Computer decides to become completely unresponsive, so ended up powercycling it, only to find after a reboot it’s still rather unresponsive and for some reason the display driver no longer loaded, I figured that i’d have either a dying drive or some file system corruption from that fact i’d just powercycled it without a proper shutdown.  The machine again stops responding completely, so I go for another powercycle and ready a boot CD to being some diagnostics.

But on powering backup it becomes evident that the drive had indeed died as the raid controller now reports a problem with the RAID0 stripe, and the drive is no longer showing in the controller.

I take the drives out of the raid0 configuration and boot a diagnostic cd just to double check it is indeed the drive, the utility fails to find the drive at all although the bios can still see it.

So I just ended up pulling it (and it’s partner) out and then reinstalling the OS on my other 2 drives (I used to have 4 drives in the machine).

Thankfully I have my PC backup on a daily basis to the RAID1 array in the NAS (Network attached storage) as well as doing an online backup of the most important data to the rackspace cloud (via jungledisk) so all I really lost was the HDD itself and the time it took to reinstall the machine (which BTW thanks to Ninite doesn’t take that long thesedays)

The Backup restored succesfully from the NAS so I didn’t need to restore from the Online backup this time… but it’s nice to know that the data’s safe even if something did happen to both the PC and the NAS (which is possible given they are both in the same room)

Did think about doing an Image based backup of my boot drive, but since I don’t find reinstalling to much of a problem I never bother, just would have preferred not to have spent my Saturday reinstalling me machine…

Since this was my first time using Navigation, I wasn’t sure what to expect and as it was a long Journey I also packed my Tomtom Just in case, although i’m pleased to say the Tomtom was not required.

Once thing to note is if you are using an Andorid version prior to 2.0 the voice navigation does not work, I didn’t realise this initially so sat there trying to navigate by voice and just making myself out to look like an Idiot.

Since voice navigation does not work on my phone, I used the alternative of searching for my destination on google maps, then selecting the navigate option.

Once navigate is pressed, Goggle navigation starts up and begins downloading the route information, this took a couple minutes since the simcard I had in the phone at the time seems to only be provisioned to allow access to the GPRS network and not the 3G network, although once this had happened I didn’t notice any difficulties caused by intermittent loss of coverage.

I did however find it a bit slow to re-route when i’d accidentally taken a wrong turning, this may be down to the aforementioned lack of 3G, I’ve yet to try and drive off route with no network coverage, so i’m not sure how it would react in those circumstances.

In terms of the accuracy of the Navigation and the Clarity of Instructions I didn’t have any major Issues, In-fact I quite liked how it reads out directions for roundabouts, not only telling you the exit you need but also the name of the road and sometimes even where it goes (And it usually matches up with what’s on the road-sign, making it a lot easier to make-sure you find your exit)

Unfortunately the voice they use is awful, I believe it’s a text to speech engine but it sounds very robotic and could easily irritate, hopefully in a future version they’ll be able to change it to a more human sounding voice.

It Did slip up once when locating a train-station, for some reason it took us to the road behind the station and not the one leading upto it, thankfully the station had a foot bridge to cross to the correct side and I was only dropping people off, might have been a little inconvenient if you were expecting the car park however.  It was very nifty how it drops into street view as you approach your destination (if Google have street-view imagery of the area)

In Terms of Data usage It appears to have used Less than 5MB for a 220Mile journey (The Prepay Sim i’d put in the phone had 250MB of data allowance on it and according to the operator there’s now 247Mb left… of course the data use may vary depending on what you are planning on doing with it, probably best to have some kind of data bundle if you plan to use navigation).

I’m unable to comment on the traffic reporting functionality as the majority of my journey goggle didn’t have traffic info for.

To Sum it all up it’s a pretty decent piece of navigation software and if you happen to have a Android handset running Android 1.6 or higher then all you need to do to get Navigation is to visit the market place and grab the updated maps application, not only is it Free but it’s darn good as well.

*Not supported on the official UK firmware, since at the time of writing the i7500 galaxy in the UK is running Andorid 1.5 and navigation needs a minimum of 1.6 I used JC6 (1.6 based) from here, note replacing the firmware with firmware obtained from an unofficial source will probably void the warranty on the phone.

Infact I was recently in a battle where I was coming close to winning (and then i could have saved) when the dreaded message stating that there was an error encountered and the program has been closed, it’s always happening at the worst possible movement also.

Having a quick look around, it seems there are several people reporting similar crashes, Can’t say i had this many problems with the original game, however the video drivers have probably changed versions several times since then.

Guess it might be worth checking the PC over just to make sure The drivers are up2date.etc But considering it only seems to happen on Dragon Age it’s probably a bug in the game itself… Sigh.

Unfortunately console games are not immune from such problems either, I recall bluedragon doing it in the middle of a boss fight at least once.

The downside is it seems the quality of recent games has gone downhill a lot, since most companies seem to have the mentality of release now, patch later.   Sadly this is now infecting consoles since again they can just issue an update via the online functions of modern consoles.

Rant over, Time to get some sleep.

On the upside, I quite like it here and also beer is cheap so not a major problem for me

Seems to me like a prime example of people who don’t understand technology making laws governing it’s use. If this is allowed to pass I suspect we’ll be saying goodbye to free wi-fi networks everywhere, a real shame….

The original thread (linked from the androidforums thread) can be found here

Whist quite a few features aren’t working yet it’s nice to see that someone at least working on Android 2.0 support, it’s just a shame that we have to rely on the kindness of android community members to keep our phones updated with the newer android releases since currently it’s questionable as to if Samsung themselves are actually going to bother supporting this phone with firmware upgrades.

I hope Samsung change their thinking behind this since by not releasing new android versions I feel they are going against the whole principle of what Android stands for.

Since the galaxy is my primary phone I shall not be upgrading at this point but I probably will once some more of the bugs are fixed and this is definitely something I’ll be keeping an eye on.

Please note using firmware from 3rd party sources will most likely Void your warranty.

I quite like typing on the keyboard (But I find it annoying not having the back raised) and that because the keyboard was otherwise fully functional I decided that I might try contacting to support to enquire if it’s possible to purchase a replacement plastic leg (which would be a lot cheaper than a whole new desktop set).

I contacted Logitech’s support via their online form and got a very polite response the next day stating that it is possible to get a replacement leg but unfortunately they didn’t have any in stock at the moment and asked me if I wouldn’t mind waiting a week or so and then emailing them again.

I emailed them again today as it was roughly a week since I last contacted them and they replied within a couple of hours of recieving my update  to inform me that they were shipping a replacement part out and it should be here in 10 working days.

I have to say I’m fairly impressed with the level of service, Other that the automatic acknowledgment emails all the support responses appear to have come from a real person rather than just someone copying/pasting some irrelevant script and it’s nice to see them supporting their products in such a way, this was not a particularly expensive keyboard /mouse set and it was completely our fault the leg went missing in the first place.

They didn’t indicate any charges for the replacement part or ask for any payment information so presumably it’s free, which if that is the case it’s certainly very nice of them, i’ve heard stories in the past about logitech support being pretty good and I’m glad to hear it still is.

Would certainly consider buying their products again in the future.

Edit:  26/11/2009

Got home from work today to find the replacement they’d promised had already arrived, and to my suprise they’ve not just sent a replacement for the little plastic leg they’ve actually sent a replacement keyboard/mouse set!

Blimey, I only needed a little plastic leg have to say that’s pretty amazing support!

This was the ridiculous proposal that’s being put forward.

http://www.itv.com/news/tonight/episodes/driversinthedock/default.html

I hope this never happens, it’s absurd the party responsible for the accident should be he one’s who caused it wether that be the driver the cyclist or both.  To say it’s always the drivers fault absolutely propostrious.

Btw why is cyclists don’t have to have insurance to use the roads yet other vehicles do, a cyclist smashing into something can still do damage, there is unfortunately a lot of crap cyclists out there who will only to happily go the wrong way up a one way street, cycle with no lights in the dark or jump red lights when it suits them (Arguably there is also a lot of crap drivers out there that seem to do similar) It’s a pity becuase it gives the sensible people a bad name.

Sigh, Rant over.

Either way Mobile networks are selling USB dongles for access by the bucket-loads, and they’re good for a certian purpose, although just how mobile they are really depends on how you use them.

I personally find that trying to use a HSPA dongle on a train for instance is rather hit and miss, the connection will drop several times throughout the journey, and in some cases it’s not even worth bothering.

I find the worst offending route that I semi-regularly use is from Waterloo heading south (covered by S.W.T)  Generally unless you want to hop on for long enough to fire off an email it’s probably not worth bothering as the connection will often drop shortly after connecting.

I’ve tried several networks so far and whist some are better than others it’s just not worth browsing whist travelling this route as you’ll spend more time trying to reconnect than actually doing anything meaningful. (Feel free to disagree, maybe it’s just my equipment, but that’s my experience anyway)

However the route between Reading and Paddington (operated by FGW) seems to be a lot better for mobile broadband, you will still get dropouts but no where near as many and it’s usually possible to maintan a connection long enough to actually do a bit of surfing.

Am I annoyed at this, well perhaps a little at the time.  Is it worth complaining to the mobile operator, probably not.

The reason is; The mobile network is wireless (Duh!) and we all know how variable wireless can be, data connections are also a lot more demanding than voice since a voice call using GSM compression will fit into 9.6kps (If i remember correctly, any telecoms engineers reading this feel free to correct me), try loading facebook with that bandwidth you’d be there for ages and then some.

Then if your on a train, your moving at high speed, this produces extra complexity for the network after all you’re probably not in the same place you were when you sent the request for the page, you may not even be on the same cell tower anymore.  The network has in the meantime handed you over to the next base station….

That is of course if there is a next base station, if there isn’t then this is likely to explain why the connection dropped.  In an ideal world the operators would be able to cover 100% of the route, unfortantly this isn’t an easy job, the operator has to get planning permission to build new masts and then even if they get that permission they still have to get some backhaul there (A mobile mast that’s not connected to anything would be pretty useless).

The cellular masts and the equipment required for them to operate isn’t cheap therefore if you’re passing though a largely unpopulated area then that may also explain the lack of coverage, after all the mobile operator isn’t going to spend a fortune putting new infrastructure in if hardly anyone is going to use it, and I can’t see everyone willing to pay a lot more on their bills so some of us can browse the interwebz on the train without interuption ;(

The geography of an area will often also determine the range and performance of a mobile network, hills can be a problem as can valleys and tunnels.