Newest Technology Blogs (215)

With all the phones, tablets, laptops and computers I go through, I should be used to upgrades/changes by now. Last week, I took delivery on the Samsung S24 Ultra with 1 terabyte of memory. It's their flagship model that boasts a 200 megapixel camera.

Using Samsung Smart Switch app, I backed up the old phone to my computer.
The new phone came with a double end USB-C connector for direct transfer phone to phone which s faster than using Wi-Fi. Smart Switch is resident on both phones but it took a few tries to connect.

Nearly everything transferred and all the the apps and screen settings are identical. Passwords didn't sync and I had to setup Google, Gmail, Samsung, WhatsApp and Signal again. I lost my most cherished app called Gesture Search. Someone else is making a version of Gesture Search that is no better than a first year computer programming homework assignment. Hopefully, they will listen to the user comments and make an update worthy of calling it Gesture Search.

I'm estimating nearly 2 days lost for research to set the phone up where it actually functions to my liking. A handful of calls to T-Mobile support and so many calls to Samsung customer care and technical support I lost track. I had a 'needed to fix' list or the phone goes back to Samsung and I get a refund.
Some features are no longer supported so I have to do a 'work around' to get what I want.
Notifications both visual and sound are nearly there. I would have preferred to see a flashing indicator or flag to let me know there are unread messages or emails.
The phone will give a reminder beep after 3 minutes and briefly vibrate when I pick up the phone. Always on display is the cure, but that eats into battery time.
Most of my text messages are converted using the microphone... Well, they were on my old phone, but the icon wasn't on the top row of the keyboard as expected. A call to Samsung and I was told the microphone is no longer supported. WTF? microphone not supported.
They had me download and install Gboard which is Google's keyboard app. It worked fine and quick, but the top row with numbers (found on the default Samsung keyboard) required a function key and extra keystrokes to achieve the same results... just like my BlackBerry phone 20 years ago!

Not accepting the Samsung Tech Support solution, I reverted back the the Samsung keyboard. An internet search revealed, you can toggle the microphone on and off via a separate menu. It now appears on the lower corner and not along the top row of commands like the previous 4 cellphones did.

Now for the camera that cannot default to low resolution images. I guess Samsung thinks it's beneath the S24 Ultra and forces them to only shoot high-res images.
Images were distorted and out of proportion. I reset the phone settings to default, rebooted the phone and most of the camera aspect issues went away. Photos sent by text messages are large, but the file size is manageable. Probably 2.5 times larger than my old phone.
The phone has a serious problem with images appearing like a fisheye lens. Vertical lines appeared curved, especially noticeable when looking at buildings or geometric objects having straight lines. I downloaded Samsung's Camera Assistant that has a setting to cure that. I'll test it tomorrow when I'm out on appointments.

While my experience and product review with this phone has been mostly negative, the speed of functions and menus is amazingly fast. It does automatic translation when texting. A very powerful feature.
I'm holding the screen resolution at it's lowest setting of HD+ 1560 x 720. maybe later I'll experiment with the QHD+ 3120 x 1440.
All the drawbacks to using anything more than the basic settings is reduced battery time. I'll have to test it with lots of use, calls, photos, GPS and see if I need to activate battery saver.
(note to self: phone doesn't come close to rated battery life)

Cellphone hell...

I have an added feature with my phone carrier to notify me of potential spam calls and an enhanced blocking feature. For some reason my good friend John gets added to the blocked list. Several calls to tech support gets him removed and minutes later... he's back to being blocked!

My call was transferred from the carrier to Samsung's tech support where I installed an app allowing them to do diagnostics remotely on my phone. They couldn't find John on the blocked caller list so it must be a glitch. According to Samsung, the cure was to go back to the carrier and get a new SIM card.

A second after I entered the store, the salesman asked if he could help. I explained my friend keeps getting blocked on my phone and that Samsung said I need a new SIM card.

Immediately I detected an attitude... he said that wasn't the problem and that I needed to buy a new phone. After we went through the identification verification, he got the tool to remove the SIM and I said "The phone is still on!"
That didn't stop him from removing the SIM and inserting a new one while the phone was powered up.

Flipping screens on my phone and his tablet to enter the new number scanned from the card holder, he was back and forth a few times removing and reinstalling the SIM. All attempts were unsuccessful as the phone reported no SIM installed, when one was in the phone. He removed it again and installed the old SIM and got the same message.

At that point... he told me my phone was broken. I asked his name, SNATCHED MY PHONE FROM HIS HAND, said "Have a nice day" and walked out of the store.

Ya think I was pissed?

There's another store 5 miles away, so I went there.

Explaining the salesman (at the first store) 'hot swapped' the SIM on my phone. The new guy knew exactly what I was talking about. He scanned the card, installed a new SIM, powered up the phone and all was well.



I cannot recall how many times my phones have had SIM card changes in the last 25 years and EVERY time it was done with the phone turned off.

Basically, removing the SIM while the phone was on, damaged it, installing a new SIM while the phone was on, damaged it too.

John isn't on my blocked list anymore.

I'm happy that the issue was only with the SIM cards and thankful that it didn't damage my phone or the SD memory that shares the same tray.

Not rocket science...

Every year, I tell my family not to get me anything for Christmas. They all develop selective hearing loss and get me something. This year, I received a small and simple gift that I will often use.
It's called GUARD YOURID.
My trash goes in a community dumpster, boxes into recycle bins. If you are like me, You'll probably peel off the labels bearing your name and address. If you cannot remove the label, covering the information with a marking pen is the next option.

This device looks like a date stamper with a roller wheel on the bottom. What it does is roll over a band of black ink quickly creating a security block to the information you want to cover.



Awesome

A number of technological traits will drive smart-domestic generation well past what’s available on keep cabinets nowadays. innovations in synthetic intelligence, as an example, stand to upend almost the whole thing in our lives, inclusive of our houses. you would possibly already be the use of some sort of AI-powered voice-assistant device to get the modern news or weather forecast every morning. however inside the smart home of the future, the ones AI structures ought to function the mind for whole homes, getting to know about citizens and coordinating and automating all in their various smart gadgets. IoT employer Crestron, as an instance, is operating on software that tracks someone’s habits, like which tune they need to listen inside the morning or which lights they want to be on at a certain time of day. Then, as soon as it gets the hold of a user’s preferences, it automatically plays simply the right playlists or dims the lighting fixtures before bedtime. “That’s sincerely the following evolutionary step in proper automation,” says John Clancy, head of Crestron’s residential commercial enterprise.

I grew up in the era of Black & White TV and times when something electronic wasn't working correctly, it would require banging the side of the console to magically get things working again.

Solid state technology changed all that... or did it?

I turned the computer on this morning and got an error message the power supply fan isn't working. Huh? I've got a few computers with spare parts here and could change out a fan if need be. Turning it off and on 2 more times got the same message. The computer would not boot.

I banged it a few times, opened the case and when I powered up air was coming from the power supply fan.

Fixed... just like the old days!

My recent trip to Dayton, Ohio has markings everywhere as reminders of the Wright brothers being the first to have a powered aircraft successfully take a man into flight. I got to see a reconstruction of their workshop, wind tunnel for airfoil testing, some of their original aircraft and videos of some of their failures and successes.
The desire they had was great, but they were by no means great designers and it took a few years of testing and retesting to get a engine powered plane to fly more than a few seconds with control.

I've started watching a few YouTube videos about their work, the secrecy as they learned others globally were attempting the same thing. They had a patent in the United States for the design, but that means nothing in Europe and other experimenters were right behind the Wrights.

The one thing I read/saw was they based some of the steering in wing bending that was evident in soaring birds. A competitor had a fixed wing and used adjustable flaps called ailerons to control the steering. Fortunately for the Wright brothers, their documented flights were the first.

Probably the smartest thing the Wright brothers did was to avoid a flapping wing design as it proved to be the biggest flop in mankind attempting to fly like a bird!

I came across this video of such disasters in the early days of manned flight.
Funny now, but I'm sure many were injured and killed in their attempts.



It's amazing how many 'test pilots' wore suits and ties.

On Friday, I got to visit the Carillon Historical Park, with some of the oldest buildings in the Dayton area. There were a few hundred displays of things & photos of the made here. NCR cash registers, DELCO automotive parts, Huffy bicycles, Frigidaire refrigerators for example. The Charles Kettering display had a moving mannequin describing some of his inventions and experiences.
The main attraction was the Wright Brothers National Museum where they had recreations of the bicycle store and workshop where they started propeller design and testing models that eventually lead to the building of their aircraft.
A small auditorium was playing movies with actual film footage of their experimental aircraft. I had no idea of the number of failures they experienced getting a working airplane and how they went to Europe to demonstrate it's flight and dispel the rumors as other inventors were very close in their attempts of manned flight.

I'm a half mile from the clubhouse of a golf course. On top of the building is a small weather station with a siren to alert golfers of lightening strikes.
It's pretty standard in South Florida where bad weather can jump up in minutes. I've read many of these systems are networked to larger weather centers that use sophisticated lightening detection systems and weather radar. When lightening strikes are detected, the siren blasts out a warning for the golfers to seek shelter.
Typically, I've got the windows closed, a/c on and louvers closed, so I'm not distracted by what's going on around the condo... but I do know it's going to rain when I hear the lightening siren.

I considered purchasing an amateur weather station when I lived in Miami and had a 60' high tower with a string of radio antennas. That must have been 20+ years ago when I was available as a first responder using 2-way radios to assist when a hurricane hit, power was out, phone lines down and no cellular service.

Life and interest changes for me that I'm no longer in a radio club to offer public service. There are many more resources now, so let someone else invest the time and money for weather stations and inclement weather alert systems.

They are all around my area so I don't have to look too far to find one:

Carbon emissions may play a part in the environment but is not ultimately the heart of the issue.
Heat emissions is the core here's why:
The heat of a regular gasoline car is up to 1400 degrees Fahrenheit or 760 degrees Celsius

Apply this heat emissions on the Highway 401 in Toronto America
Or Dan Ryan Expressway through Chicago on a daily basis.
Also apply this to factories whose heat emissions are equally high you have current practical idea of what is affecting climate change

The morning heat of the sun creates fog which lowers the moisture content from the soil that same fog rises and becomes clouds. But the most important factor is lowering moisture content in the soil. But radiant heat can not achieve this if it is affected by convective heat and if the soil has prolonged moisture content it will begin to crate water mold on a molecular level.

This is a war of convective heat versus radiant heat on a global scale day to day.

But also this creates an unbalance of natural weather cycles because the moisture content if ever is dissipating at a later time during the day due to the high levels of convective heat.


However this is solvable and a business here in Whanganui has created a solution of lowering heat emissions by 99% called TPE Racing. Owner David Tunnell.

You could apply this to computers where u will no longer need fans or water coolant systems to cool cpu hard drives gpu motherboards etc or even large computer systems the amount of savings u would make would be substantial.

That's a topic I haven't discussed before. Consider the extreme hot and cold temperature range on the moon. -208F ( -133C) in darkness to 250F (121C) in direct sunlight.
I'm not sure how they got the darkness reading as we haven't sent any lunar landers there, but they've got the facts.
We've setup seismic measuring equipment near the Apollo 17 lander module in the 70's that detects activity.
Is it important to know what happens on the surface on the moon? To scientists who make a living on doing 'out of this world' research it is.
I would think the moon is a pretty quiet place. No hurricanes, strip mining, fracking, nuclear missile testing and things that happen on earth...

Maybe one or two things to mention. The Russians attempted their own lunar landing that ended up in a devastating crash. Yeah, the country who invaded Ukraine has the money and resources to explore the moon. That's got to be a huge source of quake, possibly changing statistics in the Farmer's Almanac update later this year. The other thing is an alien base setup on the dark side of the moon. So, maybe there is a lot of excavation and road work happening behind the scenes.

Thoughts are running deep on the subject.




Link that kinda got me started: