Category: Gadgets

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Gadgets Linux Open Source Technology Web Development Wireless

Blog back online and now running on a Raspberry Pi 0 W

Since I finally got Gigaclear Fibre to the Premises (FTTP – which took over 18 months from when I placed my order) my blog has been offline. This was due to the fact that my static IP is associated with the FTTC (regular Fibre to the Cabinet) Broadband – which I am keeping as a backup/ secondary WAN as its only costing me a couple of quid more than land line rental. Getting FTTP mean’t getting a new router and I decided it was a good time to rethink my home network and implement VLANs to segregate different uses of my home network. Bought a very flexible little Dual WAN router/switch that I am super pleased with that allows me to seperate IoT from my main network (which is security best practise as IoT can have some horrible security holes). Now need to upgrade my main switch to a managed switch so I can implement VLANs throughout the network (and I am still wondering what to do about WiFi (without an expensive upgrade to VLAN aware Access points – as Gigaclear threw in a pretty decent Wifi Mesh system) At the moment I am running 2 Wifi networks – but that probably needs a rethink at some point.

As for the Raspberry PI Zero W – amazing that something so small (and powered off a router USB port!) can power a WordPress blog. Sure its not going to handle loads of requests (but then my blog never gets that!). I’ve also switched from Apache2 to Nginx. Now my web server is totally separate and decoupled from the rest of my Home Lab and virtual servers etc (which have become more experimental over the last few months with the new job).

I’ve also enabled HTTPS using a properly signed cert from LetsEncrypt. CertBot is amazingly easy to use – highly recommended.

Blog is still pretty broken in places, might get around to fixing that at some point!!!

Categories
Gadgets Road Cycling Technology

Sony Xperia Z1 initial review

So I’ve finally upgraded my mobile, after having stuck it out with an iPhone 3GS for far to long I feel like I have moved into the 22nd century with the Sony Xperia Z1!

So first off – size. Yes it is big, a lot bigger than my old iPhone, even bigger than the S4. But I’ve got used to it easily and it doesn’t feel too big in most cases. It does poke out of some trouser pockets though!! However the advantage is that I will be reaching for a tablet or PC far less as the screen is amazing.

Camera is very good and has some great modes – Timeburst is very useful (Google photos creates animated GIFs automatically from this mode as well it would seem!) Augmented Reality is pretty fun as well. Image quality is very good and the lens offers a decent wide angle.

The things that I didn’t expect but have really impressed me is the audio quality on calls. Its also a brilliant speakerphone good enough to do meetings with (the 3GS was shocking in this regard).

Battery seems good – as a comparison a 1.5 hr bike ride on Strava (screen off) on the 3GS killed 40-50% of battery. It only takes 6% of the battery on the Z1! In generally usage I have about 50% remaining at the end of the day, and thats without using the Stamina mode which claims to boost the longevity by about x2.

Only glitch I have found so far is that if the phone gets too hot it will stop you from using the camera with a warning message telling you it needs to cool down!

So overall – so far so good!…

Categories
Cycling Gadgets

Nice shot of Donnington Castle

One of my better recent shots taken on the SLR:

Taken on a recent bike ride to Donnington and Bagnor

Info on Donnington Castle here and here on Wikipedia

Categories
Gadgets Sony Stuff Technology

Exciting Playstation Updates (Iplayer & Playstation Home)

The latest firmware upgrade for the PS3 (is it me or does the thing love to spend half its time updating itself or something or other?!) is worthwhile – whilst the last one added Life with Playstation (which is an enchancement to the folding@home application that puts spare processing power to use) this one adds Playstation Home (think Second Life) and the ability to play Iplayer videos (although not download) which is really cool and very useful.

Playstation Home looks really good although it must be struggling with increased demand – as most of the time it fails to connect which is a shame.

Can’t help but think though that some of these products – Life@Playstation, Playstation Home could use better more imaginative names…?

Categories
Gadgets Life

I now have a PS3 – expect tumbleweed here for a while :)

Busy at work (lots of EU related stuff at the moment) and have now got some new toys including a PS3 80GB (one with the dual shock rumble pad) – so don’t expect many posts in the near future!!

I’m sure I’ll get the blogging bug again before too long………

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Gadgets Wireless

Opera Mini Web Browser on the BlackBerry…

…is brilliant, miles better than the standard Web Browser, although still not quite on a par with the iPhone (but then half the magic of that is the touch screen interface). Very fast and displays pages like a standard desktop browser, but the killer feature is that it allows you to see the whole website in a zoomed out view allowing you can click to zoom in/out and then move around the page really easily. Also has a handy bookmarks sync feature (where you can enter URLs online using your desktop browser for use later on the phone).

Grab it from http://mini.opera.com (using the standard browser on the phone). You can also check out a demo on PC here: http://www.operamini.com/demo/. This is also available for other devices other than BlackBerrys.

Getting the Wifi to work can be a bit fiddly (not the initial Wifi Connection but getting the device to use the WLAN rather than the GPRS). Look for options along the lines of “Prefer Wifi” in the phone settings menus.
Opera Mini behaves much better in this respect than the standard browser.

Was also very pleased to discover that I could buy a Sandisk 2GB microSD memory card for my BlackBerry for £6 on play.com! Brilliant deal! Also discovered that Sandisk do a really cool SD card that folds in half to allow it slot into your USB port so that has joined my gadget collection too!

Categories
Cycling Gadgets

New kit!

Prescription Oakleys…
Oakleys - hmmm...

Those of you are lucky(?!) enough to know me will know that I love a good gadget or 20. I took the plunge recently and bought myself some Oakleys with prescription lenses – some Livestrong Flak Jacket XLJ’s. The reason I’ve been wanting to get some (Oakley’s) for the last 5 or so years is for my cycling and skiing but haven’t got any because they are so damn expensive with prescription lenses in (about double the price standard price of Oakleys!). Of course it rains the whole weekend that I get them so I have yet to really wear them in anger…

One thing to note about prescription lenses in Oakleys is that they aren’t thinned (I’ve got thinned lenses in my regular glasses over the last few years as I’ve started getting more short sighted) so the lenses are quite thick. But they are wrap around so you get the feeling you can properly see (including peripheral vision) again (like wearing contacts – but I never got on with those). I’ll try and remember to take a picture for comparison next time I am with my 20:20 vision cycling mates.

Blackberry – aka “Crackberry” – as my former colleagues at 7city used to call them – as in they are addictive : – )

Work have been kind enough to ease my email (and keeping an eye on things) burden with a Blackberry 8820 which is nice. Has Wifi which is pretty useful. No doubt I’ll be posting some Blackberry related posts soon…