Choosing a drive

There are a bewildering number of options out there. Budget, as always, dictates the combination of speed and size available.

Size

You may not need as much space as you think so even if you intend on a fresh install clean-up your current drive to get an idea of requirements.

Remembering to backup before:

1. Identify biggest culprits
   Try DaisyDisk ($19) or Disk Inventory X (free) and drill down to catch unexpected bloat in your music library, videos etc.
2. Clean up unused system junk
   Use CleanMyMac ($30) or MonoLingual (free) to clean up logs as well as redundant processor and language support.
3. Archive unused content
   Move those podcasts, TV shows, applications and games you aren’t going to use again to cheap external drives.
4. Deal with orphaned & duplicate files
   Find media in your iTunes folders missing from iTunes lists and either trash or add it back then use iTune’s Display Duplicates.

If you’re prepared to sacrifice your DVD drive then you can move your existing hard drive to the optical bay via an adaptor and purchase a smaller SSD for the OS and key performance-critical files. This saves cash and gives you more space but will cost you battery life.

Speed

SSDs are not created equal and the combination of flash and controller (on drive and in your machine) play a part in defining performance. Firmware, hardware revisions, drive size and operating system can also affect the speed so do your homework.

Anandtech have in-depth coverage of SSD’s including an SSD Bench with Tom’s providing a more general SSD Buyer’s Guide. Drives come and go quickly so keep an eye on review dates and exact model numbers as manufacturers have models with similar names with difference specifications.

My choice – lightning giant

I settled on the Crucial RealSSD C300 (CTFDDAC256MAG-1G1) because of it’s blazingly fast 256GB configuration and my storage requirements were still around 150GB.

This combination doesn’t come cheap at $699 USD. My links to the Crucial web site include my affiliate code ever optimistic I’ll get a small commission on a drive or two. (I dream that one day my blog will cover it’s own hosting charges)

Some other popular alternatives

• Intel’s X-25M G2 is well regarded and can be had for around $430 for 160GB and $210 for 80GB
• Intel’s X-25V (for value) can be had for around $120 for 40GB

Installing my SSD & Mac OS X (without a DVD drive)

The newer Unibody MacBook Pro’s hard-drives are designed to be user-replaceable and are covered in the manual.

My non-Unibody is not however those nice chaps over at iFixit have put together a hard drive replacement guide for 15” that is close enough but I have one complication. My DVD drive died which raised the question (and subsequent section)

How do I install Snow Leopard without a DVD drive?

Remote Install

Remote Install let’s you put the a DVD into a machine with a drive, run Utilities > Remote Install and follow a few steps which include holding down the alt key on the machine that doesn’t have a drive.

Unfortunately the machine wanting to boot has to be a Mac mini or a MacBook Air from 2009 or later – i.e. something Apple shipped without a DVD drive.

NetBoot

Mac’s can boot from network images however there are also obstacles here:

1. Apple’s official Netboot server is part of Mac OS X Server and that costs $499
2. The only unofficial server-less guide I could find is out of date  (nicl & NetInfo were deprecated in Leopard)

You will also need to create an image of the Mac OS X DVD to be able to install from.

USB image

Your USB device will require over 6.2GB to fit the image of Snow Leopard and need to be partitioned with GUID Partition Table which will wipe it. My 4GB memory stick was too small and I didn’t want to wipe my 1TB external drive so ended up using my 8GB Compact Flash card.

To get the Snow Leopard DVD copied to it:

1. Use a Mac that has a DVD drive and insert both the install DVD and USB storage device
2. Launch Disk Utility from the Utilities folder
3. Select the USB storage device from the list of devices and then choose the Partition tab
4. Choose 1 Partition from the Volume Scheme drop-down
5. Press Options… choose GUID Partition Table then OK
6. Press Apply to confirm you are happy to wipe away all the data on the device
7. Select the install DVD from the list of devices and then choose the Restore tab
8. Drag the install DVD from the list of devices into the Source text box
9. Drag the USB storage device from the list of devices into the Destination text box
10. Press the Restore and wait a while

When finished eject the USB device and insert it into your DVD-less Mac. Turn it on holding down alt until a boot selection screen shows and use the arrow keys and return to launch the installer from your USB device.

It may take a while for the installer screen to appear but be patient.

Press Options… from the installer to turn all off all the features you don’t need such as additional languages, printer drivers etc.

Performance over time & TRIM

A simplified primer

SSDs are fast but the flash technology suffers some limitations most importantly they can’t overwrite data without erasing it first.

In order to avoid this performance hit, and to preserve the life of the drive itself as blocks can be erased a fine number of times, SSD drives use fresh blocks for as long as they are available. Once they run out every write has to take the hit of an erase and performance can drop to traditional hard-drive speeds (or worse).

The problem arises sooner than you think because file-systems when deleting a file do not actually cause an erase but rather just de-allocate the block knowing it will get overwritten when it’s next needed so these fresh blocks decrease over time even if you drive never gets full. (Which is how file-recovery tools are able to undelete files)

This doesn’t sound too bad until you realise that when erasing a file in an operating system the file system just removes the block from it’s own list to be reused later and therefore the drive itself has no knowledge that the block can be erased until it runs out and starts honoring overwrites.

The solution

Manufacturers initially solved this problem by writing tools (for Windows) that examined the file-system structures to find out which blocks are unused so they can send ‘erase block’ commands down to the SSD drive and get your performance back – at least until you run out of blocks again.

This wasn’t a great solution so they agreed on a standard called ‘TRIM’ that lets file-systems tell the drive when blocks are no longer and can be erased in background on-demand. Support was built into Windows 7 and Linux 2.6.28 making a lot of SSD owners very happy.

Mac OS X & TRIM

Mac OS X doesn’t yet support the TRIM command although one Apple engineer confirmed they are looking at it back in October. They’re in no hurry as the SSD drives Apple ship don’t support TRIM yet.

In the mean time you might want to minimize unnecessary writes:

1. Don’t use Finder’s Secure Empty Trash or the srm command line tool – the overwriting they did on magnetic drives doesn’t overwrite on SSD but steals up to 35x the blocks of the original!
2. Keep large churning files on external drives (e.g. video processing)
3. Don’t let your laptop run out of power as it copies the RAM to disk each time (2-8GB)
4. Prevent unnecessary disk operations such as the ‘last accessed’ attribute on files (see below)
5. Don’t keep running disk benchmarks that cause lots of writes!

Turn off last-access-time

These access times are pretty useless and indeed the iPhone also has them switched off. Create a file named noatime.plist in your /Library/LaunchDaemons path with the following contents:

<plist version="1.0">
  <dict>
    <key>Label</key>
    <string>noatime</string>
    <key>ProgramArguments</key>
    <array>
      <string>mount</string>
      <string>-vuwo</string>
      <string>noatime</string>
      <string>/</string>
    </array>
    <key>RunAtLoad</key>
    <true/>
  </dict>
</plist>

Thanks go to Ricardo Gameiro for that tip although his other Mac SSD tweaks of creating a RAM disk is questionable given the way Mac OS X manages memory and disabling the RAM copy-to-disk entirely and therefore losing data is more risky to me than running out of blocks early.

Do not

• Turn off the sudden motion sensor – SSDs ignore the park head command anyway
• Turn off HFS+ journaling – some users report odd issues and corruption

Last resort

If you do get into the situation where your write performance is suffering badly and you are prepared to spend a little time to get it back you can do the following:

1. Ensure you have a full Time Machine backup
2. Boot from a Linux Live CD containing a recent build of hdparm
3. Use hdparm to perform an ATA Secure Erase
4. Boot from your Mac OS X DVD/USB stick
5. Choose the Utilities > Restore System From Backup menu option
6. Point it at your Time Machine backup

You should also be able to do this with other full-system backup tools like SuperDuper but you’ll have to figure out the steps for yourself ;-)

Performance

I wish I had some better benchmarking tools but Xbench is all I have, sorry! It’s worth bearing in mind that the non-unibody MacBook Pro I have (MacBookPro3,1) is limited to 1.5GB/sec on the SATA bus (despite having an Intel ICH-8M SATA controller)

Xbench HD Test

My original performance figures with the original as-shipped 0001 firmware and Crucial’s updated 0002 firmware:

Thoughts

SSD is fast but given the hype I was expecting everything to be instant and it wasn’t quite there. Applications do normally launched within a single dock bounce and everything feels a lot snappier but there wasn’t the massive WOW! I was expecting – at least not yet.

There are also a few other advantages often overlooked, especially on a laptop:

• lower power consumption
• less weight, noise & heat
• greater shock, dust and magnetic resistance

Here’s a table that pulls the specs compared to the 7200RPM Travestar that was previously my main drive.

Time will tell how well the machine now deals with large Aperture libraries of RAW images and Visual Studio compilations from inside Parallels and I’ll be sure to report them here.

[)amien

Brenthaven Pro BackPack

My parents bought me the Brenthaven Pro 15-17 Backpack for Christmas. It has a great number of sections and compartments yet can still be thinly packed with the padding contributing to a comfortable wear. The only negatives are that the finish seems a little rough in places and that the rigid laptop protection area seems to be designed to hold a laptop almost twice as thick as a MacBook Pro despite claims of being ‘Designed for a 15.4″ MacBook and 17″ MacBook Pro’.

Of course the dream laptop bag would have an external USB port that would power and charge various devices within ;-)

RadTech sleeve & protector

I’ve owned RadTech sleeves for all three of my Apple laptop’s to date and they’ve all been excellent. Snug fitting, soft but hard-wearing and well-made they keep the machines clean and scratch-free. Now available in a multitude of colours but call me a traditionalist I’ve stuck with aluminium-grey. I also recommend grabbing a screen protector that sits between the keyboard and screen that doubles up as a cleaning cloth.

OCZ Rally 2 4GB USB stick

Another gift I recieved is the ever-useful USB memory stick for those odd file transfer tasks. The OCZ 4GB Rally 2 USB 2.0 Flash Drive can double up as a Vista ReadyBoost cache (providing you are booted natively, neither Parallels or VMware Fusion emulate it fast enough) and is housed in a small black metal enclosure the size of my little finger. Minor downsides are the easily-lost cap and the green led that casts an eerie glow over the geek at the keyboard.

Microsoft Wireless Notebook Laser Mouse 600

I’ve been using mice with laptops less over the years as my comfort with trackpads has grown and i have found myself without desk space for a mouse. The Microsoft Wireless Notebook Laster Mouse 600 works quite well however and the battery seems to last for ages. It is quite light and possibly a bit too small to be comfortable and if I was to replace it I’d go with something Bluetooth to avoid the dongle (which clips into the mouse when not in use).

iPod Nano

I purchased a iPod Nano 8GB 3G late last year after my 60GB iPod died. The device is incredibly small with a good battery life and fantastic display. Not convinced that the screen or control is suited for video or games but it makes a great little music player – I’m just hoping the flash models have a longer lifespan.

Philips Earbuds

These Philips HN060/37 ‘Noise-Canceling’ Earbuds are pretty good considering the price, size and battery life. Whilst they don’t cancel noise out the combination of the in-ear mechanism, volume booster and the active circuity does help supress noise levels somewhat and I have found them particularly useful on flights. Some people find the high-pitched white noise the circuitry generates annoying and others find in-ear plugs irritating however. Personally the only problem I have with them is that the rubber pieces tend to come off and get lost quite easily but you can buy generic replacement packs from many airport/music stores.

My Book Pro 500GB External Drive

Leopard’s Time Machine combined with a Western Digital My Book Studio 500GB External Hard Drive provides me with a simple backup strategy that is lightning fast via FireWire 800 (800 Mbps) and still speedy over USB 2 (480 Mbps).

The Studio drive I linked to also provides eSATA support (couldn’t find mine on Amazon). It isn’t always in my backpack but does make a regular appearance.

Cables etc.

The bane of every techie’s life. Currently includes 1m USB extender, a USB to mini-USB cable that connects my TyTN, PSP, BlackBerry and Canon EOS 400D to my MacBook Pro and the Apple DVI to VGA adaptor for presentations. The Apple-supplied remote also sits in there for exactly that purpose.

Stationary

I like to keep a Moleskine pocket notepad tucked away, ruled by preference until they make a graph-paper version. This is normally coupled with a Pilot G2 at the moment which is comfy and smooth but takes too long to dry and is still too thick in the 0.38mm ’05′ version. Without sounding like a pen obsessive I’m going to try a Uni-Ball Signo Bit 0.18 next! There is also a nondescript mechanical pencil and large eraser.

Reading

Yes, there is still room in this TARDIS of a laptop bag for reading material. At the moment it is alternating between Designing Type, Managing Humans: Biting and Humorous Tales of a Software Engineering Manager and The Art of Intrusion all of which were Christmas gifts :)

That’s it! would love to find out what other people keep in their laptop bags and hear suggestions on some of my weak spots. I wish I could fit a full-size tactile keyboard in it but I guess I’ll live!

[)amien

My initial concern was that the size and weight would be unwieldy after 4 years of lugging around a 15″ MacBook Pro and a prior to that a Titanium PowerBook G4. The actual problem was that my trusty Samsonite Trunk & Co. backpack could not accommodate it and that I’d have to hope Santa would deliver something a little bigger. Being properly kitted up might reveal if the dimensions and weight are uncomfortable so expect an update once I’ve travelled with the beast.

The screen is fantastic, a little brighter, and provides me with a desktop-like experience in terms of real estate thanks to the combination of the increased size and the high-definition 1920×1200 option. I had examined the glossy finish in-store and found having my face and the rest of the store glaring back at me far too distracting for real work (it might be nice for watching DVD’s in the dark I guess) and so went with the matte finish. Surprisingly it is a little more reflective than the older MBP but not overly so and it does make removing unwelcome fingerprints easier.

One problem I had with m 15″ was that heavy use of Visual Studio within Parallels wasn’t always cutting it on performance. Compilation was faster than the cheap HP/Compaq desktop I’d been using but still wasn’t snappy enough to keep my attention tightly focused ;-)

I went with top options – a 2.6GHz processor coupled with 4GB of RAM and a 7200RPM 200GB drive – to ensure maximum performance. Mac OS X and native Vista did not disappoint and felt like a speedy desktop despite Vista being 32-bit and limited to 3GB of RAM until Apple ship a 64-bit ready Boot Camp drivers and tools.

My .NET development typically takes place inside a virtual machine – previously Parallels but now evaluating VMware Fusion with its enticing dual-core and 64-bit guest OS support. Both Parallels and Fusion had similar almost-native performance in the disk and processor department on my 15″ according to Vista’s performance index and I’ve yet to rerun those (stay tuned). Whichever gets Aero/DirectX 9Ex shader support first will be my home for a while.

Battery life was a big surprise offering over 3 hours and I certainly feel less conscious of where the next power feed is coming from although that is partly due to the poor battery on my old machine being rather tired and worn.

One big disappointment is the keyboard. Firstly it is the same size as the 15″ model which leaves the extra space to the speaker grille. Whilst the speakers do sound far superior – good enough to actually listen to music on – I couldn’t help but feel a wider enter key, a second ctrl and a little f-key spacing could have gone a long way. What is more concerning is that many keys do not register if hit off-centre even by a slight amount :(

There are still some things to try:

• Games under native Vista taking advantage of the Nvidia 8600M GT chip
• Time Machining my MyBook Pro external drive over FireWire 800 (800 Mb/s) instead of USB2 (400 Mb/s)
• Burning DVD performance
• Removing DVD drive (UJ-85J FBZ8) region protection (RPC) to play my DVD collection

[)amien

My dashboard shows that in the last 30 days I have directly earned 66,691 credits (made that number of impressions) and have been awarded 11,502 bonus credits and 3,473 referrer credits.

In return BlogRush have imprinted my last 12 blog posts (actually 11, one repeated, see below) and have sent a whole 15 visitors my way… that’s 1 visitor per 4,400 impressions which is mediocre by any measure. I get more hits than that in a month from leaving a couple of off-the-cuff comments on blog posts I’ve read elsewhere.

Apart from the mediocre conversions, some of the other problems include:

Uncontrolled spending of credits

BlogRush highly favours publicising the most recent articles regardless of hotness.

In my case it keeps putting out the More Silk Icons post despite only having 3 visitors for the 12,832 impressions whilst the older article on object initializers hasn’t got any new impressions despite getting 1 visitor for just 301 impressions.

If you have a glut of credits from a successful peak and you would rather hold on to your credits for the next post…well, tough, you can’t.

This forces you to change your posting schedule to meet your BlogRush credit balance.

Random capitalisation of post titles

It seems that BlogRush randomly changes the case of titles. Some examples include:

• Calculating CRC-64 in C# and .NET > Calculating Crc-64 In C# And .net
• AnkhSVN (Visual Studio Subversion integration) on Vista > AnkhSVN (visual Studio Subversion Integration) On Vista
• Droid font family courtesy of Google & Ascender > Droid Font Family Courtesy Of Google & Ascender
• Show Package Contents in Mac OS X > Show Package Contents In Mac Os X
• SQL Server replication blocking on clean-up job > Sql Server Replication Blocking On Cleanup Job
• Dissecting a C# Application – Inside SharpDevelop > Dissecting A C# Application – Inside Sharpdevelop

There seems to be no pattern behind it at all.

Duplication and random ignorance of content

My incredibly popular Droid Sans Mono great coding font post (42,000 hits in a week) doesn’t turn up on my BlogRush list at all.

Conversely my SQL Server replication article is treated as two different articles as I revised the title/URL.

Poor matching of content

Whilst they have introduced more specific categories my blog continued to show very unrelated posts – the whole simple categorisation system just doesn’t work especially when half the people haven’t revised from the more generic categories not have had any reminder or deadline to do so.

Something that worked off a posts tags would have been much better.

Filling the space

For now Google’s AdSense is taking the place rendering text adverts although for the default landing page it has no content for me. This apparently occurs if you are:

• Not indexed (definitely am, check out Google’s searches)
• Serving certain unspecified bad-words (every individual article gets adverts so not that)
• Nothing in your geographical region (see above)

I can only imagine the combination of words across certain posts when presented on the same page is hitting some magical figure. I hope talking about AdSense doesn’t mess it up further!

I doubt this widget will last very long – last time it was on for 3 months and earned me a whopping $9.

Ideally the site would move somewhere that can take being hit by the front page of DaringFireball again – that’s twice the sudden influx of users has knocked the site off. The first time my home DSL couldn’t take the strain, this time UHHosting kindly switched my site offoff for a couple of hours because I was “using too much CPU” – I have only WordPress, MySQL and a bunch of plug-in’s installed of which I have temporarily sacrificed FireStats, StatsPress and Gravatar2 at the sysop alter in order to keep my home online.

I have been toying with either renting a dedicated 1U server or co-locating one I buy. The latter was more tempting until I discovered that you only get 0.5 amps which is 120W for a whole server which means mirrored disks and a Core 2 chip are out…

[)amien

To me it seems perfectly natural when you consider a writer has strong preference and passion for pens and notebooks and photographers spend a small fortune on specific lenses and cameras to get the shot they want.

For years I was happy with my Apple Pro keyboard and then one day found myself messing around with my Amiga A600 and realised my typing was faster and more accurate on the Amiga than on the PC.

Some prefer “ergonomic” split-keyboards, others are impressed by back lighting, LCD screens or even an OLED display in every key. Most reviews skip over the most important aspect – what it is like to type on.

IBM Model M

I have fond memories of typing away on the IBM XT, AT and 5150 terminals and I found myself at eBay eyeing up an original unused IBM Model M keyboard similar to the ones those machines used.

Whilst the keyboard uses a membrane each key has its own spring that buckles as the key is pressed. This gives a satisfying tactile click that saw typing speed further accelerate than on the Amiga. Each key comprises of two plastic parts, the main body and the outer shell or key-cap. This means you can easily re-arrange the keys or put on specialist caps.

The Model M is a joy to type on but isn’t without fault. I can live without the Windows keys but the keyboard sports a huge surround taking up masses of desk space, is incredibly heavy and sounds like a machine gun when you get going with it.

Matias Tactile Pro

Apple produced a legendary keyboard too, the Apple Extended Keyboard but this has some immediate drawbacks in that it uses the Apple Desktop Bus, so would need an adapter, and is also tricky to get hold of.

I settled on the Matias Tactile Pro which uses the same Alps switches for each key but comes in a more friendly USB version. Designed for the Mac it has some extra keys and helpfully each key shows the various extra symbols available with the Alt key.

The Tactile Pro is great to type on however it is even louder than the IBM Model M and only available in the US key-map which means it is a couple of keys short. The enclosure mimics that of the Apple Pro keyboard but uses an inferior plastic that feels cheap and does nothing to dampen the volume but does helpfully feature a two port passive USB hub.

Note: The Matias Tactile Pro is an OEM version of the Strong Man SMK-Power989X. Matias now have the Tactile Pro 2.

Das Keyboard II

I’d heard some good things about the Das Keyboard II which unlike it’s predecessor is also mechanical but uses individual switches from one of the original keyboard manufacturers, Cherry.

The Das II is USB and is a little quieter than the other two keyboards but is still loud enough to annoy nearby co-workers and yet nicer to type on than the other two. One of the selling points of the Das II is that each key is totally blank resulting in one black keyboard but I could take or leave it.

Where the Das does fall down is the large echo-inducing enclosure and the cheap-feeling plastic used for both the keys and the surround.

Note: The Das Keyboard is effectively a custom OEM version of the Cherry G80 series.

Apple ultra-thin wired

I only picked up this keyboard a few days ago so my experience with it is not as extensive as the others which all got a fair work-in. Impressions so far are very good despite it being a scissor-switch like most laptops and not mechanical like the others.

The surround is an absolute minimum which is fantastic and it looks great. Noise levels are sufficiently quiet and the feeling very enjoyable despite the low-profile and gaps between the keys. The addition of a built-in USB hub is useful but MacBook Pro style light-sensitive back lighting would have been great.

Where next?

I’m sticking with the Apple at home for at least a couple of weeks and will continue to use the Das at work for now. The Model M and the Matias are currently gathering dust in the cupboard.

I have already modified my Das II by removing it from the enclosure and placing it on a soft sponge material. It is immediately much quieter with less echo and a soft wrist rest which solves some of the issues. Replacing the keys with a softer rubberised plastic would be great but injection moulding is rather expensive.

Check out the GeekHack keyboard forum for like minded chat.

[)amien

Curiously the update isn’t available on their site yet despite the announcement however the enterprising folks at XDA Developers Forums have made the official HTC versions available for download.

Upgrade process

The Windows-only (crack out Parallels) upgrade process didn’t go too smoothly, perhaps because I’d been running an unofficial pre-release version.

The first two attempts failed despite following the instructions to the letter. On the third attempt I left it on the familiar red-green-blue boot-screen a previous attempt had left it on and just ignored all the on-screen instructions and it flashed just fine.

Sync on the Mac

There is no official Windows Mobile sync software available on the Mac however Missing Sync for Windows Mobile is a capable, if somewhat temperamental, solution.

Version 4 is required for Windows Mobile 6 compatibility and is capable of syncing files, music, notes, bookmarks and photos as well as the expected contacts and calendars.

The initial problem is getting the Bluetooth to start syncing is a bit of a nightmare. The best advice is if it fails to do anything when you try to sync then delete both ends of the Bluetooth pair, reboot the Mac and follow the help instructions again.

Calendar sync problems

Everything was now syncing nicely with the exception of the iCal entries. The log gives the cryptic error:

Mark/Space Calendar Events: NSInvalidArgumentException [ISyncConjunctionFilter shouldApplyRecord:withRecordIdentifier:]: the record com.apple.syncservices:0845AD5F-A4C7-48D3-B1D3-B5809C9D000E should have an entity name, but instead it is {}

Over in iCal I couldn’t find anything looking corrupt but a quick Back up Database… followed by a Restore Database Backup… took care of it.

[)amien

The latest secret under suppression is a short 16-byte key which locks away the content on HD-DVD discs that only licensed software and hardware can play it back and prevent you from making copies.

This type of protection used to be called copy-protection but these days it goes under the equally unpopular name of "Digital Rights Management (DRM)". It enforce the copyright holders rights whilst denying you yours and does it in such a way that in some countries re-asserting your legal rights means you end up breaking others.

The AACS Licencing Authority believe they can now protect by law what they failed to protect using technology. This is particularly amusing because their predecessor, the DVD-CCA, failed on both counts when the encryption on DVD was broken in 1999 by an enterprising trio. Apple gets it and is going down the DRM-free route and not treating their customers like criminals.

Basing an entire business model on keeping a sequence of characters secret defies belief and thinking you can wipe the secret off the face of the internet once it’s out is laughable especially when you consider the infinite number of ways you could represent it. The AACS are at it anyway with take down notices to the likes of Digg and others. Amusingly the take down notice itself includes the ‘magic key’.

Alternative 16-byte sequence where each byte is an offset on the previous one is "09 F0 18 F1 9B D7 6F 78 7D 69 15 6F 9E F3 32 38" which if run through the following program yields a certain magic key.

class Program {
    static void Main(string[] argv) {
        byte b = 0;
        string key = string.Empty;
        foreach(string a in argv) {
            b += byte.Parse(a, System.Globalization.NumberStyles.HexNumber);
            key += string.Format("{0:x2} ", b);
        }
        System.Console.WriteLine(key);
    }
}

[)amien

The reality is that Dell offers a wider range that includes real low-end products that are often constrained or using older technology. Apple, quite rightly in my opinion, doesn’t compete there.

Okay Apple have some other gaps in their line-up most notably the typical home power-user who doesn’t want a twin processor Mac Pro, needs more configuration options than the Mac Mini and already owns a display so doesn’t want an iMac. A box half the size of the Pro with a single dual/quad core CPU and no supplied peripherals would be perfect.

That aside I was checking out the prices for their new twin 3GHz quad Xeon boxes after some individuals baulked at the price. They obviously haven’t seen similar specifications from Dell…

In this scenario the Dell is over 60% more expensive and comes with slower CPU’s.

So much for the “Apple Premium Tax”.

[)amien

You can run 32-bit Windows XP on these processors but if you want to use more than 2-3GB of RAM then you’ll need to switch to Windows XP 64-bit edition (or Vista 64-bit if you’re really brave).

With all this in mind I was a little surprised at the state of 64-bit Windows software when I finally got my hands on my first x64 machine. Here’s what I found.

Microsoft SQL Server 2005

Installing Microsoft SQL Server 64-bit (any edition) complained about a missing or corrupt sqlclin_x64.msi file which could leave you running in circles.

This problem occurs if you have the 32-bit native client already installed. Unhelpfully Add or Remove Programs describes both versions as Microsoft SQL Server Native Client regardless of whether you have the 32-bit or 64-bit version installed. The SQL Installer fails to check for the 64-bit version and throws this cryptic error message at you instead.

Solution: Remove Microsoft SQL Server Native Client.

Internet Explorer only sites that use Flash

There are a number of IE only web-sites that use Flash – Microsoft’s Online Learning is one such example. The problem is that Adobe have not made a 64-bit version of the Flash player available.

Solution: Create a shortcut to C:\Program Files (x86)\Internet Explorer\IExplore.exe to run 32-bit Internet Explorer for now.

Mozilla Firefox

There is no official 64-bit Windows version of Firefox although the 32-bit version runs just fine.

Solution: Try one of the unofficial builds although they are a little dated and there is no patching policy.

TortoiseCVS

There is no 64-bit version of TortoiseCVS and the 32-bit version will not run from the 64-bit Windows Explorer.

Solution: Install the 32-bit version and run from the 32-bit version of Windows Explorer (a pain).

A 64-bit version of TortoiseSVN is now available.

Note: If you like to be able to access TortoiseSVN from the File dialogs in Visual Studio 2005 you will also need to install the 32-bit version as VS 2005′s devenv.exe is a 32-bit application.

Microsoft Visual Studio 2005

Whilst the Profession and Team editions will let you write 64-bit applications Visual Studio 2005 itself is 32-bit only and has some additional performance and compatibility problems beyond those experienced on x86 32-bit Windows.

Service Pack 1 resolves some issues relating to debugging on 64-bit but leaves a whole host of other x64 issues unresolved including debugging SQL code.

Solution: None.

.NET Reflector

Fails to draw properly the debugging or lower left info pane. Curious considering it is a .NET application that shouldn’t care whether it is running on 32-bit or 64-bit architectures. So much for VM abstraction.

Solution: None.

This bug has been subsequently fixed.

Resources

• Start64 contains articles, news and information on all things 64-bit
• Compatibility overview from Microsoft
• Unofficial compatibility database of hardware, applications and games submitted by users

Overall a very disappointing state of affairs.

[)amien

Thankfully unlike other phones you can install extra applications and these alternatives are worth consideration.

DeepFish

Straight out of Microsoft’s Labs is DeepFish which renders the whole page and then lets you zoom in. Whilst the concept is similar to the iPhone the major difference appears to be that a server does the rendering for you making the web browser do little more than display these server-side rendered images.

The results are a bit hit-and-miss at the moment hence why it is still a technology preview which seems now to be full however there are alternative places to get the files and activation codes but be warned it doesn’t yet support sites that require form submissions/logins.

Minimo

Minimo takes a more traditional approach to browsing and uses the core Mozilla technologies as used in Firefox to provide a very feature-reach browser that includes support for JavaScript, AJAX, RSS and tabbed-browsing.

Opera Mobile

Opera Software produce Opera 8 for Windows Mobile Smartphone as part of their suite which seems to target every hardware and software combination under the sun. This version includes tabbed browsing and the usual assortment of tricks to improve rendering on small screens.

A trial version is available which I’d recommend before parting with your cash as unlike the others this one will set you back $24 USD.

[)amien

A quick browse shows Amazon.co.uk still have some available, Play have them left, hell even my local HMV here on the tiny island of Guernsey had over 100 unallocated at lunch today and had canceled their midnight launch event – albeit for ‘technical’ reasons.

People on eBay have been finding their pre-order auctions not even meeting their cost price and looking at the negative feedback they are refusing to honour them now.

How could Sony have screwed this up so much? Take your pick:

• Shafting Europeans with a 33% price increase over the Americans? ($599 vs £425 vs €599)
  599 USD = 304 GBP = 449 EUR
• Cutting backwards compatibility when costs aren’t even passed on to the consumer?
  

  But as we have made clear before, in the future our resources will be increasingly focused on developing new services and entertainment features exclusively for PS3, rather than on delivering PS2 backwards compatibility.

• Forcing Europeans to buy the more expensive model – because “that’s what they demand”
  

  Responding to retail and consumer demand, SCEE confirmed that initially only the 60GB model would be available, with the 20GB model to follow later in the year dependent on demand.

• Forcing Blu-Ray upon consumers when they have failed with so many proprietary formats already?
• Repeated delays?
  15 March 2005, November 2006, 23 March 2007
• Nothing worth playing at launch?
  27 launch titles, 6 exclusive titles for sale plus Gran Turismo HD Concept free download. Gran Turismo HD Concept looks interesting … but not £425 to play essentially a demo interesting. Resistance: Fall of Man and MotorStorm are the top selling titles with EuroGamer scores of 6 and 8 respectively.
• Pathetic attempt at on-line service in the face of Xbox Live!?
• Dropping rumble in exchange for a not-as-good-as-Wii movement sensor?
• That Sony are so full of themselves they think being expensive is something to be proud of?
  Jeff Minter, writing in his regular column for Edge, said:

  They seem absolutely certain that even when they say it’s going to be considerably more expensive than existing consoles… nevertheless us eager customers will rush out in droves to buy it because it’s, hey, a new PlayStation.” … “incredibly arrogant.”

Of course it comes down to just one thing: Give people what they want, not what you want them to have.

I doubt Sony can stop their downward trend whilst they exude arrogance that sounds like “you’ll take this and you’ll like it – we’re Sony”.

In order to try and save face Sony performed a PR stunt by giving away 46″ HD TV’s to everybody who brought a PS3 at the Virgin London store. This would hopefully mean the press and sites would write about this instead of poor turnout or nothing at all – a snip at £250,000 to Sony. Check out the BBC, GameIndustry.biz or UK Resistance for coverage of the launch event.

Update

Yeah, pathetic turn-out all round with reports of media outnumbering shoppers at a couple of events, general disappointment and even big venues getting under 100 people. On-line retailers such as Amazon and Play have plenty left.
Last night 50 regional HMV stores were open for midnight launches across the country, and “at least” 1,000 units had been sold, according to Ellis.

…only 100 or so people came to the event, as opposed to the 1,500 or so who queued for a Wii, or the 3,000 who turned up for the World of Warcraft expansion pack

[)amien

Dark Alex is the guy behind the firmware but the whole scene/process is full of terminology and a bit complex. This are the steps that worked for me (via 2.71) and for a couple of friends (via 3.03)

This will invalidate your warranty and has the potential chance to leave your PSP useless. By following these instructions you are agreeing to take that risk and liability into your own hands – no warranty is expressed or implied, the author will not be held liable for damages, etc. Sony certainly do not authorise such modification.

You will need

• PSP currently running firmware 3.03 or earlier
• Memory Stick Pro Duo with some space
• Various files linked to from this post

Also, if your firmware is above 2.71 you will need:

• Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories (original with 2.0 firmware update on it not 2.6)

My instructions below are for the earlier TA-079 hardware not the newer TA-082 so go check this guide for details of identifying which you have – they also have information on what you need to do for the TA-082 model.

Getting enabled

So check which firmware you have in the PSP’s Settings > System Settings > System Information menu option – it’s called System Software.

If it is 1.50 already jump to Flashing Open Edition section.

If above 1.50 but below 2.71

Make a note of your network settings, they will be lost!

• download the 2.71 firmware
• create the folder /PSP/GAME/UPDATE/ on your Memory Stick
• rename the file EBOOT.PBP and move it to this folder
• put Memory Stick in PSP and go to the Game > Memory Stick menu
• choose the 2.71 firmware update option and follow instructions
• download the homebrew enabler for 2.71 (I used Rev C)
• copy the contents of the downloads MS_ROOT folder to the root of your Memory Stick
• put Memory Stick back in PSP and use the Photo viewer to look at the HENx folder
• your PSP should now crash with a blue/green screen
• check the System Information menu option again – it should say HEN at the end of the System Software
• if it does, skip to the Flash 1.50 downgrade section
• if it does not, power off your PSP and try viewing the picture again
• download the generic 2.71 downgrader and unpack contents of MS_ROOT to Memory Stick root folder
• download the 1.50 firmware
• rename the file UPDATE.PBP *then* copy to /PSP/GAME/UPDATE/ on the Memory Stick
• put Memory Stick in PSP and go to the Game > Memory Stick menu
• choose the x.yz firmware update option and follow instructions
• Agree to reset the corrupt settings when it reboots
• check the System Information menu option again – it should say 1.50!

If above 2.71 but below 3.03

• download the 3.03 firmware
• create the folder /PSP/GAME/UPDATE/ on your memory stick
• rename the file EBOOT.PBP and move it to this folder
• put Memory Stick in PSP and go to the Game > Memory Stick menu
• choose the 3.03 firmware update option and follow instructions
• rename your /PSP/SAVEDATA/ folder to /PSP/SAVEBACK/ or something
• download the homebrew enabler for 3.03
• copy the contents of the downloads MS_ROOT folder to the root of your Memory Stick
• put Memory Stick back in PSP and attempt to load Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
• the game should flash the screen blue before you get to play and reboot
• check the System Information menu option again – it should say HEN at the end of the System Software
• if it does not, power off your PSP and try loading GTA again
• delete the /PSP/SAVEDATA/ folder and rename /PSP/SAVEBACK/ back to /PSP/SAVEDATA/
• download the 3.03 downgrader and unpack contents of MS_ROOT to Memory Stick root folder
• download the 1.50 firmware
• rename the file UPDATE.PBP *then* copy to /PSP/GAME/UPDATE/ on the Memory Stick
• put Memory Stick in PSP and go to the Game > Memory Stick menu
• choose the x.yz firmware update option and follow instructions
• Agree to reset the corrupt settings when it reboots
• check the System Information menu option again – it should say 1.50!

If above 3.03

You’re out of luck for now.

Flashing Open Edition

Dark Alex’s official patch requires you grab a few Sony firmware images and run a patching tool… but there is a very unofficial pre-made package available. The steps are

• download the 3.10 OE-A Easy Installer
• unpack it to your hard disk
• copy the 310oeflasher and 310oeflasher% folders to /PSP/GAME/ on the Memory Stick
• put Memory Stick in PSP and go to the Game > Memory Stick menu
• choose the 3.10 Open Edition firmware update option and follow instructions
• check the System Information menu option again – it should say 3.10 OE-A.

Get your old favourites on there!

Your PSP is now ready to play images of your original PS1 games (image with Alcohol 120% or similar image making software then convert with PopStation) and third-party “home-brew” software like ScummVM to play all those great point-and-click adventures you’ve got lying around.

In both cases just create a folder on your Memory Stick inside /PSP/GAME/ and drop the EBOOT.PBP file in that new directory. Access it from the Game > Memory Stick menu as usual!

As a bonus the battery appears to last longer playing home-brew and PS1 games – perhaps because of the lower CPU requirements or the fact the UMD isn’t spinning all the time.

[)amien

Of course when the PlayStation 2 came out I jumped at the chance and have enjoyed some great titles too – more of the same franchise really but some great titles nether less and you can still use it to play all your PS1 games. It’s a great machine although it’s definitely due for replacement by now.

I’ve spent a fair amount of cash on those PlayStation games and hardware despite flirts with Dreamcast (yum) and Xbox 1 (which did nothing for me).

PlayStation 3 should be my logical upgrade path – all they had to do was more of the same but with better hardware and on-line support but the news this week was the final straw.

Not content with overcharging Europeans for the machine they’ve also decided to make the hardware a bit cheaper for them to produce by removing the hardware for backwards compatibility with the PS2 stating it’s "not a priority" for them.

So what we have is a machine that’s been repeatedly delayed, that developers won’t be able to harness the CPU power of, that is expensive, uses proprietary media from a company that has a long list of failed media formats, that offers no compelling titles, has a poor on-line experience, has no unique features at all, is expensive and late to the party.

I know, this isn’t a unique viewpoint there have been comics and even songs (thanks Lab) about how Sony are killing off their own PlayStation brand with sheer incompetence.

[)amien

Apple TV

First off the Apple TV tops out at 720p high-def – what!? For less than Apple TV’s $299 I can get an Xbox 360 that does video & audio streaming at 1080p. Sure the 360 is missing HDMI and the slick software but it does play state of the art 3D on-line games.

Video scaled up to 720p by the device and then scaled up to 1080p by the TV is ugly.

iPhone

Apple’s iPhone is supposed to be state of the art but GSM really isn’t good enough. The world is moving on to 3G and UTMS is essential in the likes of Japan and important even in the USA. Other manufacturers do it, why isn’t Apple?

Secondly this is supposed to be state of the art Internet? Where the hell is instant messaging? You’ve got the UI with SMS but what if I want to talk to iChat, Google Talk, ICQ, MSN Messenger users? Zip.

Thirdly where is the SDK/API? Initial reports are indicating that it is a closed platform.

Hello?

Phone users seem to fall into one of two groups. People who want a voice phone with maybe a few extra features who won’t be prepared to pay $499 (plus the cost of a 2 year contract) and the second are existing smartphone users who often need to install additional applications and maybe even games. No mention of J2ME, no mention of an SDK. Nada.

It’s a slick product but for now is just functionally incomplete compared to what I have. Smartphone + iPod all the way.

Finally…

Jobs also thinks they are going for 1% of the massive mobile market share. Funny as ex-Apple’s Kawasaki puts this goal at number 11 of his Top Ten Lies of Entrepreneurs.

My god who decided to let the Cingular CEO on stage to read their corporate brochure.

[)amien

The Xbox 360 enjoyed its second year and titles continue to impress although the count is still a little on the weak side. The addition of 1080p output was a great bonus but one many people (myself included) can’t take advantage of without a HDMI cable and nobody seems entirely sure if the 360 can pump out a digital video signal (I doubt it).

On-line support is blooming although can get very expensive if you want all the extras for games you’ve already paid for – come on guys we put £40 down gives a few freebies!

The PlayStation 3 on the other hand is vapour ware here still in Europe and was notably absent from Japan’s premier Sony Building in Tokyo. Online the only people raving about it are those that were raving about it before it came out…

Nintendo’s Wii has been getting a lot of press for being fun (if tiring and occasionally dangerous to your environment) but with the console itself is effectively a reboxed GameCube which didn’t impress 5 years ago and the graphics look very dated on the couple of titles I’ve been able to see. With rumours of a more powerful unit doing the rounds and nothing stopping anyone producing a similar controller for the 360 or PS3 can Nintendo stay a contender or will they go the way of Sega?

With consoles traditionally being loss-leaders for the first few years perhaps Nintendo would have been better off producing controllers and software for the 360 and PS3.

Game: Oblivion

People often rave about how open-ended Grand Theft Auto is but lets be honest here – it isn’t a patch on Oblivion.

Like the aforementioned title you can follow the story or run off and do what you like. The difference here is that Oblivion is truly massive and is filled with interesting people, their stories and ultimately their sub-quests.

The graphics look absolutely gorgeous and show off the Xbox 360 very well – demands on the PC side are beyond what my desktop can deliver.

Surprise: Microsoft Office 2007

Microsoft took a brave step in reinventing the menu/tool bar that has been established for the last 10 years. Sure, the result isn’t a giant leap in terms of innovation but it is a joy to use and a big improvement over the older technology.

Importantly it shows a beacon of hope that there are people at Microsoft prepared to fundamentally change how people use their software for the better and not just deliver to developers (.NET, XML-HTTP).

Web site: YouTube

We were told repeatedly that this would be the year of high-definition yet despite large sales of HD ready equipment the content is still a bit thin on the ground (Sky HD, Xbox 360 and a smattering of HD titles). Sony hit another strike this year as another of their proprietary formats bombed – UMD video for the PSP – although sales of TV shows on Apple’s iTunes seem to indicate there is a market for tiny distinctly non-HD video.

The real winner on the video front has to be YouTube which goes on to show that whilst content is king there’s no reason you need to pay for it to be successful. Grainy, out of focus and copyright infringement seem the orders of the day but nobody cared – at least until a company worth suing brought them out (Google).

Communications: HTC

HTC phones and their branded variants have been popping up all over the web and in techies hands everywhere. Reviews are generally positive although I’m finding my TyTn sluggish in a couple of areas – something I hope the latest firmware will address.

Motorola meantime has been getting bad press over it’s Rokr variants.

Apple’s vapourware mobile phone continues to get insane coverage despite nobody having anything but speculation and rumours to go on. Cisco/LinkSys released an iPhone to which they own the trademark so I guess iChat Mobile is an option.

Web application: Google Reader

Google finally put it’s arse in gear and upgraded Google Reader to something not only usable but actually enjoyable to use. Now if only they could stream out the next 20 articles BEFORE I hit them so I don’t have to wait…

Rojo on the other hand deployed a screwed update and continually failed to pick up feeds complaining they were invalid or couldn’t be contacted despite other on-line tools were working just great. Bye.

With RSS becoming increasingly more popular something has to give and it’s news aggregation sites such as Slashdot and Digg which often reveal to you news you read several days ago and have already commented about at the original source.

[)amien

_{* Yeah okay, not a proper award ceremony but a useful ploy to group otherwise unrelated content into a single post.}