Tuesday, September 25, 2012


Latest iPhone and iOS talk

Hi everyone

Well it is a very busy time in the tech world with new releases and new updates. The biggest of course is the release of the iPhone 5, a release which a lot of people deem to be an anti climax.
There has not been an enormous change in design as in the past number changes. The new model is longer, thinner and much lighter, but has maintained the same width, apple states the reason for this is to retain ease of use with your fingers and thumbs.
The display is still the high quality retina display that was introduced in the 4s, but now will fit a an extra row of icons on top. The front facing camera has been upgraded, while the rear camera remains the same as the last model, but benefits from improvements to the software via iOS 6. The biggest improvement is the speed of the phone due to a processor upgrade, and from all reports this is a major improvement
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The iPhone now comes with LTE, LTE enables the phone to link to the 4G network when it is available, and connect with much faster speeds. One feature that the phone did not come with, is NFC (near field communication). NFC allows you to use your phone to swipe at locations, this feature can use this to check in, pay, or whatever the check in patch/sensor is programmed to do. This is a very strange move by apple, not to include this in its latest offering, as all of its competitors have this feature, as will the soon to be released Windows 8 phone with its flagship phone the Nokia Lumia.

A major change has been made to the connectivity of the iPhone 5 with a new style plug in the bottom, it has gone from a the old 30pin plug to a new proprietary "lightning adapter" 8 pin plug. There is an adapter available for the old plug to the new (one comes with the phone), but it isn't cheap at just a tad over $30. The adapter is not compatible in all situations however, for instance it does not work in the BMW motor vehicle, also don't be tricked into "cheap" adapters as it is thought that the adapter actually needs a chip in it to work correctly, hence the price tag.

The iOS 6 upgrade is copping a lot of flack due to a change from Google maps to apple maps, with apple maps reported to be falling well short of the mark. Below is a link to all the features of the new operating system, how to use them, it also contains instructions on how to go back to using Google maps on your iPhone 5

I would suggest carefully reading through this story and deciding if the upgrade to iOS 6 is warranted by you if you are currently using an earlier model of the iPhone, particularly if you are using an iPhone 4 or earlier that does not use Siri, and will not benefit from the improvements made to Siri's capabilities.

Till next time, Remember, always think before you click when you are online

Wednesday, September 12, 2012


Don't alway trust the experts

Hi Everyone
I received a very distressed phone call from a friends sister last week, she had a very reputable home help computer company (that she regularly used) upgrade her PC and operating system. This lady is not a computer person at all, and is totally at the mercy of what she is told by the expert. One thing that she did continue to tell him but, was that her her 10 years of accounting records were of the utmost importance and very valuable. He asked haven't you got any backups? to which her response was "I don't know! that's what I pay you for"

This lady was supplied a new PC with the latest operating system, and the latest version of her accounting software installed, the expert in the mean time had told her that she could dispose of her old PC as long as she kept the hard drive. (This lady is a clean, tidy freak, and the thought of an unnecessary "old computer" occupying space was an annoyance). 

It is at this point in time that things went south, I am not privy to the method that the expert used to try and bring her accounting files into the new machine, but he was unable to do so with success. Accessing the old hard drive did not help at all, although the files could be seen they were not able to be retrieved. The expert simply told her they were "corrupt" and that was it, he couldn't help her.

The biggest mistake in this whole process was that the old working computer was discarded before the new system was up and running and all the data was accessible. If it was kept, this lady would still have a working version of all her data. The next mistake I believe was that the expert didn't do enough research into the correct procedure for updating the data to the latest version of the accounting software.

I advised her to stop them from playing with her data any further and cut her losses with them, as the more they played with the data the more damaged it may become. 
I tried to access her old hard drive but I just kept getting "No Operating System Found". So, Long story short, after 2 whole days work and lots of patience I was able to retrieve her data and update it for her. The last option available was to send the files into the Accounting Software Vendor's data retrieval team, this would have run out to a small fortune in cost.

My other issue with this expert, is that they failed to take ownership for a problem that I feel was clearly their fault. The customer should have been given more help than hands thrown in the air and told its corrupt. When they returned her hard drive, they left it at her front door and left without speaking to her!

The big lesson here apart from the old "Backup Backup", is that if your data is really important to you, always maintain a working version of it somewhere. If I help anyone upgrade to a new PC, I always leave the old system intact for at least 1 month, or at least maintain a working (virtual) version of that system.