I was going to write an article awhile ago about this not so well known application. It provided simple, selectable, and scheduled backups to your MobileMe iDisk. But with the upcoming iCloud, which sounds great and no longer a paid service, makes the MobileMe Backup version 3.2 obsolete. Maybe it’ll be updated so simple computer maintenance of additional backups can take place.
If you’re still interested in utilizing the MobileMe Backup you can grab it from Apple’s website here.
Nope, it’s still there. Go into your System Preferences and select Trackpad. Go to the More Gestures section and for the first option, “Swipe between pages“, click the down arrow and select “Swipe with two or three fingers“. Now you’ll be able to use three finger swiping within Finder again.
To begin with, not to happy about the download only OS X Lion upgrade. Now when I reinstall I have to download 3.5gb to upgrade to Lion. I can understand Apple protecting them from someone buying one DVD and installing on multiple systems, but there are better ways to go about that.
Anyway, if you’re experiencing an overheating Mac system it appears that the new OS requires a complete reindex of your system. This can take awhile to run and will consume a lot of your system resources. If you look at your Activity Monitor you’ll probably see mdworker using anywhere from 5 to 90% of the processor. My reindexing is still going on but my system temperature should drop once the indexing is done (my system temp reached 168 degrees).
Will add more information later, but the command is as follows for a directory (the -r means recursive, so it zips all files in the directory preserving the directory structure too):
zip -re filename.zip dir_name
To zip a single file and password protect it just omit the r in -re
Both commands will prompt for a password and to confirm the password.
Client called the other day saying his server had run out of room on the hard drive which he stores all of his work files; server is a Dell PowerEdge 840. He wanted a quick solution of mirrored drives so I researched what that system could support then picked up two Western Digital Caviar Green 2TB 64MB SATA-3G. Installed it in a matter of minutes but Windows couldn’t find it.
Went into the BIOS and I noticed the SATA port was turned off, turned it on, saved the changes and booted into Windows. Everything was good from there.
Had a customer looking for a new system that would be powerful enough for his son to play games on. They went the Dell route for their last 3 computers but wanted something affordable and would be good enough to handle games for years. Below are the specifications for this system I put together:
All contained within an Ultra XBlaster Mid-Tower Black Case running Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit.
This is a custom computer I assembled for a customer’s sign shop. He needed a high end system, and fast, as one of his jobs he was unable to plot (print) due to the vector file having thousands of objects. Once received I had the system ready to go in 3 hours and it had no issue plotting the vector file. The system had the follow components:
All contained in an Ultra XBlaster Mid-Tower Black Case running Windows 7 64-bit.
Packers beat the Steelers by 6 points, great game! The office pool I play in, I went with 48 points so it exceeded that with a total score of 56. Which doesn’t disappoint me as I was 1 game behind the two leaders whom both picked opposite teams. However I did want Green Bay to win since the Steelers already had a couple under their belt with Big Ben. The 3rd quarter was a little boring but picked up in the 4th so that was good.
With Driver (WR) and two of the Packers top DB’s injured in the first I was worried and without Driver that probably caused some issues with Rodgers but luckily overcame them in the 4th quarter. So I was a little surprised they were able to pull the game out with a few key injuries.
Speaking of injuries, looked like several were going to be out of the game. Ben slipping and hurting his knee then next play running for a first down. I forget the other injuries but a few came back into the game in the second half I think for the Steelers. Glad to see Ben not get injured to badly as I’m sure that would have kept their score lower and basically be an easy win for the Packers (although I have no clue whom the Steelers 2nd string QB is).
Anyway, great game to watch and was very entertaining! The pregame shows were great as well.
Since my last blog entry early this year I have started seeing more and more of these Penny Auction sites, some of which actually look promising. For example, I saw a commercial on TV for QuiBids so decided to take a look and see how truthful they are as opposed to BidFan.
On their home page it states QuiBids is a BBB Accredited Business so that’s where I went to first. I was surprised to see that they were indeed accredited and since September of last year and they have a A- rating with responses to 144 complaints filed against them (yikes!), here’s a link to the BBB Review. Contact information is also listed there as well as in the whois info of the domain name.
So digging further I went to QuiBids register page where they have a video from News 9 channel. I Googled the anchor woman, Kristen McIntyre, plus news 9 and returned what looks to be a legitimate news station in Oklahoma. All menu items go to where they should go (unlike BidFan that used a fake news station website which the menu items took you to BidFan). Below the video they claim they have been in articles from ABC, MSNBC, etc. Now just try to find those articles, I couldn’t with just simple Google searches (i.e. msnbc quibids article, etc.).
I did come across a Wired article but only reason it showed up is someone posted the URL to QuiBids website, I don’t think that counts. Their also listed on local news channel websites which happen to be ABC or whatever.
The last thing I found was a PDF document from Beckham & Mandel, Business Litigation Attorneys, here’s the link to the document. It’s a class action lawsuit which you can read if you feel like it. So while QuiBids looks a bit more legitimate than BidFan, QuiBids might be the safer Penny Auction to try out if you’re really interested but I would still advise not bothering with any of them.
A customer of mine sent me an email asking what I thought of this online bid site and included a URL to a review of the site by Channel 9 News – How To Save Money In A Recession. I read through the article and clicked on their link towards the end of the article stating “Use our link to get discounted bidbacks!”.
Upon visiting the BidFan you’re exposed to a lot of familiar logos such as ABC, CBS, NBC, etc. and, actually, a nicely designed web page. Scrolling down the page you’ll see a list of current auctions including time remaining, cost and current bidder. Take a look at one of the items on auction that has 30 seconds left or so noting the current bid and bidder then wait 10 seconds and refresh the page… oh look! Instead of having 20 seconds left for the same item it now has 40 (and also has the same bid and bidder). That’s the first clue.
Scrolling down further you’ll see quotes from Wired, New York Times and BBC but if you Google for those reviews you’ll find none. That’s the second clue.
Going back to the Channel 9 News page, click on one of the links (i.e. the menu bar, click on US, World, Business, etc.) and you’ll promptly be taken to BidFan’s website. Clue three.
By now you probably do not need additional information to come to the conclusion that this site is a potential internet scam but on the Channel 9 News page, towards the bottom, are comments. It states 10 of 177 comments but there is no way to view any other comments and also it says Julie Ayers reports. Google her name and the first result is a link to a report on another internet scam.
If that’s not enough to convince you go ahead and create an account. Afterwards it’ll tell you that you’re one step away from bidding, all you have to do is buy a Bid Package (125 bids at $75 or 250 bids at $250). Why do you have to pay for bids up front? That goes against all other auction sites that I am familiar with.