Windows Vista Build 5270 – Heading in the right direction?

Posted on 2006/02/08 by richardykuo

I’ve been playing with the most recent CTP of Vista over the past few days in order to test compatibility and just get a general feel for where this next version of the operating system is taking us.  So far, I’m generally pretty interested in several of the things they’ve added…the new Aero Glass interface looks great, some features like SuperFetch sound promising, etc.  I can appreciate some of the new Tablet PC features they’ve added too, although I’m certainly not putting this thing on my Tablet yet since the tablet is my main computer and since Vista is clearly not ready for primetime based on what I’ve seen on other systems in the office.  Internet Explorer 7 looks nice though…I’ll probably switch back from FireFox if the RSS support is up to snuff since the massive memory consumption of FireFox is annoying me.

I was very impressed by how little the installation asked me to get Vista up and running.  Truly a great improvement in this area.

I was also impressed by the operating system installing all my wireless, bluetooth, and sound card drivers straight from Windows Update.  I didn’t have to pull out any CD’s or dig around a website to locate drivers.  Vista handled it all and got all my hardware working.  Keep in mind this was on my old Inspiron 9100, so that’s even more impressive since laptops generally have funny issues when it comes to driver support.

Vista uses all kinds of memory.  I’m at 700MB out of 1GB when I boot into Vista.  It also seems to leak memory after I run builds of our products under Visual Studio 2005.  I have to reboot the machine a lot to stop the computer from swapping itself to death.

Frankly, I’m hoping there’s something in there that lets hardware run at or below current spec machines without pushing the limits.  I have a distinct feeling we would already be in ultra mobile PC land if Microsoft would or could just slow down for a moment and tighten up the OS or actively pin down a low spec configuration of XP or Vista (that isn’t XPE…normal users can’t run XPE).  I was running Word and surfing the web on a 32MB Pentium 100 several years ago.  At some basic level that’s still all a lot of PC’s need to do.  I’m pretty sure I could run a 32MB P100 spec machine for many moons with the current state of technology.  Point being…pushing forward the bar is great, but we also keep moving the bar ahead of where ultra mobile PC’s become practical as a result.  And that sucks.

My general impression with regards to the operating system is that Microsoft is adding all kinds of things without taking enough time to reorganize and simplify the interface.  I’m still trying to take stock of whether the differences are improvements or not, but at the moment many of the changes seem like change for the sake of change.  For example, I find the Control Panel to be an utter disaster at the present time…I don’t understand the groupings they’ve put together at all and the number of options in the Control Panel now is truly massive…somewhere around 40-50 icons to click on if you switch to classic view. 

In general I find this to be a common theme as I explore the interface…things are confusing.  Some basic user interface paradigms have been broken for no reason that I can fathom, and others have been changed radically…again, for no reason that I can see.  For example, many menus are now completely missing or positioned below toolbars when present.  Why?  I don’t know.  I don’t see that any user is going to benefit from such changes.

I don’t mind being confused if the change ultimately results in an easier to use interface.  Lord knows I’ve had to deal with making such changes myself.  But I don’t feel better after learning some of these changes…I’m just irritated by them, mostly.  I’m certainly not thinking to myself “Wow, that’s how it should have been all along.”

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The Toshiba M400 is out

Posted on 2006/02/07 by richardykuo

I bought a Toshiba M200 about two months ago.  The special thing about the M200 is that, unlike most notebooks, it is a convertible Tablet PC.

What prompted me to do this?  Two things.  One, my main laptop broke, so I needed a replacement and it got me thinking about where I needed to upgrade.  Two, I needed to sketch and diagram a lot of web pages for some projects and I am not, nor will I ever be, particularly enamored with carrying paper around in addition to my notebook.

I went into the experience expecting a real possibility of the whole idea of the Tablet PC just sucking.  That’s why I ended up buying a used M200 off of eBay…it really cut the investment I needed to make to experiment with the whole concept.

I have yet to give my long opinion on Tablet PC’s, but the short of it is that there are a lot of things that suck about them and several excellent things about them as well.  The good part is that you can just ignore all the things that don’t work well enough and focus on what does work.  The second part of that opinion is price.  Tablet’s cost too much to be mainstream.  But, like I said, I’ll get into that later.

Enough with the intro.  The first of the next generation of Tablet PC’s, the Toshiba Portege M400, is out.  Here ‘s the press release, and here’s the buy page.

The M400 is pretty much the holy grail for a lot of Tablet PC enthusiasts right now.  Dual core with the associated chipset improvements in battery life, a super bright screen, modular bay, integrated fingerprint reader…all very nice!  In my opinion, it’s almost perfect.  The places where the specs currently lack for me are:

  1. Graphics card – Biggest issue so far and may hold a lot of people back from upgrading.  The graphics in the M400 are basic Intel integrated graphics.  Now, actually, the Intel GMA950 (that’s the graphics chipset) has done some improving over the years and we’re pretty much around GeForce 3 class now.  It’s Aero Glass ready and all that jazz.  Not terrible, but still far off the mark when it comes to current technology.  There are some pretty well founded rumors that suggest that there will be a nVidia option available by the end of the month, but nothing completely substantiated.  Personally, I’m going to wait and see. By far this is the biggest issue that would hold folks back, I think.
  2. Modular bay battery – The bay is there..but I don’t see the battery option.  I personally don’t care about the drive…what I care about is extra battery life or possibly an extra hard drive. Most techies fall into this camp…we can generally install software via drive images or over the network.
  3. Size and weight (possibly) – Initial reports suggested the M400 was around 5 pounds, which is an increase over the M200’s weight of about 4.4 pounds.  That was a huge disappointment since one of the big selling points here is mobility.  However, the spec sheet I’m referring to now says the M400’s weight is 4.5 pounds.  Well, if that’s true, then at least we’re holding steady. The bulk of the M400 however, I believe is slightly worse than the M200, which is, again, disappointing when you compare against other laptops in its weight class.  The TX series from Sony or Fujitsu line have done wonders in this area.  When you stack up what one of their notebooks looks like vs the M400, it’s clear just how much more you can squeeze out of the case if you try.

Still, with all that said, the M400 is exciting news.  I’m now pretty sold on the M200 I have, so I expect to upgrade to the M400 soon if the nVidia option becomes available.  It’s just a waiting game right now.

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Lay’s Stax vs Pringles

Posted on 2006/02/07 by richardykuo

For some reason, I like snacking on artificially formed potato crisps.  Yep, that’s right.  Is it not odd that they are called crisps instead of chips?  I suppose calling them potato chips is a crime that would get you arrested by the mattress tag police.

At any rate, I was at the supermarket the other day and saw these two brands side by side.  Aside from the fact that I was hungry, which in itself is a huge mistake when you visit a supermarket, I was also curious as to which of these was the better chip.  I bought way too many chips in general, but I did make sure to buy a couple from each brand.

Here’s my official opinion…Lay’s Stax wins hands down.  The chips are crunchier and drier, slightly thicker, and appear to maintain much more structural integrity overall.  More importantly, they seem to be dusted with some sort of addictive substance which I imagine to be produced in the forests of Columbia.  The Pringles are OK, but seem slightly soggier, thinner, and more broken apart in the packaging.

Feel free to take the Crispy Challenge yourself, if you dare!

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Unwired and loving it

Posted on 2006/02/05 by richardykuo

After heading out to get some networking gear from Fry’s, I spent the earlier part of yesterday installing the goods.

Let’s keep this short. It all pretty much works.  The wireless PCI cards from Airlink I bought seem to work fine.  I put one of the adapters in a machine with integrated ethernet and disconnected the Ethernet.  Then I swapped another of the new adapters into the downstairs HTPC and took the Linksys WUSB54G 1.0 wireless adapter that it was currently using.  Then I took that wireless adapter and hooked it up to my server, replacing the HomePNA adapter and bridge that were on that (yes, a very hacked up setup from long ago).  Last, but not least, I went about unhooking a bunch of wires and hubs.  Things are a lot more organized now and I am pleased.

The new router from Airlink is slightly better.  I now have some machines further apart from the wireless router and the connections are holding up OK.  But in general, not a huge improvement over the Microsoft router I had before.  Kudos to Microsoft for producing a piece of hardware that holds up well over time.

The most difficult part of the process was getting my OpenVPN server running again.  I’ll talk about OpenVPN later…it’s hard to setup, but pretty much great technically.

Anyway, I have to bridge the network adapter and the virtual OpenVPN adapter for VPN to work the way I want it.  Worked OK with the adapter that was hooked up before…but with the Linksys adapter hooked up, the connection simply didn’t work.  Mind you, it worked when not bridged…but bridging caused the connection to just die.  So I Googled around and eventually came up with the reason…Bridge may not work with a non-promiscuous mode adapter.

I don’t think your average Joe Blow is going to figure that kind of stuff out.  Then again, I guess your average Joe Blow isn’t trying to bridge adapters for OpenVPN either.  Still, does everything have to be this hard?  I’m just going to say I’m damn happy there was a workaround.

So to sum up, I bought some cheapo wireless equipment.  Not Pre-N or TrueMIMO, but it all works.  The computer room has lost a lot of wires and routers, and as a result it looks much nicer and easier to manage.  The Roomba won’t be tripping over stuff the next time it vacuums, either.  Another small piece of my life that has become easier to manage.

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Politically incorrect moment

Posted on 2006/02/05 by richardykuo

After many entries into the Win a DocuPen RC800 contest, Rob Bushway has finally picked the winner of the contest.  Go ahead and read the winning entry.

I have to say that I’m a bit puzzled by his choice.  Keep in mind the form factor of the DocuPen RC800.  You have to run your hand carefully down the document for each page, and it’s a small, expensive, and easily stolen gadget.

I think this gesture is well intentioned, and it’s certainly his to make.  But it will clearly go to waste.  A 50 dollar flatbed scanner would help the winner of this contest more and cost less.  You cannot and should not scan the amount of documents this person dreams of scanning with a DocuPen.  I would have preferred to see the DocuPen go to an entrant that cares enough to know why they would benefit from one.  Reference the blog name, http://www.cutmeloose.com. I thought that was the point of a giveaway like this…to raise awareness of Tablet PC’s and the mobile lifestyle.

Now what I’ve said above is clearly not PC, but it is, in my opinion, completely correct.  I don’t get paid to be PC about usability.

The giveaway, however, is a tremendous gesture, and I do applaud Rob for his generosity and the buzz he’s helped to generate around the Tablet PC and Planon’s DocuPen with it.

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Do we need network drivers any more?

Posted on 2006/02/03 by richardykuo

On our way back from Fry’s, I was musing upon the installation I was going to have to do with this new networking equipment.   So I had to ask the million dollar question…why do we need special drivers for network adapters any more?  Isn’t the whole concept of a network adapter pretty much cut and dried at this point?  Don’t we pretty much know everything an adapter needs to do?

How about I plug the card in and it just starts working?  Wouldn’t that be swell?

Of course, I’m probably oversimplifying things somewhere, somehow, and I’m not aware of just how complicated things really are.  But you know what…I bet it’s doable.  I don’t think the status quo is acceptable here.  Remember when wireless wasn’t built into the operating system and network vendors were all making their own control panels and other crapware?  That sucked.  And installing their drivers sucks too.

There is no reason why I should have to install drivers to get a network adapter up and running in this day and age.  We need a standard around this that makes installing a network adapter as easy as plugging in a USB flash drive.  From a usability standpoint, it should have happened a long time ago.

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More wireless networking fun

Posted on 2006/02/03 by richardykuo

I recently got a Roomba, on account of the fact that…well, let’s just say I don’t clean up as often as I should.  I’ll write up a full posting later on that, but in the mean time, I’ll simply mention that part of getting a space “Roomba ready” is getting your assorted junk off the ground.

My house isn’t wired…and I don’t think we’re going to be wiring it up any time soon.  So at the moment, we have a mishmash of wires localized to the computer room and a wireless router which my laptop and the downstairs HTPC connect to.  It’s those wires running on the ground for Ethernet that are causing problems…plus they’ve always looked messy.

Today, Fry’s ran an ad for Airlink branded MIMO 802.11g router for 29.99 and adapters for 19.99.  No rebates attached.  Seemed like a good opportunity to go ahead and unwire the whole house, so we headed over to Fry’s and picked up two wireless PCI adapters and a router.

The Airlink 101 router hasn’t gotten great reviews.  But I don’t need it to perform that well…just good enough.  I’m replacing a Microsoft router, which has been excellent, but it’s still old technology.  We’ll see how it goes.

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Obscenities are still words

Posted on 2006/02/02 by richardykuo

Interestingly, there’s a blog post from Frank La Vigne describing how a list of approximately 3000 words known as obscenities won’t be shown as potential choices to the user.

I wonder if this applies to the actual handwriting recognition.  I don’t know if you’ve ever worked with folks in their mid-20’s to 30’s, but it’s quite frequent for someone, trying out my tablet and the handwriting recognition for the first time, to sit down and write some obscenities down in OneNote to see if this thing really knows how to translate words or not.  The recognition on actually doesn’t go off that well…and after several runs, we all suspect now that the Tablet is “censoring” us.

So here’s a tip for the handwriting recognition folks…obscenity recognition is key when targeting the young male demographic.  The MTV generation will write them on your Tablets, and to make a good impression, you should translate them correctly.

Hey, nobody ever said life made sense.

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Linksys SRX400 – So far, so good

Posted on 2006/01/30 by richardykuo

Last Friday, I took my M200 over to the lounge to watch the Sci-Fi Channel while I did some work.  It turned out to be a most unpleasant experience.

In the past, our wireless configuration in our office has been rather….shall we say, less than desirable.  Consisting of two Linksys WRT54G routers, any computer connected to the wireless network would have its connection inexplicably reset by the access points at inopportune times.  I know this because I’ve had two computers next to each other reset at exactly the same time…so it’s not the individual computers causing problems.  Not only does that bomb out any unreliable file transfers, it also pops you off and on IM, announcing to all your friends on a regular basis just how crappy your wireless setup is.

Friday was the last straw.  I was trying to offload some files from my notebook in preparation for the drive swap and I literally could not keep a connection for more than 15 seconds.  Then…it just stopped working altogether.  Not even unplugging the routers worked.

I just wired in with a really long Ethernet cable lying around the lounge and gave up.

So Sunday, having had enough of this crap, I did a little research on wireless technologies, referred regularly to an excellent MIMO roundup from Tom’s Networking, and concluded that buying something based on Airgo’s third generation True MIMO chipset was the way to go.  Getting a MIMO router would probably allow me to cover the entire office with one router, plus eliminate dead spots and significantly improve the reception for existing clients.

The third generation True MIMO chipset, when paired on both ends, literally reaches about 240 mbps of throughput…which, when translated down to real world throughput, still exceeds the bandwidth of Fast Ethernet.  Impressive!

I chose the WRT54GX4 from Linksys over the RangeMax 240 from Netgear because the Linksys appears to cooperate better with foreign networks.  Yes, even though Linksys was the company that made the crappy wireless access points we were using in the first place.  Give me ten lashes, I’m a glutton for punishment.  Even though many of these products seem to have some various issues (I note that the WRT54GX4 with SRX400 has some complaints about VOIP support), I use these things strictly as an access point anyway, so I bypass a lot of these issues.

Long story short, we get in the office, unplug all the other access points, plug it in, configure the security, and let ‘er rip.  To summarize, the range really is quite good and it does cover our entire building.  On top of that, I haven’t had any wireless dropouts today.  So yeah, it looks like it’s working pretty well.

So now that this is working so nicely, I’d like to get a compatible True MIMO card for my notebook.  Not one of the cards that sticks a dongle out of the PC Card slot…a real Mini-PCI replacement card.  Unfortunately, I don’t see where to get one…maybe they’re not out yet?

Oh well…I’ll have to be happy with stable wireless access for the moment.

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Toshiba M200 now at 60GB

Posted on 2006/01/29 by richardykuo

Not exactly a banner day for the Internet, but not a bad day over here at rkuo.com.  The 60GB Hitachi Travelstar now in my Tablet PC is, in fact, close to as quiet as the old 40GB Travelstar and way more quiet than the Toshiba 80GB drive that I briefly tried in my last post.

As a completely unexpected bonus, battery life appears to have increased with this drive installed to about 20 extra minutes past where it used to be.  From a full charge and screen brightness dimmed somewhat, I’m at 3:51 minutes of battery life.  Not bad…not bad at all.

I’m probably still going to be getting the M400, but I think this M200 is quite ready to be handed off to someone else at SnapStream whenever that happens.

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