the connected world that we live in.
Cellphones, laptops, tablets and social media follow us pretty much everywhere. For the millennial generation, this is often a non-negotiable.
The importance of taking a selfie somewhere and uploading it to every possible social media platform, has become more important than the experience of just getting away from everything and just "being".
We seem to have forgotten the power in simply existing, without having to inform thousands of random people of our every move.
Don't get me wrong - it's a nice thought and a nice ideal. Let's all be social and connected.
I get it.
Just be cognizant of when to disconnect, tune out, and have conversations with real human beings, face to face.

Take your leave, and just disconnect from all of the things.

Help! My Bose Soundlink Colour won't switch on... what to do???

2018-03-18T11:50:00.000+02:00

In the world of Bluetooth speakers, you really do get what you pay for.

I've sampled a few models in my time, and the sub-R1000 units, while they may be loud, are usually very tinny with a lack of low down bass response.
I've been fortunate enough to own a Bose Soundlink Colour for a few years now, and this speaker has delivered solid performance the whole time.

While it may not be the loudest bluetooth speaker that I have heard, it can sit in a corner and push out very decent sound at a moderate volume, without any distortion.

At higher volumes, the bass does drop off somewhat, but I've been very impressed with this little gadget overall.

I was therefore understandably alarmed when the unit refused to switch on yesterday, leaving me stranded in a world without music.
The situation was dire.
I started to envision an expensive visit to Bose South Africa, followed by an unreasonably large EFT from my bank account to theirs...

Thankfully, today we have a resource called the internet, which pretty much makes us all professionals in all fields. Instantly.
It's also a great place to spread dodgy news and make up wonderful factoids.

In this case however, it helped me to get to the bottom of my conundrum, and what follows is the recovery process for a Bose Soundlink Colour that refuses to switch on (assuming that it is charged):

We want to get the speaker into something called "Shipping mode"
To achieve this, first plug the speaker into your wall charger
Hold down the Play / Pause button for 15 seconds
After 15 seconds, while keeping the Play / Pause button pressed, unplug the charging cable from the speaker
Release the Play / Pause button
Plug the charging cable back into the speaker
Press the power button, and the speaker should power on

This process worked perfectly for me, and saved me a repair visit to a Bose store.

My Bose powers on.

Long live the Bose.

Curb your enthusiasm... for WiFi.

2016-12-13T13:31:00.004+02:00

Everything is WiFi nowadays.
There is hardly a dead spot anywhere, and we are constantly being bombarded by the wonderful convenience that is wireless internet.

From an end-user point of view, this is pure bliss.
To have internet everywhere in your home and office, to be able to walk around and be connected at all times - what's not to love?
Unfortunately, like a lot of things, WiFi solutions really should come with T's and C's, because there are some things that WiFi simply cannot do, no matter how much you wish it could.

Back in the days when internet speeds rarely exceeded 4Mbps (I remember how amazing a 4Mbps ADSL connection used to seem...), local connections (cabled and WiFi) always exceeded internet speeds.
This meant that your internet connection was always the bottleneck - every other part of the network was quicker.
Then internet got quicker. ADSL suddenly found itself running at 10Mbps, LTE took off, and fibre has now started to infiltrate offices and homes at the speed of light, literally. Well almost...

So now that internet connections are becoming faster and more stable, we have a situation where the internet speed is not always the bottleneck anymore.
To illustrate this, take the following example:

A local WIFI network runs at a theoretical maximum speed of 300Mbps:

First off, the "300Mbps" figure here is misleading - what the router manufacturers don't tell you is that this is shared bandwidth - i.e. you need to divide 300Mbps by the number of connected devices, to get your actual theoretical max. speed per device.
Secondly, shared bandwidth is not necessarily distributed evenly, in part because there are just so many factors that come into play around WiFi speeds.
These include (but are not limited to):

- Distance from the Access Point
- Specs of the WiFi adapter that you are using to connect with
- Environmental factors (a Netgear specialist even informed me that microwave ovens, office plants and water play a role in degrading WiFi signal)
- Surrounding WiFi networks (channel interference)

The list goes on and on.
Some routers do offer more advanced features (QOS, Dual Band etc.) to try and workaround the above issues, but you'll be paying extra for that of course.
Thirdly, what you gain in range / stability, you will lose in speed.

This applies in several scenarios:
- I have found that using 40Mhz channel width on a 2.4Ghz network has resulted in higher speeds overall, but due to a wider channel, there is a higher likelihood of overlap with neighbouring WiFi networks, and potentially less stability.
- In my experience, device connection speeds were lower when using 20Mhz channel width, however this setting is regarded as more robust - good for use in a highly congested 2.4Ghz environment.

It is also important to consider range vs. speed, when installing a WiFi booster.
WiFi boosters offer a simple, off the shelf, minimal config means of boosting your existing WiFi network signal and eliminating deadspots.
In theory, a wonderful proposition.
In practice, not quite so simple, especially if you are trying to cover a large area...

Here's the thing - every boost results in a 50% speed decrease. 50%!!!
This means that if you are boosting a 300Mbps WiFi network, your boosted signal will only have a theoretical maximum speed of 150Mbps - that's quite a drop off!
Now connect 10 devices to that boosted network, and all of a sudden you're wondering where the hell your 100Mbps fibre internet speed just disappeared to... in this case, the boosted WiFi just won't be able to keep up with the 100Mbps internet speeds.

So next time you find yourself wondering why your internet is slow, don't forget to eliminate WiFi as the possible culprit as well.
If you're installing a new WiFi network, also be sure to properly survey where the WiFi is going to be installed, and give some thought to these points:

- Are there a lot of concrete walls nearby which will degrade the WiFi signal?
- Is the neighbourhood already flooded with other 2.4Ghz WiFi networks?
- Does the signal cover the entire premises or will you need to consider a booster of some sort?
- How many devices are likely to connect to the WiFi? Consider smartphones and tablets as well, not just PC's.

May your WiFi experiences be filled only with high speeds and low latency :)

Lumia is dead. Where to from here?

2016-09-13T22:06:00.001+02:00

I tend to be a rather loyal consumer when it comes to brands.
I've always liked Nokia, and I have stuck it out with Cell C ever since I left MTN over 10 years ago, but there comes a point at which it just becomes illogical to flog a very nearly dead horse.

I am of course referring to the steady decline in popularity and market share of Microsoft's Lumia range (formerly Nokia), and how the decidedly lacking app ecosystem of Windows Phone has contributed to this factor.

When I received my first Lumia, the 920, I was unfazed by the critics and naysayers, all of whom were very quick to point out the lack of apps available on the Windows Phone platform.
At that point, apps weren't quite as big a deal as they are now, at least not to me.
I could do everything that I needed to, and for the most part I had all the apps that I required, with a decent piece of hardware to run it all on.
Also back then, Windows Phone was still gaining some traction, and developers were starting to work on more and more apps for the platform as a result.
Not so anymore it seems - all you see these days are Android and Apple logos all over the place.

This becomes especially troublesome when you work in the technology field daily - all the more reason to have all of the latest and greatest apps and tools at your fingertips.
Lately it just seems that the apps that I need the most, simply don't exist on the Windows Phone platform - very disappointing since the Lumia hardware has always been up for the challenge.

I then had an opportunity recently to play with the spaceship that is the Samsung Galaxy S7 - my mind was shredded when I started to grasp the sheer extent of the number and variety of apps that are available for Android.
This is of course common knowledge to Android users I would imagine, but for a Lumia user experiencing it for the first time, it's quite overwhelming.
The S7 also just does everything right - "it just works", as Apple once mistakenly claimed about every single one of their Macs... except this time, the S7 does just work, and damn well too.

Given my history with phones then, I would say that my next step would logically be to Android - possibly the Samsung S7, or whatever flagship is around when my upgrade is due early next year.
If you're an Apple user reading this, I can only begin to imagine what must be going through your head right now:

- "...what about the exploding Samsung battery???";
-"iPhones are the best!";
-"the new iPhone 7 has the best hardware in the world!" (probably all made by Samsung anyway ;))
-"iPhones are the best!";

Truth is, you either like a platform or you don't.
Of late, I've just warmed up to Android, and I like how Samsung releases smartphones that get people talking - not just about how they look or because they're "cool", but about the incredible technology and functionality that they pack into each new device that they release.

So let's have it - Samsung lovers, Apple lovers, Android lovers and haters, Nokia loyalists, Windows Phone lovers, Blackberry purists, bring it on.
What should I go for?

Is your default printer changing randomly in Windows 10? Here's how to fix it...

2016-01-13T12:40:00.001+02:00

Windows 10, by and large, has been a decent addition to the Microsoft OS family.
Apart from isolated glitches and snags which I have encountered, I have to say that I thoroughly enjoy the experience, and it makes things a lot easier when Microsoft release patches and updates that actually fix bugs (Apple could learn a lot here...).

Recently though, Microsoft released an update which has likely caused a bit of confusion.
In cases where a machine has multiple printers installed, Windows now changes default printers whenever it feels the need, or so it seems anyway...

In truth, Windows isn't playing silly buggers with you, but is in fact just sending print jobs to the last used printer, as opposed to the "default" printer.
While this may make sense in some scenarios, there is thankfully a setting to manage this:

Click on the Start Menu (bottom left of the screen), then click on Settings:

On the next screen, click on Devices:

Now scroll down through the printer settings, and find "Let Windows manage my default printer".

Switch this off:

Lastly, double check your printers in the Control Panel, to ensure that the correct default printer is now selected, and you should be good to go.

Happy printing!

Is Cell C LTE any good? Maybe this will help you decide...

2015-10-06T11:38:00.000+02:00

I had a rather joyous moment last week when after a very, very long wait, a small "L" suddenly appeared at the top of my Lumia 930 screen, in place of the usual boring "H+"...

Cell C (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

For those of you who may not know, that means "LTE" - in short, a much faster mobile internet connection which Vodacom, MTN and 8ta have been offering for a while now.

Cell C is traditionally always the late guy to the party, but I have to say that this wait was indeed worthwhile.
From the moment that I noticed that LTE became active on my phone last week, I have been taking speed tests at random intervals and all around JHB on my daily travels.
From Glenhazel to Edenvale, Bedfordview to Rosebank, Illovo to Orchards - check out the results below to get a summary of the Cell C LTE experience so far...

Downloads peaked at an impressive max. speed of 54.51Mbps, and Uploads peaked at 15.26Mbps, depending on signal strength.
Overall not a bad show I have to say, but certainly a quick way to eat through mobile data!

Avast for Business goes free...

2015-09-27T22:42:00.000+02:00

Following on from my previous post about Cryptowall, Avast recently launched a free business version of their proven antivirus software.

Avast! (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

While the personal version of Avast Antivirus has always been free, the huge difference here is twofold:

The free business version runs on PC desktop and server platforms (Windows XP, Vista, 7, 8, 10, SBS, Server), as well as Apple Macs (that old saying "Macs don't get viruses" no longer applies, folks);
The solution is cloud-based.
This is a big plus, since it can then be managed, monitored and administered from virtually anywhere.

Traditional business antivirus solutions, which are designed to protect servers as well as workstations, can set you back a fair deal.

Startups and smaller businesses however, may not have the capital to put down on commercial antivirus solutions, and this is where Avast comes in.

I am currently testing the free business solution to get a feel for it, and interestingly, there are no limitations in terms of installs or licences, so you can install it on as many devices as you need to:

The cloud-based control panel is also well laid out, and provides a tidy overview of your protected devices, as well as a real-time threat status.

I have to say that it all looks rather appealing, especially since it costs the same as a breath of fresh air...

The only real "gotcha" is that you can upgrade to a premium paid version.

This obviously offers a more formidable arsenal of antivirus wizardry, however I expect that most users will find the free version more than adequate.

I recommend that you sign up now and get it while it's free!

Cryptowall is back on the prowl, so watch your back...

2015-09-27T14:44:00.000+02:00

Back in 2014, a nasty virus called "Cryptowall" reared its unsightly head in the computer world, and it proceeded to leave a fair deal of pandemonium in its wake.

Of course once antivirus definitions the world over became aware, the threat was largely eradicated and peace reigned in the Kingdom of CPU.

These things are like a bad rash though, and there has of late been a resurgence of this particular bad boy on PC's all over the place.

Hell, Carte Blanche even featured an article on the virus a few weeks back - I'm sure the wonderfully talented humans who coded it must be awfully proud! Well done guys!

Anyway, back to the post - in short, watch your back as you normally would when dealing with the internet, email, flash drives from other PC's, pretty much as you would do when walking down a dark alley at night.

This particular threat entices the hapless victim by means of links on dodgy sites, links within the attachments of spam mails and a variety of other sneaky tactics.

Once the user clicks on the link, if not stopped by an antivirus, the virus will then initiate and continue to install itself in memory, and as a startup item on the infected PC.

Symptoms of Cryptowall (how you know that you are infected...):

Cryptowall scans the PC for folders which contain your meaningful data - here we are talking about the Desktop folder, My Documents etc.
It also scans mapped network drives - these will become infected as well, but only specifically mapped drives.
Next, it encrypts every "work" file that it finds - this includes Word documents, Excel documents and PDF documents, among others.
Finally, it dumps approx. 4 files into every folder that it has encrypted, named "HELP_DECRYPT.ext" - each of these files provides instructions on how to decrypt your data, and it's pretty simple - pay up. Yup, all this virus amounts to is extortion.
The variation of the infection that I recently dealt with wanted payment in Bitcoins, but I'm sure they take Diners Club, AMEX, VISA and many other forms of payment too :)
Any attempt to now open an encrypted file will result in a generic program error, as if the data within the file is corrupted.
At this point, panic may set in.
This is justified, since there is no way to decrypt the files without paying up, unless you have a recent intact backup of your files. Do not plug your backup drive in, until you are 100% sure that your PC is clean again.
For a very technical rundown of the threat, including cleaning and recovery options, check out:
http://www.bleepingcomputer.com/virus-removal/cryptowall-ransomware-information

You DO NOT want to see these files on your hard drive...

So in essence it's a pretty simple virus, but the impact that it can have on a business with a lot of data is HUGE.

After going through a rough few days taking one of these bad boys down recently, my advice to end users is simple - protect yourself in every possible way, and that isn't limited to antivirus software.

Sure, getting yourself a great antivirus like Avast is a non-negotiable, however always tread carefully when making use of a public domain like the internet.

Watch where you browse.

Triple check who sent you that not-so-kosher looking email.

Don't click on that link in the body of a "banking" email, and if you do end up being on the very unfortunate receiving end of one of these, make sure that your data is backed up somewhere off your PC - preferably on an external drive.

Netgear modem refusing an IP address change? Try this...

2014-11-20T15:19:00.000+02:00

In my line of work, I install new ADSL modems on an ongoing basis, and I often need to change the default IP address that the modem is setup with.
One of my best sellers is the Netgear DGN2200, however I ran into an odd problem recently which puzzled my poor brain to pieces, until one of the awesome tech support guys at Netgear shed some light on the situation.

The webpage when you setup the modem IP address looks something like this:

It all seems pretty simple - fill in the new IP address, and hit Apply at the bottom.
Done, right?
Not in this case - no matter how many times I tried, the router would reboot, and then revert to the original default "192.168.0.1" IP address.
Highly frustrating.

Even Google was clueless - combing through the search results revealed nothing of use.
At the end of my wits, I fell back on the support guys at Netgear - I mean after all, that's what they are there for, surely?

2 words: "Change browsers."

The answer to a problem which became a rather unpleasant throbbing pain in my right temple, was that simple.
Accessing the web interface of the router from Internet Explorer 11 rather than from Chrome, and performing the exact same steps, resulted in a fresh new IP address.

Now if only all IT problems were that simple to fix :)

This has to be the king of PC error messages...

2014-11-08T08:50:00.002+02:00

This is not what you want to see when copying files from a Samsung Galaxy S4 Mini...:

Simple cool stuff to do with the kids during the break...

2014-10-08T10:26:00.000+02:00

So the school mid-term break is now in full swing for the parents among us, and after Disney Junior (DSTV channel 309 for those non-parental readers) is all maxxed out, we have to start getting a little bit more creative in terms of stuff to do.

After all, this is meant to be quality time that we should be spending with our kids, is it not?

So it occurred to me that all we really need to do, is go back to basics.

I dusted out the crazy cobwebs in my noggin, and took a trip down memory lane, back to when I was a kid who still held school holidays in high regard.
Man, those were the days - endless weeks of free time, so much free time... where did all the time go?
Does time diminish as one grows older? I guess in a way it does, but that's a subject for another day...

Anyway, I came up with a few simple things from my childhood that often provided hours of entertainment, and which still apply today.
Just because we live in a world full of iPads and WIFI, doesn't mean that our kids can't still enjoy some of the same things that we did while growing up.

Next time you are at a loss for something fun to do, maybe this list will be of some use:

Build a puzzle:
I used to spend hours as a kid on jigsaw puzzles, and they fascinate me to this day.
The kids also love them, even from a young age.
Make some Lego:
Does anybody not enjoy Lego?

From building crazy castles as a kid, to creating massively reinforced cars (only to smash them into the nearest wall), Lego is truly timeless.

Lego at work. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Roast marshmallows:
This one requires some adult supervision obviously, but it's a favourite and generally accompanies any braai as a sweet treat afterwards.
Avoid contact with clothing...!

Yummy!
Swim:
Kids go nuts for pools in summer. It's that simple.
If the weather permits and you are fortunate enough to have access to a pool, get in.
We have some pretty awesome summers here in South Africa, so we may as well make the most of them.

Blue-water-pool (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Make a fire:
Lighting up a fire at sunset just does something for the soul. Perhaps somehow it connects us to our ancestral roots, to a time when fire was vital for survival.
Who knows - all I can say is that even as an adult I still enjoy a good fire, be it a campfire or a small log fire to roast some marshmallows over.

Just flames (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Stargaze:
While stoking the fire, why not turn your eyes up to the heavens and pick out some of our celestial neighbours or constellations.
Apart from the moon, several of the planets in our solar system are easily visible in our night skies, and with dark enough skies and cloudless conditions, even amateur equipment can reveal a surprising amount of detail on objects such as Saturn and Jupiter.
Pretty awe-inspiring, and appreciated by young and old alike.

English: Pleiades Star Cluster (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Create silence:
Here is one that I struggle with a lot, but which I still try to achieve, however difficult it may be.
When you get home, switch your cellphone to Silent. It has been ringing all day, with a thousand different people vying for your attention.
So ask yourself, how many of those people are more important to you than your loved ones?
It's not easy I know, but in a world where constant noise is the order of the day, a little bit of silence can't be a bad thing.

If it's an excursion you are looking for, then head over to our other blog - Plebs with Kids, where we review kid-friendly spots in and around Johannesburg.

As I type this post I keep thinking of new things that I want to add to this list, so I guess this post will be a bit of a work in progress.
Can you think of anything that you loved as a kid, that you feel deserves a mention?

Drop me a comment below and maybe I'll add it in :)

Get your 50GB of FREE cloud storage...

2014-10-06T12:31:00.000+02:00

There are dozens of cloud storage providers out there today who all provide free and paid storage options to new customers.
Putting a copy of your data on the cloud is a great way to guard against potential device failure or loss, however the amount of data that we generate nowadays is rather a lot...

The traditional 2GB free data offering from Dropbox just doesn't cut it anymore - Microsoft moved the goalposts somewhat with their 15GB free offering, but even that will still be used up pretty quickly once you start syncing photos, videos and music to the service.

Enter Mega - launched in 2013, it was founded by the same chap (Kim Dotcom) who founded the now defunct Megaupload in 2005.

Mega essentially operates in the same way as Dropbox - you install a sync client on your PC, and this keeps a dedicated folder on your PC in sync with the Mega servers, to the tune of 50GB of free data.
Now 50GB is a lot of data in an any language, and it pretty much beats any other free offering out there.
I have been trying out the Mega service myself, and it has been fairly painless so far, with a nice web interface to boot.

Give it a shot if you need free cloud storage (and who doesn't?):

https://mega.co.nz/

Comments welcome - free services like this will hopefully keep the big guys competitive and on their toes, provided that they keep their systems more secure than Apple, that is... ;)
Oh and one last bit of advice - keep your most personal intimate pics off the Cloud, lest they should fall into the wrong hands!

Do not drop your hard drive. You have been warned...

2014-10-04T10:00:00.000+02:00

How much data do you generate in a single day?
Between documents, images, videos and other content, I would guess that the figure is somewhere in the tens of megabytes at least, if not hundreds or more.

The amount of data that we generate nowadays is just scary, and the more data we create, the more storage we require to keep it safe.

English: A USB hard drive. This is made by Western Digital and uses a mini B USB connection for both power and data transfer. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The obvious solution? External hard drives.
Cost-effective, portable and convenient - just plug in a USB cable, copy and paste and you are good to go.
Well, that's the idea at least.

While USB hard drives are a great place to put all of your stuff, they are also vulnerable to damage if not handled correctly.
Recently I dealt with several clients who expressed a great deal of surprise when their prized external hard drives suddenly went belly up, nasty clicking sounds and all.
I really feel that hard drives and other similarly sensitive products should ship with a bold disclaimer on the box, something like this:

"IF YOU DROP THIS DRIVE, THERE IS A PRETTY GOOD CHANCE THAT ALL OF YOUR PRECIOUS DATA WILL BE LOST FOREVER"

You get the idea - inside that sleek outer casing, there are platters, heads and other moving parts that when crashed together, can render a hard drive completely dead.

In some cases, even a light knock can damage a drive, and I am amazed that people still find this hard to believe.

I suppose because they have spent a lot of money on the device, they expect it to be tough and able to take some punishment.

Sure, you can find so-called "rugged" hard drives which boast of an increased ability to take a beating, however I certainly wouldn't put my precious data at risk testing one of these devices...

Trust me, hard drives are feeble in careless hands.

So next time you purchase an external USB hard drive, why not spend the extra few bucks and get a second one, just in case Murphy and his minions are lurking somewhere down the road...

What to do if your Apple has run out of USB ports...

2014-10-01T22:19:00.000+02:00

All too often nowadays, I come across Apple owners who are at their wits end because they have run out of USB ports.
Well the obvious solution would be to go out and buy a USB hub to upgrade the amount of USB ports, right?

Well thankfully, there is now a far simpler, and indeed cheaper solution which I will outline for you using the images below:

Before: Limited by only 2 USB ports

After: A 3rd USB port has now easily been added to this Apple

Taking a closer look, post-upgrade...

You can take this even further than just one extra USB port of course - in theory you are limited only by the amount of free space available on the Apple itself!
Take note - some discolouration of the new USB port is normal, a few minutes after the upgrade has been completed.

Now don't all thank me at once for saving you a few hundred bucks on a USB hub... :)

What will the next "WOW" feature be in smartphones...?

2014-09-25T23:18:00.000+02:00

Of late I have noticed that most of the big players in the smartphone game are releasing new phones with obvious improvements over older models, but lacking any real sanity-smashing game-changing new features.

Some may beg to differ, but I am talking about influential features like these:

NFC - upon launch it was a biggie, but now this is pretty much a standard;
Wireless charging - what no cables? How can this be? Very useful indeed;
Hand gestures / facial recognition type technology that are now present in a lot of high-end smartphones;
Fingerprint readers - building a seriously solid layer of security into devices that are often full of sensitive info;

So my question is, what's next?

Samsung are generally pretty good at the "wow" stuff, with insanely powerful beast phones powered by V8 motors, and capable of some pretty amazing things... :)

I am also bombarded daily by tech mail ranting on about iPhone 6 this and iPhone 6 that, "new" features (which are nearly all present on competitor devices), how the iPhone 6 will take down all competitors etc... beyond boring really.

In truth, what game-changing and crazy new features has the iPhone 6 got?

Well, there is Apple Pay, which is an attempt at replacing the traditional credit card in order to pay for goods.

Others have tried (with some success), but I'm not sure how widely adopted it will be, especially after Apple's recent spectacular fail at the hands of hackers, which resulted in the leaking of hundreds celebrity photos - go iCloud, you impenetrable fortress you!

Right, so we know that Apple cannot be trusted to safeguard data. Good luck Apple Pay!

On an unconfirmed note, I have heard rumours of a feature that may find its way onto the next Nokia Lumia flagship, and this one really would be a game-changer if it turned out to be true...:
Solar charging.

We are all at the mercy of cellphone battery capacity nowadays, so if the battery dies, who cares what else your phone can do anyway?

But a device that you can just pop in the sun to revive? Now that's something that I would pay good money for.

Think it's true?

What feature do you think could be added to new smartphones to make your life simpler, or otherwise change the game completely?

The day that Evernote died...

2014-09-22T14:05:00.002+02:00

Evernote, for me at least, is the king of all note-taking apps.

Evernote (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Let's go through some essential features that set it apart from the crowd:

Cross platform: This is a biggie - Evernote runs on any device that you may be using, be it Apple, Android, Windows Phone, Blackberry, PC, Mac... the list goes on.
You can also access it directly from any web browser of course.
There is serious power in compatibility.
Pricing: The free version offers a lot of functionality, so much so that I only found a need to upgrade from the free plan this month, for reasons that will be covered in this blog post...
Evernote offers features that I haven't even started to use yet - scanning through the menu on my PC, I don't even know what some of the features do, but I am guessing that once I start using them, I will find it hard to imagine life without them!
Convenience: Instead of trying to remember each and every thing that I did in my day, which customers I visited, time spent on-site, tasks completed etc., I make a point of updating Evernote on my Lumia 920 several times per day, and the data is automatically synced back to the cloud, and then onto each of my other devices when they in turn sync later on.
Couldn't be any simpler really.

Cloud-based note software is therefore an amazing way in which to keep your life, your devices and indeed your mind in sync, no matter where you are or what device you happen to be using.

It is the perfect, simple, centralized solution... or is it?

For over a year now, I have been using Evernote (free), to make my life simpler by remembering important stuff for me - and it has worked sterlingly well.

Then last week, something decidedly odd and alarming happened which caught me completely off guard, and which turned an otherwise fantastic Monday into one with a distinctly blue hue.

While opening a critical note (I say "critical", since it pertained to information stored for the month that directly affected the bottom line of my business), I discovered that the entire note appeared blank.

The note title was intact, as was a preview of the first 3 lines of the note, but that was it.

No stress, I thought, still reasonably calm at this stage, as I switched over to my phone to access the note there.

Same thing on the phone. Zip, nada, nothing in the note.

Stress level successfully upgraded.

Last ditch to recover data? You guessed it - turn to the oracle of all things - Google.

Oddly, while this particular event appeared to be rather common in search results, no real explanation, solution or fix accompanied any of the articles that I was desperately trawling through.

Attempting to start rebuilding the note from memory only made things worse - the more that I could remember from the scattered bits and pieces haphazardly floating around my brain, the more I realised that the task facing me was near insurmountable - I had stored a lot of data in that note...

It would be safe to say that I was going through unusually high stress levels at that point.

In desperation I continued what now seemed a pointless effort to find any scraps of info online, that may turn the situation around.

Finally, one faint glimmer of hope caught my eye from the far recesses of the web - a feature included in the Evernote Premium (paid) which allows you to roll back to a previous version of any note.

Ah, but I was on the Free plan, so what use would this be to me?
Thankfully, quite a bit, since Evernote actually implements this feature on all new accounts, Free or Premium.

This means that by upgrading from a free plan to a Premium plan, you can access historical data about your notes, even from the period before you became a Premium user - a massive lifesaver if you are someone like me, who was about to lose most of my remaining sanity due to data loss.

In short, I was able to upgrade to a monthly Premium plan (R 49 per month), and access a version of my lost note that had been saved that same morning, approximately 99% intact.

Stress levels normalised. Meltdown averted.

So what's the point of this post really?

Well, I am an avid cloud service advocate - whenever clients ask me about data storage needs for the future, cloud is always in there somewhere when I respond.

I think that the lesson in all this, is that while the cloud is as reliable, secure and stable as it can possibly be, shit does happen.

Just as external hard drives can be dropped or fail at random, cloud services and syncs can fall over with unpredictable results, and when dealing with your data, unpredictability is a scary thing.

Whichever way you go, be it local storage or the cloud, take precautions and put extra measures in place, within reason obviously.

Duplicate backup drives, store a local copy of your cloud data or make use of multiple cloud storage services.

Whatever you do, have something to fall back on, because when it all goes belly up, data is impossible to replace.

We review the Turtle Shell 2.0 Bluetooth Speaker, and it's one decent piece of kit...

2014-08-04T22:33:00.001+02:00

So I was fortunate enough to get my grubby paws on a pretty funky piece of techno gadgetry recently, in the form of the Turtle Shell 2.0 Bluetooth Speaker.
Everything today is going wireless - I don't even want to start thinking of all of the wonderful things that are probably happening to our brains as a result, but the reality is that people don't really want to use cables unless they absolutely have to.

Wireless audio just makes life so much simpler.
Step into any electronics or audio store today, and you will be amazed at the choice of Bluetooth speakers available, when compared to just a few years ago.
Trouble is, there are a lot of downright cheap and nasty products on the market - great in terms of convenience and portability, but when it comes to performance and sound quality, just not up to scratch.

While one cannot really expect a small Bluetooth speaker to be capable of window smashing bass, it is still possible to achieve a respectable level of audio quality, while retaining portability and decent aesthetics.
The ability to take a beating would also be nice - after all we often want to take our music with us, don't we?

Enter the Turtle Shell 2.0, by Outdoor Tech:

I don't need to be Patrick Jane, to know that you are already hooked by the look of this thing alone.
Outdoor Tech have paid particular attention to design - the angles actually remind me of the Stealth Fighter - I wonder if it is invisible to radar? :)

So is it any good?
Well I won't venture too far into the tech specs now, as much as I usually love to pretend that I know exactly what they mean.
Instead, you can check out all the important details here, while I proceed to provide a first hand account of my experience with the Turtle Shell 2.0.

From the outset, I was not expecting anything tremendous from something so small - the Turtle Shell 2.0 comfortably sits in the palm of your hand (or hands, if your hands are particularly small :)).
It happily travels wherever you need it to, thanks to the nifty carry bag supplied with it, and you don't have to stress about accidental drops or spills - this thing is built tough (it is IP65 dust proof and water resistant - apparently that's good). :)

Bluetooth pairing is beyond basic, and you can expect up to 16 hours of audio (depending on how loud you pump the bass, that is).
If you still don't know what Blueteeth are, there is also a 3.5mm audio port on the side, where you can plug in a walkman, iPod or other audio player.
Charging is via Micro USB, which is fast becoming one of the most popular charging methods - another thumbs up there.

Moving along - once paired up with my Nokia Lumia 920, the thing that (pleasantly) surprised me most about this speaker, is how well it "threw" the sound, even at soft volumes.
That has to be down to the way that Outdoor Tech designed it - apart from the funky look, those angled surfaces serve to direct sound omnidirectionally (I just Googled that to make sure it's a real word).

Bass, mid-range and treble were all of high quality when considering the device size, and I noticed that the speaker volume maxxed out more or less just short of any distortion, without sounding "tinny", like those walkman speakers of old.

3 simple buttons on the side allow you to navigate through your tracks and control the volume, and a standard camera mount underneath allows for various mounting options.
During my time with the Turtle Shell 2.0, I also found myself setting it up wherever I went, just to have some quality sound in the background.
Soft or loud, this little gem excels.

Of course, once the party is over and it's time to get back to business, you can always use the built in microphone to conduct wireless conference calls - another nifty feature thrown in, just to sweeten the deal.
I have to say that in the congested world of Bluetooth Speakers, the Turtle Shell 2.0 totally stands out from the crowd on several fronts:

High quality audio
Seriously rugged - dust, water and shock resistant
Portable
Funky design - available in a range of funky colours
Feature packed

So here's what you get in the box - they even throw in some cool Outdoor Tech stickers :):

I sure was sad when I had to hand this back.

Thankfully though, I later become the proud owner of a Bose Soundlink Colour, and what a cracking little piece of tech that is :)

A lot of soccer fans can relate to the Google Doodle today I suspect... :)

2014-06-23T10:18:00.000+02:00

I kinda got bored watching the daily Google Doodle every day since the beginning of the Soccer World Cup, but the one today probably hits home with soccer supporters everywhere:

Go take a peek and have a giggle during your coffee break...

Nybbles and Bytes

It's time for change... Seeya Cell C, roll on Melon Mobile!

Re-visiting my most successful blog post ever - How to synchronise your Tissot T-Touch...

If you need decent wireless earbuds, these are them...

What are your lockdown "essentials", and what has lockdown taught you...?

How everyday technology makes life easier - Spotify, Admyt, Banking apps, Tap to Pay, Google Maps and more...

Looking for a free website email form processor? Try Formspree...

Things I learnt in 2018...

Take your leave, and just disconnect from all of the things.

Help! My Bose Soundlink Colour won't switch on... what to do???

Curb your enthusiasm... for WiFi.

Related articles

Lumia is dead. Where to from here?

Is your default printer changing randomly in Windows 10? Here's how to fix it...

Related articles

Is Cell C LTE any good? Maybe this will help you decide...

Avast for Business goes free...

Related articles

Cryptowall is back on the prowl, so watch your back...

Netgear modem refusing an IP address change? Try this...

Related articles

This has to be the king of PC error messages...

Simple cool stuff to do with the kids during the break...

Related articles

Get your 50GB of FREE cloud storage...

Related articles

Do not drop your hard drive. You have been warned...

Related articles

What to do if your Apple has run out of USB ports...

Related articles

What will the next "WOW" feature be in smartphones...?

Related articles

The day that Evernote died...

Related articles

We review the Turtle Shell 2.0 Bluetooth Speaker, and it's one decent piece of kit...

Related articles

A lot of soccer fans can relate to the Google Doodle today I suspect... :)

Related articles