I liked my original Jawbone UP24 however it broke and Jawbone replaced it with their new model the UP2. Newer means it should be better right? I would say different, but probably not better. My chief complaint with my UP2 was that it would not stay on my arm very well. The clasp was too easy to knock off when out doing things, even simple walking it seemed to come off for no reason. I was concerned with losing it so I went online looking for an answer. I ended up bending the clasp a bit to put some more pressure on it after seeing this post, this definitely helped but didn’t solve the problem. I then saw a suggestion on Reddit to use an O-ring. That post has disappeared from what I can tell now so I decided I would make a new one with new photos to show the fix. Since doing this my band has not fallen off once.
I went to the corner neighborhood hardware store into the plumbing section and found o-rings in the sink rebuild area. The o-ring cost me $0.49. The size I used was a #7 O-ring which is ½ x 3/8 x 1/16 in size.
You can put the O-Ring on the band or the clasp with similar performance. I hope this helps everyone fix their Jawbone UP2 bands.
The Tesla Model S is kind of the halo “electric” car at the moment, and it really breaks the mold of a stereotypical electric car. It is fast, sexy, and super high tech, yet drives almost normally. Being a car enthusiast, I had previously driven the Nissan Leaf and Chevy Volt locally; but with so few Tesla showrooms and service centers in the country, it’s hard to have the opportunity to drive a Tesla, especially in Nebraska.
I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to test drive a Tesla Model S on May 3, 2014 in Omaha, Nebraska. I had spotted a post on the Tesla Facebook page saying they were taking reservations for a test drive, so I signed up. They called me the next day and confirmed.
They had 4 cars on display in the corner of a parking lot. All were the P85 variant (the big battery model), and some had quite a few options, so sticker prices ranged from about $80k-$107k. Quite a few people were hanging around the car that was charging while a Tesla employee answered questions. Having read several reviews of the car and watching several videos of it, I had quite a bit of knowledge to draw from for my test drive.
My time slot came up and I scanned my drivers license, typed in a little info on an ipad and went for a test drive. The car is so quiet that in a somewhat crowded environment, people kept walking behind the car when we were trying to back out of the parking spot. Their mouths kind of dropped open when they saw this car come at them silently.
The Driving
Acceleration – Instant torque is addicting. Really addicting. The acceleration in the Model S is so smooth and linear. It definitely pushes you back into the seat in a very satisfying way. Its speed and power are deceiving because of how quiet it is. In a gasoline powered car the engine gives you an indication of the speed you’re going; the S doesn’t have that, so it was very easy to go faster than the law says you should. It would be interesting to see if Model S owners get more speeding tickets because of it. I can verify that traction control is pretty effective too. When you give the S a lot of acceleration off the line, the traction control will come in and make sure you keep things on the road and straight; it does give the sensation of wiggling around a little though. It was fun. Because the Model S has no transmission or torque converter like in an automatic transmission, the car doesn’t creep along at low speeds. Tesla has added this creep mode as a software mode if you miss it. It takes a little getting use to in non creep mode.
Brakes – The Model S brake feel was nice and linear under normal street driving. Tesla has taken an interesting approach, giving you the option of a maximum regeneration mode or a low regeneration mode. It’s a simple setting on the 17” touchscreen center console. In the low generation mode, the car will coast much like a normal car with an automatic transmission with low drag. The downside of this is that it will generate much less energy to put back into the batteries and extend range. In maximum generation mode when off the accelerator it feels much more like you have downshifted on a car with a manual transmission. The feeling of drag is increased quite a bit. It’s essentially using electric motors as an engine brake by using the electric motor to generate electricity.. It takes a little getting used to since you don’t have to touch the brakes nearly as much in city driving. For instance, when coming down a hill, instead of coasting down the hill you actually may have to just use the lightest input on the accelerator to maintain speed. The benefits of this is it’s extend range optimally. Tesla says that this also greatly decreases brake rotor and pad wear because you’re not using them as much to slow the relatively heavy car.
Steering/Suspension – The Model S is the safest car on the road, and part of that has to do with how stiff the chassis is. That stiffness really adds to the sportiness of the car. The suspension is stiff, but well damped so it’s not harsh, but also not “Lexus” smooth. I would call it european inspired suspension. The car corners pretty flat, and in normal street driving hides its weight pretty well, I thought. That stiffness also made the car feel really solid and well built. Our test car (829 miles on the odometer) had no squeaks or shudders. It would be interesting to compare a model with the sport suspension option. The steering was a nice weight and some road feel feedback.
The Interior
The 17” touch screen that serves as the cars center console and main control unit for all configurable things in the car really is the top interior feature. The large screen and first HD backup camera that can optionally be used when driving were great. The layout and navigation were really logical and intuitive of the controls and options. The UI was fast, and the cas a web browser build in to search for anything or read a website. Navigation was by Google Maps so it was great and always updated. The only driving control I was hunting around for was to put it in park (I will blame wanting to continue the test drive, I think it probably had enough range left to make it back home 🙂 )
For what the car cost, the seats should have been better. After visiting the BMW Welt in Germany my benchmark is admittedly a bit high when it comes to seats though. The Model S I drove had the standard seats, and while stylish, they lacked some adjustability and didn’t have enough side bolstering to match the car’s performance. With approximately a 300 mile range, you’re not as likely to be in one without a break as long as you would in a diesel or gas European luxury sedan in the same price range. The flat floor (no transmission tunnel) was really nice, and made the middle rear seat much more useable. Someone who is tall might have problems sitting in the back seat without hitting their head on the roof. The interior design was minimal but nice. The design of the door handles are by far my favorite interior design feature. I didn’t care for the dark gray walnut wood trim on the dash, and would have probably prefered a carbon fiber or dark, warmer wood color.
Model S door
The key of the car is pretty cool, as you would expect. It’s a fob and there is no traditional key. It’s actually a Hot Wheels sized model of the Model S in black that is a bit more streamlined. Touching the model (key) on the trunk for a second or two will pop the trunk. Walk up to the car with the key in your pocket and the door handles automatically come out and it unlocks. The car is always on and ready to drive; sitting in the driver’s seat and putting your foot on the brake to put it into drive is all you need to do, no push button start or turning of a key. There is also no shutting it off, you touch the button for park and get out, the car locks and shuts off itself.
Model S Key
Conclusion
Coming into the test drive the car was already sitting on a pedestal. My test drive was short but for the most part it met and exceeded expectations. For me the standouts were the acceleration, large center console screen, general technology, and its sexy lines. It’s an expensive car, and for most people it probably would not be your only car unless you had access to something with more range for long trips. That will change as electric charging, especially the Tesla Super Charging stations, becomes more common. For me it would be a great daily driver: fast, sexy, super safe, and minimal day to day costs. The main barrier right now for most is the cost. It’s still quite an expensive car. Tesla is rumored to be coming out with a less expensive smaller 3 series competitor that will be more affordable for the masses. By that time they should have a more robust charging network too. That will be more of a revolution for the masses. Until then, the Model S is a great example of how good an electric car can be made, especially in the USA. It makes a few sacrifices and has some great benefits.
I received my 2013 Nexus 7 a couple of weeks ago. One of the things I miss most is that my old case that allowed my tablet to sit up at an angle on a table for video viewing or reading. I have a new case on order but it is going to take a few more weeks to get here. I went searching online for cheap stands I could make and I ran across several ideas and combined a few with what I had.
To make this I took a blank PCI Bracket I had in my desk and bent it in the middle a bit so that it would stand up. I then bent the 90 degree angle portion a bit more (125 degrees I would guess) so it would grip the edge of my 2013 Nexus 7. (Since it’s so thin it’s pretty slick). For as simple as this is it works well, and it even works for my Note 2.
I have talked with Lincolnites citywide who share similar frustrations with the ISP options in town. The big guys tend to overpromise, underdeliver, have over utilization problems, and reliability issues. For me, the last 6 months have been worse than average, with huge fluctuations in speed, especially during peak times. I had techs out, replaced modems, talked with support and there just was not much that could be done. On top of this, new fees and a fairly high bill have been enough for me to start looking at other options.
In Lincoln there are not a ton of options. Lincoln has a fairly limited market. We have one cable provider and one traditional POTS phone provider. There are a few resellers but they mainly use the infrastructure of the first two, thanks FCC. There have been other options, but they typically have not been able to offer the price/performance ratio I was looking for, especially delivering a faster upload speed.
The Solution
Wide Range Broadband (WRB) is a small, locally owned and operated ISP, wanting to give Lincolnites another option to get Internet, phone and TV service. When I first ran across them in late 2012 they didn’t have service in my area, but this has recently changed as they expand to cover more of the city. View a coverage map here. WRB is a point to point line of sight Wireless ISP (WISP). They use a RF technology and mount an antenna on a high point of your home and then run CAT5 inside. More on the install later. They are using fiber for the backhaul between their current 5 towers in town.Their main provider is Level 3 who dumps to the internet in Dallas TX. The transmissions from the antenna to the providers tower is encrypted using 128 bit AES, which is a great thing.
This is the rooftop antenna on my house.
The Install
The install at my house took about 1.5 hours on a weeknight. It was refreshing to have an appointment time that was not a 4 hour window. During the install, Aaron, the company owner, installed an antenna on my rooftop. They had a lots of options, and I chose to put it on the side of my chimney. Another common install point was the PVC exhaust vents many roofs have. This is a good choice if you can’t put holes into the structure. The install is similar to a satellite dish install, with the mount actually being from a satellite dish. From there he ran a length of outdoor rated CAT5 wire down the eave of my house and inside, with the rest of the service wires. The antenna and CAT5 blend in pretty well, I think. You can see them if you’re looking for it, but if not it blends in pretty well. Inside there is a simple small POE injector that plugs into electricity and a patch cable to your router.
Performance
I will admit I was a little skeptical at first of a wireless point to point service. I have two pretty heavy users (Gaming, Streaming, Online Backup and more) in the house, so low lag and performance is a must. Point to point systems of the past are associated with having problems when there is weather, and high ping times. So far I have not found this to be the case. I am on the top residential package (21×5) and am seeing download speeds between 18-20mb/s and uploads of between 5-7mb/s Upload speeds to seem to vary some, but they don’t dip that low, and are still significantly faster than I was previously receiving with my old ISP. Higher speeds are being seen at non peak times. The speed test screenshots speak for themselves. There are no bandwidth caps with the service either.
Service is dependent on distance from the towers, and according to Google Maps I am about 2.5 miles from the tower. My housemate reports his ping times when playing online games are about 1/2 or 1/3 less with the new service. Ping times to Google during peak hours are less than 30ms. Youtube and Netflix performance are a lot better; much less buffering and no throttling. So far we have not had any thunderstorms roll through to see how that affects the service. WRB told me that rain or snow would not affect the service. So far in the one storm we have had I didn’t notice any performance differences.
After having the service about a week, I can easily say it’s the best ISP experience I have had in Lincoln and the best value. The top package is quoted as a (21×5) for $60 a month. With my old ISP I was paying $65 for (15×1) and that was not being delivered, so this is a much better value. Other packages are available as well with various levels of speed and price. I also like supporting a local company.
WRB also offers a referral program. If this post has made you interested in signing up please let them know LiquidRetro referred you.
If you have any questions, feel free to leave them below or find me on Twitter at @Liquidretro and I will reply back.
UPDATE1: I just wanted to write a quick update on the performance in the crazy weather Lincoln has had in the past 2 days. On Tuesday some very significant thunderstorms rolled through town. These brought with them some intense hail, that did cause a problem with my service. After talking with the ISP they acknowledged a bit of downtime due to the weather. The hail had struck some of their antennas. This was unexpected and they were looking deeper into the cause of the problem. Good news is the outage only lasted about 20 minutes. During the rest of the rain in the later thunderstorm there were no problems. Today Lincoln has received a at times heavy wintry mix of precipitation I have not had any problems with reliability or speed. Speeds are still nice and fast.
UPDATE2: As of October 2017 I no longer was a Widerrange customer. I had the opportunity to get Allo Fiber to the home which is the best thing to happen to the Lincoln ISP market. It’s a fantastic service with great customer support.
Since my Update 1 My service with Widerrange declined in speed, because unstable and customer support suffered greatly. Running a WISP takes knowledge of the wireless spectrum above general networking and it woudl appear the new owner is lacking in this. My service required resetting due to vulnerable firmware that was known to the ISP but instead of being proactive they were reactive when users called in about a problem.
At the current time I do not recommend Widerange if you have other options. The product being delivered did not meet expectations nor did the customer service. Lincoln now has better options, and I would recommend using one of them if possible.
On my drive home from work today I was very surprised–when listening to Security Now episode #326Steve and Leo answered the question I submitted to the show! Let me backup a little and explain things. Security Now is a weekly podcast on the TWIT network that discusses hot topics from the past week on all things security related, as well as fundamentals of computers, the internet, and security. In addition to security news, they also touch on Sci-Fi books and a few health concerns—recently the all important Vitamin D3. I have promised myself to write a big blog post about Vitamin D3 at some point this winter. If you are not a listener, I strongly recommend you listen to an episode or two (At least listen to the Portable Dog Killer episode, it’s not what you think it is at all) .
Question Setup
I am a big fan of Lastpass Password storage system after learning about it on Security Now and hearing why it was safe to use (Episode 256). I am also using the Google Authenticator on my Android phone(Also available for all other major mobile phone OS) for a second form of authentication when logging into my Google account because of how much additional security it provides, especially as this account grows more important. The question I asked below was simplified slightly (Probably due to me not thinking things out fully to get the answer I wanted) but the results were good and answered about 80% of my question.
My question was as read by Leo
“Leo: No. Question 7, Jon in Lincoln, Nebraska – another cornfield flyover – worries about giving Google too many eggs: Steve and Leo, I love the podcast. I’m a long-time listener, LastPass and Vitamin D advocate. I have the entire family well educated and believing now. Yay. Over the weekend I saw that now LastPass – as we mentioned in the news – supports Google Authenticator. This is great news because I currently use the app on my Android phone to get into my Gmail account. I also know how much more secure two-factor authentication is, thanks to previous Security Now! episodes. But it makes me wonder if tying so many of my services to Google is a good idea or a potential security problem. What happens if Google were to go down for a few hours? Any thoughts or opinions on this would be appreciated. Am I putting too many eggs in Google’s basket?”
Watch the video on Youtube of Steve and Leo answering my question below. Start at 1:30:00 goo.gl/kaJD5
After hearing this answer I am feel reassured about my concerns and I am very glad it is independent and closed loop. My biggest concern was if my Google account was suddenly compromised/deleted/suspended etc that I would be locked out of my Lastpass too, but since it is independent and I have a backup of codes generated I know I won’t lose my Lastpass. Just in case I always have my local Lastpass Pocket standalone as a measure of last resort (No cloud).
Yes Pinball Deluxe is the best Android game to date in my opinion. I know that this is almost sac-religious to say it is better than Angry Birds but to me it is. I have nothing wrong with Angry Birds and think its a great game. Before the most recent update however it was kind of jerky on my Motorola Droid X, and it displayed in game advertisements that got in the way, however it did have great game play and is an enormous value with the amount of game play it offers.
Pinball Deluxe is a Free Game for the Android platform. The game contains 3 different pinball machines each with their own different theme. Each pinball board contains a mini game which I have not seen in many other pinball games before. Its a neat little thing to set it apart from the others. The game has your classic flippers at the bottom of the board and then on some levels middle flippers higher up as well. This game runs very well. It is super smooth on my Droid X and looks great while doing it. It is safe to say this is the best looking Android game I have seen. In addition to the game running well the designers have really thought it out. You can pause and resume your games so you can come back later. It also asks you on start-up if you want to enable sound. This is a must have feature as far as I am concerned. I often like to pull out my phone if I am in line and the last thing I want is the opening music to come blaring on. Since Android has different volume levels for different items its easy to leave your phone on vibrate but have the media volume on a high level. I have heard stories of people in public places where they probably should not be gaming on their phone (Church) and they suddenly hear the Angry Birds theme song start up someplace in the room. I am sure this happens in college classrooms across the country as well. So this game prevents that.
The Physics in the game seem to be very accurate. The ball and paddle behave the way you expect them too. Different surfaces and materials behave differently and velocity seems to be accurate as well.
The only negative I can come up with is with the ball Launcher/Plunger. I would like some type of power meter here so I can tell how powerful the launch will be. Currently it shows a spring that compresses but
This afternoon Google held an event focused on Android, specifically Honeycomb, its tablet centered version of the Android operating system. There were several neat things that were shown off. I will let Engadget provide you with the specifics if you are interested. Here , Here and Here.
One other thing before I talk about the New Android Market in the browser. Google choose to stream this event live, for free, for anyone with a browser and a copy of flash. Proving Google is all about being open, this was open to all devices (well nearly). You could even watch it live on your iPad if you watched the TWIT stream which was in a non flash format. The main stream looked and sounded great. This is really the way it should be and I applaud Google for making their event viewable for all.
For me the biggest thing announced was the new Android Market . This in your full size browser on your computer. This is unique, the competition doesn’t have this feature and instead force you into their walled garden that is iTunes to buy or browse your apps on a computer. This requires you to be at your computer. The Android Market has nothing like this, proving Google’s openness. You can download apps from anywhere you have a desktop and cell service. At the Library, at work, at a Friends house you name it. Use any old computer, find your app in the web browser press install and your done, more on that in a minute. The design of the new store is clean and fresh. It has large graphics, screenshots of the application, a description and then users reviews. It also has a related apps bar on the side. The website also has featured apps and the ability to search for applications and then filter your search results by lots of things such as price (Free or Paid) etc.
The neatest thing is the ability once logged in to the store is once click install and purchases all from your computer. It is very simple. First you find the application you want to install, next you click install. You are presented with a screen that shows what services this app uses and you have to agree. If this was a paid app you are then presented with what your funding source is. Click OK and the payment processes. Now within about 3-4 seconds your phone the app is pushed to your phone. The download and install starts automatically. In your Notifications menu you will notice a small down arrow to show you are downloading the file, just like if you downloaded any application. It then installs and that is it. The website also
allows you to link to specific applications with emails or IM. There is even a direct Tweet button on the page of every app so you can easily publish apps to your twitter stream. No longer do you have to share the name of the app and how to get there with your friends you can just give them a link.
In app purchase is not a huge thing for me but it is for developers. In the past it has been hard to do and as a result many developers believed the marketplace did not work for them. Now that this is available it helps to solve these problems. It also shows that Google is listening to developers and making chances to improve the process so it Android ecosystem continues to grow and flourish.
The web Android Market is a game changer for Android, its users, and developers. I predict app downloads will increase greatly just because it is so easy to try apps. It is also much easier for payment of apps as well since you can easily change your payment source. I showed this to a few people at work today and they were blown away with how easy it is. Apps kind of scare some people, but now they feel more comfortable because things are larger and the experience of using a web browser is better than on the small phone of your screen. You can open many tabs now in your browser when comparing like apps too. It’s slick and just works! Way to go Google, keep up those innovations!
Background
Last week Adobe released a new version of Adobe Acrobat, version X. This is a new version of the program that many of us use every day. In the past people shied away from new versions of Acrobat reader because over the years the program had become bloated and slow. However this new version offers important security benefits and speed improvements that make the upgrade worth it.
As many people know Adobe Reader has become one of the favorite attack vectors for hackers and malware over the past few years for a number of reasons including.
The install base is huge! Most new PC’s come with it preinstalled, if not almost everyone needs a PDF viewer and Adobe’s is the most popular.
Quarterly updates that Adobe releases are too slow and infrequent, Only if an exploit is really bad does Adobe decided to do an out of cycle update. Even with these updates few people know that the program needs updated. The automatic updates in version 9 have been better but still seem to fail most of the time. Manual updating seems to be required.
The ability to run things such as Javascript in a PDF exist and are on by default. Just about everyone does not need this feature and it represents a large place to exploit.
The Good Security
The biggest feature of version X is the introduction of a Sandbox. A sandbox provides isolation of the program from the operating system, to lessen the chance of security exploits. Adobe does a great job in explaining all about the sandbox features in these two blog posts, Sandbox Post 1, Sandbox Post 2, Sandbox Post 3, Sandbox Post 4. This is such a big thing from a security angle that the SANS institute has recommended that everyone install Adobe Reader X to get this feature. https://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid=9976
Speed
Surprisingly this new version is faster than the old version 9. It appears to be less bloated and quicker responding.
Other changes
I noticed the voice that will read text to you if you want seems to be more like a human. The flow is greatly improved. The interface has been tweaked slightly to have more of a beveled edge, silver stainless steel look. I like it. Its nothing revolutionary but a nice, clean change. The updater also now allows for you to set it to automatically download and install updates. Hopefully this works well and allows the program to stay up to date without much user intervention. I do hope Adobe changes their company policy and moves to a monthly update policy on the second Tuesday of the month, like Microsoft. This will make the task of corporate administration much easier on the administrator.
The Bad
By default two security settings are on, when they should be disabled for increased security. They pertain to features that a very, very small percentage of users actually use. If for some reason you needed these someday you can easily turn them on, but for maximum security they should be off. Adobe has even recommended doing this when the program has had problems in the past.
So to disable these settings go under EDIT—> Preferences —-> Then on the Left hand side choose JavaScript and then at the top of the page, uncheck the box that says “Enable Acrobat JavaScript
”
The second option that needs changed is under this same menu. Choose Trust Manager on the left hand side of the page, then at the top of the page uncheck the box that says “Allow Opening of non-PDF file attachments with external applications”
The other bad thing is that despite these new security features the very people you are trying to keep out are trying to take advantage of this new release to push their spamware most of it dubbed “Adobe Acrobat 2010” THIS IS FAKE and Malware, DO NOT INSTALL. The SANS institute has a nice post about this as well, even with photos! https://isc.sans.edu/diary.html?storyid=9982
This is the rooftop antenna on my house.
