Continue reading »]]> I’ve seen examples of both Amazing/Excellent Customer Service, and pretty piss poor couldn’t-care-less Customer Service in the last 24 hours.

My DART Tag

Starting with the negative first, earlier this week I had cause to travel through the Dartford Toll Crossing twice. As a reasonably regular traveler of that route in the past, I long ago invested in a “DART-TAG” to make my life easier, and to save a few pennies.  What SHOULD happen is that as you approach the toll barrier, the equipment there somehow senses the presence of your tag, and so just debits the charge to your account.  In most cases you don’t even have to stop, the barrier is sensitive enough and quick enough for you to just slowly drive on through.  The Tag usually emits a loud “bleep” to indicate it’s been recognised, and you get a nice friendly message saying that the toll had been paid (or your credit was low of course!).  But this time, when I tried it on the way “out” this week, NOTHING HAPPENED.

No Bleep.  No nice friendly message, and most importantly NO ACCESS through the barrier.   And of course the car behind me was right up behind me, meaning I couldn’t reverse to reach the machine’s coin catcher if I wanted to.

I had to go rummaging around in the loose change in my pockets, and rolling about in the car trying to find enough change to pay my toll.  I could see the people in the car behind me getting impatient and exasperated, and then I had to sort of wriggle out of the window and reach over my shoulder and behind me to get the money in the machine.

The return journey was a similar experience, only I was prepared for the eventuality that it might not work and had the cash ready to use.

So as you might expect, I looked at the Tag Website to see what if anything was said about a Tag not responding, and there was nothing.  The “FAQ” seemed quite laughable in actual fact, when you consider the number of tags that must be out there (mine is numbered well in to the hundreds of thousands) it is not outside the realms of possibility that they might just stop working every so often, for whatever reason.   Simply NOT having a “What do I do if my tag doesn’t work” in the FAQ doesn’t really make me think that it’s a wholly reliable solution that never goes wrong, merely that the operators of the service are too short sighted to realise that this is EXACTLY the sort of thing an FAQ might actually be Helpful with.   Instead I resorted to the “for any other enquiries please e-mail xxxxxx” option, seeing as the published telephone numbers all seemingly close at 5.30pm!

Anyway, to my disappointment, it’s been over 24 hours now, and I’ve not so much as had an acknowledgement of my e-mail, let alone an answer to my problem.   If I’d have been traveling through the Crossing again today, it would have cost me £1.50 each way instead of £1 each way with the tag, so I’d have lost more money.  I therefore hold this up as a classic example of (1) how to NOT help your customers via your Service Website, and (2) how to NOT help your customers by responding in a timely manner.  There’s nothing for it but to label this as  BAD CUSTOMER SERVICE.

And then the positive.

I was gutted today to discover when I picked my Kindle up intending to use it, that the screen appears to have broken.

My rather broken Kindle

I can genuinely say that I’ve not dropped it, smacked it, or anything else.  Indeed you can see the plastic surround is pristine and undamaged, as is the surface of the screen itself.   I keep it in a purpose made leather wallet which is also totally undamaged.   When transporting it, I tend to put it in my baggage right next to my iPad which is also absolutely fine, so I have absolutely no idea how this damage occured.

Unfortunately it renders the Kindle quite unusable.  The top/right hand part of the screen stubbornly displays the last “advert” it displayed in Sleep mode before I turned it on, and the bottom/left part of the screen works more or less as normal.

So I called Amazon using the “call me back” facility on the Website.   I bought the Kindle back in March this year, from my local Tesco.  I had Googled “Kindle Repairs” and come up fairly short, so really wanted to ask Amazon if they could offer or recommend a repair service.  However I was astounded by what happened next.

I explained what I’d found, and how I couldn’t explain how the damage had occured, and before I could ask my questions, the operator started asking me a few other things.  When did I purchase the unit?  I wasn’t totally sure, maybe as long as 6 months ago from Tesco, I hadn’t bought it from Amazon.co.uk directly.  No, to the best of my knowledge it hadn’t been dropped, or squashed, or exposed to water.  Yes, I had tried the “cold reset” facility.    Ok then, in that case they’ll dispatch a replacement today on next-day delivery, please send the old one back in the next 30 days.

I was astounded.    Given my honesty and sheer puzzlement over what could have caused the damage, I certainly wasn’t angling for a free replacement.  I was expecting to have to pay for a repair or even replace it at my own expense.   Never did I expect a replacement to be sent out just like that.   No “proof of purchase” required, no quibbles, or messing about.  Just a straight replacement, and I hadn’t even asked!

Of course I wasn’t going to turn it down, so I went from being quite angry and annoyed with the prospect of spending another £150 on a replacement Kindle to elated and overjoyed that I’d be getting a Free Replacement (and a postage-paid label to return my old broken one with!) the very next day.

That in my estimation is going above and beyond the requirements of Acceptable Customer Service in to the realms of the Exceptional.  Well done indeed Amazon.co.uk, you have one very happy customer here!

Continue reading »]]> After what seems like an eternity, my new car is here!

My Vauxhall Insignia Elite Sports Tourer

It’s rather nice to drive, positively gliding along the Dual Carriageways. I’m glad I went for this rather than the Ford Mondeo Estate. Visibility in this seems far better than in the 5-door hatchback I tested.

We haven’t tried Tinker in the back yet, that’s a job for the weekend and two people, as the Automatic Tailgate might be slightly confusing and unsettling for him for the first few uses.  The Interior looks quite elegant compared to the older cars I’ve driven:

Insignia Interior

Insignia Interior - closeup of Central console

Insignia Interior - Dashboard

More photos and feedback to follow in due course!

Continue reading »]]> I wrote a few days ago about my interest in a Fuji Finepix XP30 camera.  I wanted it specifically because of it’s underwater ability, and the dustproof/shockproof characteristics would come in handy for my grand holiday later in the year.

However, I’ve been dissapointed, and in retrospect I’m actually glad.

I went ahead and ordered the Camera from Amazon, together with a “Pro” class 16Gb SDHC card for it.  Unfortunately the day it was due to be delivered I was out of the office at a certain Football Stadium.  When I returned and found no parcel waiting on my desk, I contacted Amazon who confirmed that “Home Delivery Network” had put it through the letterbox at 9.02am, and hadn’t obtained a signature.

The only problem being there IS no letterbox at my work address!   Needless to say I contacted Amazon who went off to investigate.  They later confirmed that something had gone awry with the order, and were good enough to re-order both the camera and the memory card for me at no cost.   But the story doesn’t end there!  Of course the Camera itself is out of stock at Amazon now, and the only options are more expensive.  Amazon will be re-stocking but in 3-4 weeks time.

So I’ve been looking around for alternatives.  And having read through in more detail the reviews for the XP30, both at Amazon and elsewhere, I’ve phoned back and cancelled the Camera, and requested a refund.

There are a few alternatives out there, including the Canon PowerShot D10 (12.1 MP, 3.0x, 2.5″ LCD), or the Pentax Optio WG-1 (14MP, 5 x Wide Angle Zoom, 2.7″ LCD), the Panasonic Lumix FT3 (12.1MP, 4.6x Zoom) or the Olympus TG-310 (14MP, 3.6x Wide Angle Zoom, 2.7″ LCD)

I’m not sure which to look at, the Canon and the Pentax both have much better write-ups, and both come in at about the £220 mark.  While that’s a fair amount more than the Fuji XP30, it’s not unreasonable.  The Pentax appears to have the best specifications of the two.

I don’t expect this to be a fantastic camera, but I do want to be able to take it underwater.  The dustproof & shockproof nature also have some appeal given where I’ll be taking it.

Anyone out there have any experience with cameras like this and able to offer any suggestions?

Continue reading »]]> There’s a little known tool that’s provided as part of a Windows installation, it’s certainly available under XP and Vista which seems to be overlooked in Network troubleshooting.

Called pathping, it’s a command-line utility that will help you to troubleshoot intermediate hops between your source and a destination host. Something of a combination of ping and tracert (or traceroute for the *Nix users out there).

Tracert will show the intermediate hops between you and a destination, together with the link latency, and packet loss rate. In other words it will very likely show you where a problem lies between two nodes on the network.

The command itself takes some minutes to run, dependant of course on the number of hops between you and a destination host. The below example takes for me 475 seconds to run because Google is 10 hops away, via my corporate internet connection. Sample output is shown below (but of course the IP Addresses have been changed to protect the innocent!)

Usage is simply pathping [destination host or IP]

C:\>pathping www.google.com
Tracing route to www.l.google.com [64.233.183.104] over a maximum of 30 hops:
0  mydesktoppc [192.168.1.10]
1  mydefaultgw [192.168.1.254]
2  internal-local-ce-router-01 [10.0.0.1]
3  service-provider-pe-router-01 [172.16.1.10]
4  internal-remote-ce-router-01 [172.17.24.1]
5  remote-core-switch-01 [192.168.254.254]
6  remote-inner-perimiter-firewall [192.168.0.100]
7  rate-shaping-switch-perimiter [192.168.74.12]
8  remote-outer-perimiter-firewall [192.168.75.6]
9  isp-router
10  unspecified-00.ukcore.bt.net [1.2.3.4]
11  unspecified-01.ukcore.bt.net [2.3.4.5]
12  unspecified-02.ukcore.bt.net [3.4.5.6]
13  195.99.125.82
14  209.85.255.175
15  66.249.95.130
16  64.233.175.246
17  72.14.233.79
18  216.239.43.34
19  nf-in-f104.google.com [64.233.183.104]

Computing statistics for 475 seconds...
Source to Here   This Node/Link
Hop  RTT    Lost/Sent = Pct  Lost/Sent = Pct  Address
0                                           mydesktoppc [192.168.1.10]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
1    0ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  mydefaultgw [192.168.1.254]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
2    0ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  internal-local-ce-router-01 [10.0.0.1]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
3    6ms     2/ 100 =  2%     2/ 100 =  2%  service-provider-pe-router-01 [172.16.1.10]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
4   11ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  internal-remote-ce-router [172.17.24.1]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
5   12ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  remote-core-switch-01 [192.168.254.254]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
6   12ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  remote-inner-perimiter-firewall [192.168.0.100]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
7   12ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  rate-shaping-switch-perimiter [192.168.74.12]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
8   13ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  remote-outer-perimiter-firewall [192.168.75.6]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
9   22ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  isp-router
0/ 100 =  0%   |
10   21ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  unspecified-00.ukcore.bt.net [1.2.3.4]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
11   21ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  unspecified-01.ukcore.bt.net [2.3.4.5]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
12   22ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  unspecified-02.ukcore.bt.net [3.4.5.6]
0/ 100 =  0%   |
13   29ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  195.99.125.82
0/ 100 =  0%   |
14   26ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  209.85.255.175
0/ 100 =  0%   |
15   26ms     3/ 100 =  3%     3/ 100 =  3%  66.249.95.130
0/ 100 =  0%   |
16   37ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  64.233.175.246
0/ 100 =  0%   |
17   34ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  72.14.233.79
0/ 100 =  0%   |
18   39ms     0/ 100 =  0%     0/ 100 =  0%  216.239.43.34
1/ 100 =  1%   |
19   35ms     1/ 100 =  1%     0/ 100 =  0%  nf-in-f104.google.com [64.233.183.104]
Trace complete.

So what is the output showing?

In this case I’m loosing 2% of packets getting to my service-provider-pe-router-01 and a further 3% at one of the later hops (probably a network interconnect) later down the chain.

When PathPing is executed, first section shows the route for the traffic, as would be shown by Tracert.

PathPing then displays a busy message which will vary based on 25 seconds per hop to the destination, during which time it will gather information from all the routers previously listed and from the links between them. At the end of this period, it displays the test results.

The two rightmost columns — “This Node/Link Lost/Sent=%” and “Address” — contain the most useful information.

The loss rates displayed for the links (marked as a “|” in the rightmost column) indicate losses of packets being forwarded along the path. This loss indicates link congestion. The loss rates displayed for routers (indicated by their IP addresses in the rightmost column) indicate that those routers’ CPUs or packet buffers might be overloaded. These congested routers might also be a factor in end-to-end problems, especially if packets are forwarded by software routers.
Loss Calculation

The raw data that PathPing obtains describes how many ICMP Echo Requests are lost between the source and an intermediate router. The diagram below shows how PathPing estimates the per-hop loss statistics. While at first this calculation might seem trivial, it is complicated by differences between the forwarding code path and the code path taken in responding to ping packets (ICMP Echo Requests/Replies).

The horizontal lines indicate the “fast path” of a router, which is taken by packets that are not sent to or from the local computer. That is, the fast path is the code path taken by transit packets that require no special processing other than forwarding, and is highly optimized for such packets.

In the diagram, the vertical lines indicate the extra processing taken when an ICMP Echo Request is sent to the local computer. This kicks it out of the fast path and delivers it to an ICMP module (often using separate queues and processors). Assuming no packets are dropped due to queue overflows, the ICMP module then generates an ICMP Echo Reply, which is forwarded back to the original sender.

Since packet loss can occur in the path indicated by the vertical lines (but such loss does not necessarily imply loss on the horizontal forwarding path itself), the raw numbers obtained from pings do not by themselves determine end-to-end packet loss. For example, pinging an intermediate router might create a 10 percent loss even though no end-to-end packet loss is occurring. PathPing’s algorithm uses the change in values from hop-to-hop to estimate actual per hop loss rather than losses in the higher-level router components. This actual per hop loss is the result provided in the “This Node/Link” column of the final PathPing report.

Continue reading »]]> You might just have noticed over the last couple of weeks, this Website has undergone a bit of a transformation.

One of the extra abilities that some of this work has given me is the ability to gain a little insight in to the people that visit my blog.  While perusing the statistics today one particular entry caught my eye.

Extract from my Website Logs

Somewhere, Someone is using a very VERY old version of Windows still!

Microsoft have not been supporting or producing any Security updates to Windows Millenium since July 11th 2006, meaning that for nearly five years now, that individual has been receiving no patches or updates of any kind.  I would suspect that any Anti-Virus software (if any!) that they may be running is long past it’s end of life now, and is very likely to be out of date at best.   Internet Explorer 6 is probably the newest version of IE that Windows ME could run, and the more observant amongst you have probably already noticed that the PC in question is already infected with the Zango Toolbar spyware!

I guess it just reinforces for me my belief that it is vital to stay current with your Software Updates and Patches.  I know there will always be a healthy dose of pragmatism involved on the spend/save upgrade cycle, but in my mind that really is pushing the limits in my mind.  It is little wonder that we are subject to such massive disruption and organised anarchy caused by “Hackers” (used in the negative context) using things like the Storm Botnet, which to an extent relies on un-patched vulnerabilities in Windows to spread.

So the message of the day today – Keep your PC Up to date.  When was the last time you ran WindowsUpdate?

Incidentally, I’ve added a small section to this blog with some recommended tools and utilities, including a Free Anti-Virus recommendation, and some Security Tools to help keep your PC safe.

Continue reading »]]> I first noticed this gadget on the TV. Adverts featuring a Bungee Jumping guy who “catches” a camera in mid air, who then plunges underwater may be an amusing idea for an advert, but if the camera lives up to it’s hype then it has piqued my interest.

Fuji Finepix XP30

I’m off on a “big” holiday to Egypt later on this year, and I’m definitely interested in a pocket-camera that I could take underwater, or not have to worry too much about getting dusty etc. In previous years at Centerparcs we’ve purchased some of those single-use underwater film cameras they sold for splashing about in the pool with, so the idea of a reusable digital camera that works underwater is very interesting indeed.

I’m still undecided if I’m going to take my DSLR and a selection of lenses with me. I want to, and know that if I don’t I’ll most likely regret it forever after, but it’s a lot to carry around and will eat up the baggage allowance quite considerably! But of course that one isn’t a waterproof, dustproof, freeze-proof, drop-proof affair, the XP30 is (or at least so it claims).

Some of the reviews I’ve read of it are quite critical of the picture quality, but I’m not especially concerned about a high quality image from a cheap £115 camera.  It’s available in a number of different tacky colours if you’re interested!

So I’m still pondering whether to make the investment, or if I should leave it until nearer the time before we go.  If you or anyone you know has any experience with this little gadget, please let me have your thoughts!

Continue reading »]]> Long time followers may be aware that I’m lucky enough to be part of a test programme run by a certain large PC & Printer manufacturer. On two previous occasions I’ve been sent an all-in-one Printer/Scanner/Copier/Fax to “test” and report back on, at the end of which time I’m allowed to keep the printer as a Thank you for my feedback and participation.

I finished the second of these test programmes in about August last year, and have happily been printing away on this “free” printer ever since. Admittedly not making particularly heavy use of this one, it’s still got it’s original ink cartridges fitted!

I came to use it a few weeks ago and discovered that the printer just had no power whatsoever. Having checked the obvious cables, and extension leads I concluded that it was a printer fault of some sort, and started cursing as I expected that meant I’d need to go out and buy a new printer.

Surprisingly, I made a few inquiries first, and after one phone call, much to my delight a new power supply is on it’s way to me. I have “full” support on the printer until September this year!

For a printer that cost me nothing but a little time, I think that’s pretty fantastic service!

Continue reading »]]> I’ve resolved to try and start to update this Website a little more frequently! 

And in that spirit, I’ve settled on a new theme which I think is quite clean and tidy, and retains all the functions I’m after.  I think it looks quite good, but will give it a week or so before deciding finally. 

In other news, it’s the last episode of Game of Thrones tonight on Sky.  I fervently hope this gets picked up for a second season, as it’s most definitely new and innovative Fantasy/Scifi Television, not another remake or reimagining which we seem to see so many of just at the moment.

Being the regular reader that I am, I am so painfully aware that there are ample quality works out there that would translate well to modern television, so why oh why do Film & Television studios insist on Remaking older works.  I cite recent works such as “V”, the aborted attempt to remake “Dune” (even though SciFi Channel already did that), the recent Star Trek film, and we’re close to seeing the third “reboot” for Superman, to name but a few.

Game of Thrones is based on the book A Game of Thrones (A Song of Ice and Fire, Book 1) by George R R Martin. 

I think the relative successes of Sky’s attempts to bring Terry Pratchett’s work to life on screen prove that there’s an appetite out there for the content, and so there’s no need to try and appeal to an existing fan base for a previous incarnation, provided of course that the work is done to a certain quality standard in the first place. 

Continue reading »]]> Prompted by some fellow Networksy types, (Jeff and Jeremy), who’s recent entries on the contents of their toolbags I found extremely interesting;  I thought I’d go through mine as I have a few unusual items!

Starting with the fairly standard stuff:

Wire Strippers

Good old fashioned and simple wire strippers.  These ones have an adjustable lock to stop you stripping too much cable unintentionally.

RJ45 Crimping Tool

Then of course the RJ45 Crimps.  Nothing too fancy, just cheap and practical.  I have never needed to crimp an RJ-11, so all I need are RJ-45 ones.

RJ45-DB9 and RJ45-DB25 Console Cables

A standard set of Cisco Console cables;  I tend to have a couple of brand new ones as well as tried and tested ones in the box, as I often end up leaving them behind attached to “core” devices, so there’s at least one on any site that we touch.

A Krone Tool, or Punchdown Tool

A good old Krone punchdown tool.  My old and trusty one is starting to be a bit tempramental now when it comes to cutting the wires, so I’ve recently added a new one which has yet to be christened.  Fortunately I don’t need these THAT often!

Cage Nut Tools

The quite rare and exceedingly valuable lesser spotted Cage-Nut Tool. I try to keep hold of these as they have a tendancy to vanish from my toolbox when other engineers realise what they are and how useful they can be! Most decent brands of Rack seem to come with one, so I’m not sure quite how they are so rare. Maybe they live under datacentre floors along with the cage nut eating mice?

Cage Nuts and Velcro Ties

Some Cage Nuts/Bolts, and some Velcro ties, have to try and keep things nice and neat now!

Multi Tool

This one is a relatively new2 addition, a freebie I picked up at Infosec this year, but it replaces a rather worn and similar one.

RJ45/Cat5e Couplers

I usually keep a handful of these Couplers at the ready.  I’ve used them for all sorts of strange purposes over the years.  Everything from extending Cisco Console Cables for those REALLY hard to reach devices, to temporarily connecting cables in lieu of an IP Phone with a built-in Switch.

Anti Static Wrist Strap

I probably don’t need to explain why these are here, but it’s a good “just in case”.

Baby Cat5e Cables

Always a good standby, but I keep some of these 6″ Cat5e cables, they seem to come in handy all over the place!

A collection of Serial Adapters, Converters and Loops

A mixture of Adapters, Gender Benders, Modem Eliminators, RJ45-RS232 adapters, and Loop Tools.

Now on to the slightly more interesting stuff!

Not sure what this is called!

I’m not sure what this is called; I managed to pick this up several years ago when doing a project involving opening and unboxing over 1200 new IP Phones which were boxed in boxes of 4.  The sheer quantity of cardboard and the number of boxes to be opened quickly caused fingers to be cut to shreds and fingernails to be damaged, but this really made life so much easier.

USB Memory Stick

I’m always equipped with a USB Memory Stick, simply because my lanyard with my Swipe Card on it has one built in.  This was a Promotional item from a supplier a couple of years ago, and has 1Gb storage, which is plenty for most things I’m likely to need.

Tone Generator and Probe

This one is so valuable when trying to trace cables and find those frustratingly misnumbered !  I stick with this slightly older model because it has both an RJ45 connection, and a set of Croc-Clips for wiring only checks.

A Butt

Not sure if I’ve spelt that one correctly!   The Butt is becoming less useful these days in the “modern” world of IP Telephony, but it’s still useful to have for tracing Wires and Analogue lines.

My current Cable Tester

A fairly standard Cat5 cable tester.  I haven’t had cause to use the older BNC style cable tester for some time, but this one is a two-part unit for testing local cables or entire cable runs, and will identify Straight Through or Crossover cables.

Short Wave Radio's

I added these some years ago after myself and a colleague were working in a building, one of us in the Patch Panel / Comms Room, and another person at the other end of a cable run.  I actually have a set of four but keep two in my Toolbox and two at home.

Star Drive

An all-in-one unit for most sizes of star type screw, this one is a really useful one to keep handy.

Digital Multimeter

Again an all-purpose tool which has a multiplicity of uses!  I tend to use the conductivity test and Voltage readings most of the time, but it has saved me from a nasty shock on at least one occasion!

Cable Snake Head

This one is in the spirit of keeping things tidy!  I sometimes have cause to use the plastic surround which wraps a bundle of cables in a protective sheath.  This is the special head which is used to apply the covering.  It opens up and is clipped around the cables to be protected, and the sheath slides over the protruding knob.  You then slide the head along the cable while pushing the protective sheath on to the head and hey presto, the cable is all nice and neat and protected.

MiFi and USB Extension Cable

The MiFi is used to get me Internet connectivity in places where corporate network connections are not available, or too slow.  You never know when you’re going to need to download a different IOS image, and if the Network is broken – well you simply have to have an alternative.  It’s often also faster than Hotel Wifi as I can get up to 8Mb all to myself on this, depending on how good the 3G coverage is at the time.   The USB extension cable is used to get to those really hard to reach USB ports from time to time.

Head Light!

Interestingly I note some of my peers keep a Flashlight in their tools;  this is my equivalent.  With an elasticated head fitting, it can go over my head to give me hands free illumination while working.

Cable Clips

I’m not sure where I picked these up, or what their proper purchase is, but they are ideal for temporarily holding some cables “up” together in the back of a rack somewhere.  The metal clips will hook on to all sorts of things, and the Velcro at the bottom keeps the cables secure.

CompactFlash Adapter

Used for connecting directly to the Laptop and transferring stuff straight to/from a CF card before putting it in a Router or Switch.

Special Tool to Factory Reset a certain type of UTM Appliance

This is a specific tool for a certain brand of UTM appliance.  It’s credit card sized but fairly thick with a push-out USB cable head.  Plugging it in to the USB port on an appliance will cause the appliance to reset to it’s factory default, so the ultimate in password reset tools I guess!

Miscellaneous Widgets

And lastly a collection of Miscellaneous Widgets including some Permanent Marker Pens, a collection of Batteries, a standard USB Memory Stick, a Wireless USB Network Adapter, and a GLC-T GBIC.

That’s all.  I’ve not shown the “boring” screwdrivers, or must have label printer etc which are probably an ever present feature of most Network Guys’ toolkits.  My only problem at the moment is that I don’t have a proper “box” to put all the tools in;  I’d like one similar to this Stanley one, but currently this is all in a plastic crate at work which will slide in to the back of the car nice and easily if needed.

So, what’s in your Toolkit?

Continue reading »]]> There’s a gadget out there; one that I’ve been sitting on the fence about.  Those that know me will understand how unusual this is, for me to NOT be investigating the latest gadget etc is extremely unusual!

I am referring to the Amazon Kindle.  

As a lover of books, I’ve not really been attracted to buying one, I’m not really sure why, and in hindsight I wish I’d bought one sooner. 

But, recently based on the recommendation of a friend, I took the plunge, and I’m extremely glad I did!

The screen is; simply put .. Stunning ..   It’s not an LCD or LED screen, there’s no use comparing it to an iPad or mobile phone, instead it uses an amazing e-Ink “Pearl” technology which uses a Pearlescent white/grey background capable of 4 different shades of black/grey.  From what I understand it only uses power when changing the display, thus accounting for an excellent battery life, and it’s extremely readable in direct sunlight.  Of course it suffers in the same way a conventional book does in low light situations.

I’ve been using mine for a couple of weeks now, and haven’t read so much in years!  I’ve been looking at different sources for the books (not just Amazon’s online shop) and I’m confident I can find sufficient reading material with the right appeal to keep me going for years.  It’s light, it’s effective, it’s easy to read, I’m sold.  My only real dilemma now is that I need to decide if I’m going to keep my existing library of books which take up lots of space on the shelf and gather dust, or whether I should start to replace them with the electronic versions.

Having said all that, I have two reservations about Kindle.

Firstly – and perhaps somewhat selfishly – I use Books as a ready source of gift ideas for people.  I maintain an Amazon Wishlist which usually has a selection of Books and DVD’s on it which I can refer people to when they ask the inevitable questions around Christmas and Birthdays, and I can’t see an easy way of someone buying me an e-Book, and certainly not wrapping it up to give as a gift in a few weeks.  Sure you could probably use a gift voucher or something, but it’d be nice if Amazon could come up with something to make this easier.

Secondly – There are two types of book.  The largest section of the market I can see being ‘compatible’ with Kindle, all of my Fiction collection and most of my reference books for work are monochrome (Covers notwithstanding), but I do have a small percentage of books that contain full colour glossy photos.  Cookery books for example, and as it stands Kindle just doesn’t lend itself to these books.

Imagine then my surprise and indeed glee after doing some Google searches to find the Kindle picture above to find that the company behind the existing display technology have produced a COLOUR version of the same tech, called e-Ink “Triton” which has extremely interesting possibilities.

It is my estimation that this is going to change the way we read and use books forever.  The ONLY thing that’s missing is a better way to manage and index the library of content on the device.  Just putting it in to an Alphabetic list doesn’t really do what’s needed.