My History of Smartphones

Thanks to gifmaker.me.

The Trump Backups

When I built "The Trump" I used Windows Storage Spaces to create a mirrored data drive.

On the Storage Spaces I used Microsoft's Resilient File System (ReFS). The 2 TB drives I used had 4096 byte hardware sectors.

While I still believe that this was a solid technical decision it has caused me difficulties in backing up my data drive.

My "go to" backup solution Drive SnapShot didn't support 4096 byte sectors and couldn't give me a date for adding that support.

This sent me on a quest for alternatives.

For AOMEI Backupper Standard:

In summary I didn't find ANY personal backup (read that "free") tools that supported 4096 byte sectors and ReFS.

The best I could find was Macrium Reflect Free.

It supports 4096 byte sectors but treats the ReFS like a fully used GPT volume. With Reflect's compression and differential backups this has been acceptable.

I'm looking forward to the personal backup tools stepping up to these new technologies.

OTG

OTG stands for "USB On-The-Go."

OTG is a "specification that allows USB devices ... to act as a host, allowing other USB devices ... to be attached to them. ... For instance, a mobile phone may read from removable media as the host device, but present itself as a USB Mass Storage Device when connected to a host computer."

Translation: An OTG drive can be plugged into a PC and then into a phone.

I had never played with these until I came across this one.

Then I couldn't find anything to do with it!

But recently I found a good use case for it.

I had ripped Flash Boys: A Wall Street Revolt to mp3s and wanted to move it to my Nexus 5.

I put the USB A end into Trump and dragged the mp3s to it. I ejected it and took it over to the phone.

When I plugged it in I got this in the Notification area.

I tapped on "PNY USB drive" and got this.

I long tapped on "Michael Lewis" and then pulled down "...".

I tapped on "Copy to ...".

And I was able to copy the folder to the phone.

To eject it, I pulled down the notification shade again, opened the Settings and ejected it.

If it would just fit on my key chain I'd use it a lot more. By the way, it did get hot while plugged into the phone.

Oh, there's one for the iPhone too with a slight Apple tax.

Comcast Atta Boys

My EMCO Ping Monitor had been complaining about brief Internet outages for a couple of weeks. I almost never noticed them. When I did the Internet recovered before I could do much problem determination.

One day the blip lasted 10 minutes so I called Comcast.

After a few minutes of fruitless discussions with the Philippines I was transferred to to Lisa in Denver (888-824-8988). She said that my signal levels were low and scheduled an appointment for 2 days later between 10:00 and noon. They had offered to come the next day but I was not available.

The evening of the next day Comcast called me and said that they had made repairs in my neighborhood and wanted to know if my problem was resolved. As it was so intermittent I couldn't say either way so we let the appointment stand.

At 9:00 on the morning of the appointment I got an e-mail that the technician was at my house. I looked out the window and there he was an hour early.

Then my phone rang and he announced himself.

He was a Comcast employee, not a contractor, and was very capable. Before he called me he had checked that my signal levels were good. He was aware of what they had done on the previous day and said that that repair was what had corrected my signal levels.

I haven't had the problem since.

Good job Comcast!

Then on Memorial Day, both the Internet and cable TV went down.

When I called Comcast I was greeted with a message that there was a problem in my area and they were working on it. I found this just down the street.

The service was restored before the time they had promised.

Good job Comcast!

And finally, the speed.

Good job Comcast!

You Won't Believe What My Next Phone Is!

I have a pattern of buying old, cheap, niche mobile phones: Samsung Captivate, Samsung Skyrocket, Moto X, OnePlus One, and Google Nexus 5.

I've loved my Nexus 5 but the battery life is erratic.

So I found something new.

	Google Nexus 5	New Phone
DESIGN
Device type	Smart phone	Smart phone
OS	Android (6.0, 5.1, 5.0, 4.4.4, 4.4.2, 4.4)	Android (6.0, 5.1)
Dimensions	5.43 x 2.72 x 0.34 inches (137.84 x 69.17 x 8.59 mm)	5.79 x 3.04 x 0.37 inches (147 x 77.2 x 9.4 mm)
Weight	4.59 oz (130 g)	6.77 oz (192 g)
DISPLAY
Physical size	5.0 inches	5.4 inches
Resolution	1080 x 1920 pixels	1440 x 2560 pixels
Pixel density	445 ppi	541 ppi
Technology	IPS LCD	AMOLED
Colors	16 777 216	16 777 216
Touchscreen	Multi-touch	Multi-touch
Features	Light sensor, Proximity sensor, Scratch-resistant glass (Corning Gorilla Glass 3)	Scratch-resistant glass (Corning Gorilla Glass 4), Light sensor, Proximity sensor
CAMERA
Camera	8 megapixels	18 megapixels
Flash	Dual LED	Dual LED
Aperture size	F2.4	F2.2
Focal length (35mm equivalent)	30.4 mm
Camera sensor size	1/3.2"
Features	Optical image stabilization, Face detection, Digital zoom, Self-timer, Back-illuminated sensor (BSI), Autofocus, Touch to focus, Geo tagging	Optical image stabilization, Autofocus (Phase detection), Touch to focus, Face detection, Digital zoom, Geo tagging
Camcorder	1920x1080 (1080p HD) (30 fps)	3840x2160 (4K) (30 fps), 1920x1080 (1080p HD) (60 fps)
Features
Front-facing camera	1.3 megapixels	2 megapixels
HARDWARE
System chip	Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 MSM8974	Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 MSM8992
Processor	Quad-core, 2260 MHz, Krait 400	Hexa-core, 1800 MHz, ARM Cortex-A57 and ARM Cortex-A53, 64-bit
Graphics processor	Adreno 330	Adreno 418
System memory	2048 MB RAM	3072 MB RAM
Built-in storage	32 GB	32 GB
Maximum User Storage
Storage expansion		microSD, microSDHC, microSDXC up to 2000 GB
BATTERY
Talk time	17.00 hours
Stand-by time	12.5 days (300 hours)
Capacity	2300 mAh	3410 mAh
Not user replaceable	Yes	Yes
Wireless charging	Built-in (Qi)	Built-in (Qi, Powermat)
MULTIMEDIA
Music player
Filter by	Album, Artist, Playlists	Album, Artist, Genre, Playlists
Features	Album art cover, Background playback	Album art cover, Background playback
Speakers	Earpiece, Loudspeaker	Earpiece, Loudspeaker
YouTube player	Yes	Yes
INTERNET BROWSING
Built-in online services support	YouTube (upload), Picasa/Google+	YouTube (upload), Picasa/Google+
TECHNOLOGY
CDMA	800, 1900 MHz
GSM	850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz	850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz
UMTS	800, 850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz	800, 850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz
FDD LTE	800 (band 20), 850 (band 5), 900 (band 8), 1800 (band 3), 2100 (band 1), 2600 (band 7) MHz	700 (band 12), 700 (band 17), 700 (band 29), 800 (band 20), 850 (band 5), 1700/2100 (band 4), 1800 (band 3), 1900 (band 2), 2100 (band 1), 2300 WCS (band 30), 2600 (band 7) MHz
Data	LTE Cat 4 (150/50 Mbit/s), HSDPA+ (4G) 42.2 Mbit/s, HSUPA 5.76 Mbit/s, UMTS, EDGE, GPRS	LTE-A, HSPA (unspecified), HSUPA
micro-SIM	Yes
nano-SIM		Yes
Positioning	GPS, A-GPS, Glonass	GPS, A-GPS
Navigation	Turn-by-turn navigation	Turn-by-turn navigation, Voice navigation
CONNECTIVITY
Bluetooth	4.0	4.1
Wi-Fi	802.11 a, b, g, n, n 5GHz, ac	802.11 a, b, g, n, n 5GHz, ac
Mobile hotspot	Yes	Yes
USB	USB 2.0	USB 2.0
Connector	microUSB	microUSB
Features	USB charging	USB charging
HDMI	via microUSB
Other	NFC, DLNA, Miracast, ANT+, SlimPort, TV-Out, Tethering, Computer sync, OTA sync	NFC, Tethering, Computer sync, OTA sync
OTHER FEATURES
Notifications	Haptic feedback, Music ringtones (MP3), Polyphonic ringtones, Vibration, Flight mode, Silent mode, Speakerphone	Service lights, Haptic feedback, Music ringtones (MP3), Polyphonic ringtones, Vibration, Flight mode, Silent mode, Speakerphone
Sensors	Accelerometer, Gyroscope, Compass, Barometer, Step detector, Step counter	Accelerometer, Compass, Gesture
Hearing aid compatibility		M3, T4
Other	Voice dialing, Voice commands, Voice recording	Voice dialing, Voice commands, Voice recording
AVAILABILITY
Officially announced	31 Sep 2013	25 Sep 2015
FCC Approval	04 Nov 2013	22 Oct 2015

Source: phoneArena.com

It's a Blackberry PRIV.

So while it's relatively new, I can't get away from cheap and niche.

Source: phoneArena.com

I found the PRIV on a fire sale on eBay for $299.99. As usual I added a Seidio holster.

3,278,983 Nissans Recalled

This post is outside of my normal topics but I believe that it is important to share.

In July 2013 we traded our 2009 Maxima for a 2013 Nissan Pathfinder. The 2013 Pathfinder was the first year of a new generation of Pathfinders and is built on the Maxima platform. Mechanically and trim-wise it was very similar to the Maxima.

We get lots of compliments on the ride of the Pathfinder, especially from backseat passengers.

But...

Early on we noticed that occasionally when I was driving and my wife was in the passenger seat that the "Front passenger air bag status light" was indicating "OFF." The owners manual says "The front passenger air bag will not inflate if the passenger air bag status light is lit or if the front passenger seat is unoccupied." The problem happened with other passengers as well.

Several times while this was happening I drove to the nearby Nissan dealership and pulled into the service bay. A few seconds after I came to a stop and before a service representative could come over the light went off.

I eventually took it in to let them look at that problem. Of course, they didn't find a problem. And the problem persisted.

I took it back in and they found a water bottle under the seat and attributed the problem to that. And the problem persisted.

Then I read about a related recall. I took the Pathfinder back in and they applied the recall update. And the problem persisted.

I took the Pathfinder back in and they reapplied the recall update. And the problem persisted.

The service manager asked me to video the problem. I did and submitted 3 YouTube videos. After a week or so, one had been viewed 6 times and one twice (one was probably me) and the third one only once (probably me).

I finally made an appointment to have a Dealer Technical Specialist (DTS) look at the car. The DTS said that when the vehicle is started the sensors (There are two sensors on the left seat rail of the passenger's seat - forward and aft.) determine if there is a child in the seat and "classifies" this to the air bag control module. There are 3 conditions that can be "classified" - empty, child, and adult. When the gear shift lever is moved from Park the status ("classification") at that instant is retained. Subsequently if the vehicle comes to a complete stop (regardless of gear selection) for several seconds then this "classification" is repeated.

The DTS and the service manager were able to "manipulate" the car to leave the air bag status light displaying OFF by putting a partial load in the passenger seat and then moving the gear shift from Park to Reverse and subsequently to Drive. The light would continue to display OFF until they let the car come to a complete stop for several seconds.

They concluded that this "manipulation" was what was happening when my wife and other passengers were in the passenger seat. This is a characteristic of the algorithm of the air bag control module. It is related to the changes made by the recall but not the specific situation.

The DTS then said that this was "normal" and couldn't be repaired.

I disagreed with this and the DTS suggested that I call Nissan Consumer Affairs (800-NISSAN1) about the Pathfinder. They were recording it so I began recording as well. The representative terminated the call because I wouldn't stop recording. On a second call the representative said it was a "user problem." When I asked him to repeat that while I was recording he terminated the call.

I filed a complaint with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) in June 2014. There were hundreds of related complaints.

The issue went through years of NHTSA bureaucracy and Nissan's pushback. All the while I had to adopt a deliberate startup process to ensure that the passenger airbag was engaged.

Finally in January 2016 Nissan notified NHTSA that there had been 3 injury accidents attributed to this situation and that Nissan was going to address it.

The recall was issued in May 2016. It affects 3,278,983 vehicles. For reference the top 10 all time recall was 3.7 million.

When I visited the dealership on June 22, 2016 I was told that parts wouldn't be available until August.

Windows 10 Default Browser

On "The Trump" I clicked on an html link and got the pop-up asking which browser I wanted to use. I chose Chrome. Then Chrome asked if I wanted to make it the default. I clicked that I did and went on about my business.

But I'm curious so when I finished, I clicked on that html link again.

Uh,oh. Same thing.

No problem. I'll just go to "Choose a default web browser" and set it there. I chose Chrome and checked "Make it the default".

Still curious so when I finished, I clicked on that html link again.

Uh,oh. Same thing.

A little Googleing turned up this forum post on a Dell site.

Open Control Panel, Search for Default and change it there.

Odd but it worked.

Retired Software

It may be hard to believe but I'm a technical minimalist. I'll go out of my way NOT to install software.

I've been using Virtual CloneDrive for several years.

Virtual CloneDrive works and behaves just like a physical CD, DVD, or Blu-ray drive, although it only exists virtually. Image files can be "inserted" into the virtual drive from your harddisk or from a network drive by just a double-click, and thus be used like a normal CD, DVD, or Blu-ray

And I've been using DVD Decrypter for even longer. I primarily use it to burn DVDs from ISOs.

So when I built "The Trump" I installed them both as usual.

But I didn't need to.

Right clicking on an ISO gives a menu that includes "Mount".

So I don't need Virtual CloneDrive.

And the next entry in that menu is "Burn disc image".

While there are probably some features of those programs that you don't get with native Windows 10, it certainly meets all my routine needs.

2 pieces of software scratched off my list.

Clash of the Titans

Two recent stories have more connection that seems obvious at first.

1. iOS 9 enables ad blockers
   "There is also clearly the potential for Safari ad blockers to hurt Google"
2. Google demotes sites that promote apps
   "it will demote websites (that) encourage visitors to download an app"

Do you see the connection/conflict?

Jeff Jarvis said "Google is the anti-Apple."

Just remember that all of their revenue comes from you one way or another.

CrashPlan Adoption

I've been using CrashPlan for more than 2 years and it's doing great. When I migrated to "The Trump" I planned to discontinue using Tivoli CDP.  Although I had been successfully using it for 10 years I knew I would have to upgrade it for Windows 10.

But when I moved my data to "The Trump" I used the Windows 10 directory names for Documents and Pictures which are different than the corresponding Windows 7 directory names.

With CrashPlan you define the backup sets using directory names so I was worried that CrashPlan would think that those were different files and back them up all over again.

I shouldn't have worried.

CrashPlan has an excellent guide on changing computers. Basically you keep the directory names and paths the same between the computers if you can but if you can't don't worry about it.

As I'd observed before CrashPlan dedups backups resulting is a much smaller bandwidth usage than you'd expect. Similarly CrashPlan scans a new computer's backup set matching the files with the files it has previously backed up regardless of location.

When I started CrashPlan on "The Trump" the estimate to complete the backup was in DAYS. I almost panicked. Then the estimate started to drop precipitously as it determined that it already had backups of those files. It finished the 300+ GB backup in a couple of hours.

Nice.

TiVo Features

In late 2015 TiVo pushed out the Winter 2015 release of their TiVo software. It took a while to get to all devices. My TiVo Minis didn't get it until early 2016.

This release had several new features;

• HD Channel Notification
• QuickMode
• SkipMode

HD Channel Notification - With this feature if you are viewing a standard definition channel that is also available in high definition, pressing the"D" key will switch you to the HD channel. I understand that as an option Xfinity's X1 system will do this automatically.

QuickMode - This feature allows you to watch a recorded or time-shifted program at 130% speed without distorting the sound.

SkipMode - For recorded programs, this feature allows you to automatically skip to the start of the new program segment skipping the commercials. Previous to this feature you had to repeatedly press the "Jump" key to skip 30 seconds at a time. You could queue these up, e.g. 10 times for 5 minutes, and the TiVo would fast forward over the commercials. If you overshot the start of the program, pressing "Play" would back up a few seconds and usually put you close to where you wanted to be.

The SkipMode feature is available on the top 20 most-watched networks and more channels will be added in the future. The shows that will be SkipMode-enabled are those that appear during the most common recording hours: seven days a week, between the hours of 4:00 pm and midnight (12:30 am for late night talk shows airing on ABC, NBC and CBS). Recorded shows with the SkipMode feature appear in your MyShows lists with a SKIP icon.

Here's how this worked previously.

And now with SkipMode.

Love my TiVos!

Storage Spaces

When I was building "The Trump" I wanted to RAID-1 my internal data drive. I was hoping that the Asus motherboard supported RAID but that was not to be. As I Googled around looking for that answer though I came upon lots of discussions of "Fake RAID". This (archive.org) is one example:

Fake RAID is essentially software RAID provided by the BIOS on the motherboard, however, it has none of the benefits of Software RAID and none of the benefits of Hardware RAID...

And it went on:

[I]f your motherboard dies, your data is probably lost unless you can find another identical motherboard.

So I guess it was good that my motherboard didn't support RAID. But what to do?

What I found was Windows' Storage Spaces. Windows Central has a really good article (archive.org) on it.

I used 2 2TB drives and created a mirrored Storage Space as drive D:. To prepare the drives I used diskpart and cleaned the drives.

Storage Spaces can use Microsoft's Resilient File System (ReFS).

The features compared to NTFS are:

• Improved reliability for on-disk structures
• Built-in resilience
• Compatibility with existing APIs and technologies

In this BetaNews article (archive.org), the author performed the ultimate test.

I shut my Dell 840 server down, pulled out the drive caddy, and connected one of the mirrored drives into my Thinkpad X230 laptop for some spot checks on my data.

What did I see when I plugged it in? Exactly what I wanted to see.

Nice. But keeping my fingers crossed.

By the way, to migrate the data from "Big Honker" to "The Trump" I used Drive Snapshot. I think that I have mentioned that you ought to TEST restoring your backups. I practice what I preach.

The Trump

No, this isn't a political post. It's about the successor to "The Big Honker" purchased on Christmas Eve 2009.  I'm calling the new tower PC "The Trump" because it's HUGE!

Newegg had an Asus M32BC-B01 for $400 (incidentally the same price as "The Big Honker"). It came with an 8-core AMD processor, 8GB of RAM and a 2TB HDD. I wanted something that would go up to 32GB, hold an SSD to boot from and a second 2TB HDD for mirroring.

I researched the Asus as much as I could but couldn't find the answers to the RAM and disk bays. I finally signed up for a free trial of Newegg's Premier to get no restocking fee returns and ordered it.

I wasn't disappointed. There were 4 DIMM slots with one populated with an 8GB DIMM so it would hold my desired 32GB. There was an internal 3 1/2" bay and one external facing 5 1/4" bay. I added 8GB of memory, found a 250GB SSD and had a spare 2TB HDD sitting around so I was ready.

The Asus came with Windows 8.1 Home. I upgraded it to Windows 10 Home but wanted to go on to Windows 10 Pro. I had a Windows 7 Pro key that had not been used.

This post explains how to do that but it starting with "All you need to do is swap your current Windows 10 Home product key for the default Windows 10 Pro one..." is a little misleading. Who has ever heard of "the default Windows 10 Pro key?" That's just the start of it. The upgrade process took about 15 minutes, most of that after the screen said "100% complete." But it worked and I was on the way. When it finished it complained that it wasn't activated and asked for a Windows 10 Pro key. I input the Windows 7 Pro key and it worked.

Working with the UEFI firmware was new to me. After I had upgraded to Windows 10 I used diskpart to "clean" all the drives (knowingly wiping all the data) and converted the SSD to GPT. (The "clean" drives will come up again in a later post.) Then I installed Windows 10 on the SSD from a USB drive created from Microsoft's Media Creation Tool. Windows 10 retained its activation and Pro upgrade.

ClipConverter

Now and then I need/want to download a YouTube video, especially when I've used the YouTube Editor to crop/combine videos.

The best tool I've found is ClipConverter.cc.

Go to ClipConverter.cc and enter the viewing URL for the YouTube video. Click on "Continue".

On the next screen, chose what resolution you want and click on "Start".

When the conversion has completed, click on "Download".

Realize that downloading from YouTube is just a little bit shady. Beware of unwanted pop-ups/-unders.

Windows 10 Metered Connection

We all know how aggressive Windows 10 is on applying updates. One of the tips is to set your network connection to "metered."

That works.

But...

This disables all updates including Windows Defender's signature updates.

So if you use this tip, don't forget to force Windows Defender to update every day or two to get fresh signatures.

Google Street View

Have you been wondering where all the Google Street View car goes? Normally you can only see whether they drove down the street you're interested in by dragging the little man over the street.

But I wanted to see its route through an entire neighborhood or shopping center.

Here's how.

In Google Maps, position the map to where you want to start. Drag the little man onto the map. Notice that the routes the Google Street View car has mapped are highlighted with blue lines. But these lines are not persistent. They're only presented while you are dragging the little man.

Now drop the little man anywhere you want. That takes you into Google Street View.

Here's the fun part.

Now click the "-" in the lower right corner. This takes you out of Google Street View but leaves the routes highlighted in blue.

Some of these routes are interesting. Look at the outlots of Wolfchase Mall.

The Google Street View car drove through ALL the aisles of the Bed Bath & Beyond parking lot. Was he looking for his girlfriend's car or what?

I'm Not Strange (I'm Just Like You)

Sigcheck

If you don't know what your Windows "certificate store" is just quit reading and go back to Facebook.

Now since you know what your certificate store is, I'm sure that you've had a couple of sleepless nights over it.

Here's how to get back to those restful nights.

Or you might not close your eyes until you've reformatted and reinstalled Windows.

Go to Microsoft's Sigcheck page and download sigcheck.zip.

Extract sigcheck.exe somewhere convenient like your desktop.

Run the command prompt. Navigate to where you saved sigcheck.exe. Run "sigcheck -tv".

It'll take a couple of minutes.

The results will determine how (or whether) you sleep tonight.

Note: This doesn't check Firefox's certificate store.

Never Leave Home Without It

So when you are in the gate area at the airport, do you plug your phone into one of those courtesy USB charging ports? Please say NO.

If you have to make sure you have one of these in your bag.

Think of this as a USB condom.

Your device will not enter 'data transfer' mode so there is no risk of data hacking / viruses when charging from an unknown USB socket.

There Was a Problem

I continue coming up to speed on Windows 10. Overall it is still going well. There are just bumps in the road here and there.

I'm working toward upgrading my wife's ThinkPad T420s. I want it to go smoothly (which I fully expect) and quickly (the subject of this post).

To make it go quickly my idea was to have the latest Windows 10 bits downloaded. To do this I ran the Windows 10 Media Creation Tool.

I had used the Media Creation Tool before. But this time it was different.

I tried it on a new PC. One where I had taken my own advice and made the default user NOT an administrator.

The tool downloaded successfully and ran through its first couple of screens asking for the administrator's password. I'm not sure why it needs administrator rights but anyway...

Then I gave it access to the USB drive I wanted to use for my fresh media.

There was a problem running this tool. We're not sure what happened, but we're unable to run this tool on your PC. If you continue experiencing problems, reference the error code when contacting customer support. Error code: 0x800704DD - 0x90016.

"We're not sure what happened?" C'mon Microsoft. Nobody but you can know what happened.

So I started searching Google for this and came across this.

The net of this is that to create a USB drive you have to run the Media Creation Tool while logged in as an administrator.

Recover Google Photos Storage

So Google Photos has free unlimited storage. Not. That's a whole another discussion. This post is to cover what to do when you discover that you are using too much of your free 15GB of Google storage for photos.

Here's where to look for the problem.

https://www.google.com/settings/storage?hl=en

Now I'm not really having a problem but my daughter did.

I believe there's an underlying problem with Google wrongly counting older photos against your storage even if they are under the 16 megapixel size.

This post from the Nexus 5 subreddit gave me the solution.

WARNING: The following procedure will resample your full resolution photos down to 16 megapixels.

Go to Google Photos Setting screen.

https://photos.google.com/settings

Click on "RECOVER STORAGE".

And click on "COMPRESS".

You're welcome.