Techbadger Claw Marks

VMWare 5: New NIC drivers without recompiling!

Ya, ESXi doesn’t allow driver disks during the install. Old ESX did but not i! Instead you have to have an extra linux box lying around and do a recompile to get it to work with the newest Intel and other NICs or it just fails on you!

Well if you use ESXi customizer not only can you add new drivers to your custom build but if you are running ESXi 5 it will even spit out an ISO of the 5 build ready to be burned for your install. Best of all it even runs under Windows! Now you can get that virtual Linux without needing a real Linux box to begin with.

BTW, if you are looking for an ESXi Intel NIC driver (82579 or the like) here it is!

Internet podcasts and radio anywhere.

If you are like me, you’ve become tired of just AM/FM local radio. You want choice. I’ve been adding a Grace Internet Radio to my library Linn Classik (ya, it’s spelled right.) to give me Podcasts and ripped CD from my hone NAS unit.

It is controlled from my Android phone to access podcasts, mp3s, internet radio stations, you name it. It outputs through any audio system with a AUX port. It does have a limited remote that come with the unit but the app offers a lot more control and the ability to choose sources without having to have direct line of site on the Grace.

The control app is also available for iPhone and any Android with 2.3 (Honeycomb). Can’t wait to get it loaded on my tablet (Herotab hasn’t come out with my 2.3 firmware yet.)

A great tablet.

I’ve had my Herotab M8 (bought from Merimobles)for a week now: I am using it as a a note taker, PDF reader (saving me a ton of paper on technical manual), Book reader both for pleasure, travel and class books. This unit also adds a wondeful car GPS unit and even a backup phone (I bought one with 3g slot). Does all wonderfully.

Conclusion (saving you from reading the whole review): I love this tablet, yes it has its issues but I think they are all solvable and it is doing everything I wanted/needed from my tablet.

Positives: great speed. Good Battery life (about 5 hours with WiFi and everything, GPS is about 3 hours, with all wireless turned off I get about 6 or 7 just using it as a reader. Screen size is wonderful for PDFs (8.5X11″ PDFs look great on this 1024X768 8″ display). 3d graphics are speedy and videos are at 30fps. Kindle and standard reader look wonderful and no eye strain over long 3-4 hours of reading.The size is perfect compared to the just too small 7″ tablets and the ipad’s 10…if fits my pockets, backpacks and satchels.

Negatives: Lockups, mostly coming out of stand-by or with screen off. Sometimes it isn’t really a lock up but it takes a few to unlock the screen. Android store has issues figuring out if apps are compatible with this tablet, always have a stylus (my old hp4700 works perfectly) . A few games seem unable to get the tilt to work with them. The GPS takes about an hour to get a lock the first time(seconds after the first time). All these are really minor and probably will be fixed in a firmware or two and 2.3 and 3.0 OSes will probably make these issues a laughable memory. Another annoyance is the lack of a power-lock on the unit and the power button is easily bumpable in a satchel or backpack using valuable battery-life just sitting there with the screen on, hopefully the new slipcase coming out next week will solve this issue.

10 class micro-sds have problems with this unit but that’s not limited to the M8, it’s a problem with Android devices and current crop of class 10s (Wintec, Sandisk and Patriot are all working on this issue and will support and replace cards under warranty).

Looking at the hardware, it looks like the 4gbs internal ram is upgradable for the price of a replacement micro-sd from 4 to 16GB, you will have to get another firmware from Merimobiles to make this happen.

Even better than my experience with this tablet was my experience with Merimobiles, Phillip, Oliver and the rest were wonderful in their fast communication, fast shipping and wonderful support after purchase. I am definitely going to be a long-time customer of this company!

Yes, I am back up and running

Ya, I was gone a little while. The latest wordpress demanded MySQL5, new PHP, and working through chopsticks(parallels) wasn’t the easiest DB upgrade path I’ve had the pleasure of using but I finally had time and determination to get this working again…WOOT!

SPB wallet now available for Android!

One of the things I missed when moving over from my old Symbian Nokia phone was my old data wallet, I made due but I really missed the graphics and design of SPB’s.

A data wallet keeps track of all your passwords, accounts numbers, lock combinations and all the important data of life in a secure way (in this case AES-256bit encryption!).

Well all that has changed, SPB has finally released a client for Android that does sync (direct, gmail and cloud) with the desktop client.

There is even a password generator so you can make completely random unguessable passwords that can be huge since it’s all cut and paste.

It is on sale for 3.5 bucks till 5/31 when it goes to to $7.99

Is Android ready for prime time?

Replaced my beloved Nokia E-71 with a HTC Inspire 4G.

I saw a peer using his and liked the size and clarity of the new screens, the new apps that worked with PDFs, Word and other MS apps was useful.

All my friends (well 80% are on Android) and there were apps I would like to have in my pocket at the ready. I figured at over 2 years Android should have worked out the bugs by now.

Not to mention one of my friend’s phones was dying (come to think of it, I gave them the dying phone, my old Motorola before my beloved Nokia!) anyway it helps a few people and gotta help that economy!

First, it was hard to sign up for another 2-year agreement with AT&T, I have been off the reservation for nearly 5 using unlocked phones, but an amazing phone for $50 instead of $450 for the unlocked seemed worth it.

What I liked about my old Nokia: It had apps for everything I needed. I mean it doesn’t have the Apple store, but it had enough aps to fill my requirements. All I needed was a data wallet, a turn-by-turn GPS, a twitter app (Gravity for Nokia is amazing btw).

The Inspire is a terrific work phone, has all the apps I need and then some! (dropbox, airline, calendar and because it’s an Android phone, yes it has google-apps as part of its DNA. On a business trip it was my everything, GPS, Clock, reservation monitor, email, calendar…If it weren’t for deskwork I probably could have left my laptop at home.

It has its glitches though:
It takes a few seconds to voice dial, my old Nokia was instant.
Its voice dial isn’t as nice or selective as the Motorola, Nokia or the Blackberry (where you can choose name, home, mobile…etc by voice).
The GPS is more inclusive and allows voice dial, but it doesn’t offer speed limit warnings or traffic warnings. On the other hand, telling me the side of the road for the destination and the search features by voice are amazing.

One thing I will give the Android, the cut and paste are sublime, You never relieze about important they are until you grab and address or phone number out of email or finding or dialing. Google/HTC got that right!

Nokia put out an amazing SDK, the Android one is ok but the Nokia one seems more free with better coding libraries. This might be me not being used to playing in the Google sandbox.

And most importantly my Nokia locked up maybe once in over 3 years, my new android has already locked up a few times and I haven’t even rooted it yet! (perhaps it’s the AT&T crapware and I should!).

Overall it a great productive phone, I am just not sure it is reliable and ready for prime-time.

With virtualization, cheaper is actually better.

I am in the process of building a server testbad for testing network/platform configurations:

Build list:
Lian LI PC-Q08 Case
WD 2GB drives.
Corsair 500W PS
8GBs memory(16gb are available yet).
Intel DQ67EP Motherboard
Processor i7 2600.

You might ask why not go to the 2600k processor, because it doesn’t support VT-D visualization and yet the cheaper 2600 does.

Why? I have no idea, just a warning to others, if you want to run VMware ESXi (and you know you do…) get the cheaper processor.

Weird but true!

Gōng Xǐ Fā Cái everyone

Happy Chinese year of the metal rabbit!

If you miss 1-800-Goog-411

Ya; I know, it’s been the year of companies getting rid of great services.

First PayPal gets rid of their terrific virtual Mastercard now Google has gotten rid of Goog-411, the first number that used to be one of the first I’d put in any cellphone. Directions, maps and controllable by voice.

Well, I am still working on a PayPal credit card solution but I have a replacement for Goog-411: 1-800-Call-411.

It’s Microsoft’s Bing voice search and it offers everything Goog-411 did and more, send messages to other people, maps and driving directions from where you are!

The Windows7 home premium 3-pack is back!

If you have a bunch of vista machines, this is the cheapest way to upgrade them. $150 bucks at the MS Store: http://store.microsoft.com/microsoft/Windows-7-Home-Premium-Upgrade-Family-Pack/product/87DFFF11

Or if you have access to Costco, it’s $125!