Ralph’s Place

In the last 2 weeks I’ve learned a valuable lesson about backing up data. We all know we should do it, we all occasionally think about it. Sometimes, if we’re lucky (and smart) we even make the odd backup, but all too often the hassle and time involved mean it gets put off until another day.

It’s funny how it takes the realisation of our mistakes to really make a lesson hit home. I made a mistake, in fact I made quite a few. Every time I thought to myself “I should probably back these up sometime soon” and didn’t, that was a mistake.

About 2 weeks ago, my computer ground to a halt, shut down, then failed to boot again. It turned out that this was because my hard drive had failed. Music.. photos.. files.. all gone (or at least held inaccessibly where only some expensive recovery work can get them).

My last full backup? Never. Music - about 18 months ago. Photos - about a year.

Luckily many of the most important photos to me will also be on Caroline’s machine, so I should get some of them back. But some are lost forever, along with other pretty irreplaceable stuff like my climbing route log.

So.. as I said before, I’ve learned a lesson. My external drive was out today, and I’m set up and ready to clone my drive weekly. There’s plenty of software out there to help, it just takes a bit of effort up front to get on and do it. Don’t make the same mistake I did…

For Mac (if you haven’t got Time Machine like me) I’d recommend SuperDuper. It’s free, or you can pay for extra features like scheduling backups. For Windows there are a few options, none of which I’ve tried: Norton Ghost or DriveClone are the first 2 that come to mind. Neither are free, but worth every penny I’m sure. There are no doubt some free options out there too, even a scheduled batch file would do!

If you’re anything like me, then dumping the contents of your brain into some sort of list or mind map is something you do quite regularly. Just thought I’d share a clever free tool that I was introduced to recently, which can help you do this quickly

FreeMind

Enjoy!

Taken me a while to get round to it, but the gallery is fixed (used to cut off about 2/3 across the screen) and the recent photos are back on the right hand side of the main page.

Maybe I’ll use them both now.

One of the simplest and most well known equations in the electronics world is that Bigger numbers = Better. 2 gigabytes, or 2,000 megabytes of RAM in a computer, is much better than a mere 256mb and a 2GHz processor could wipe the floor with a 400MHz cpu of old.

However, take that 2GB of RAM and use a rubbish memory management system, then you might barely match the performance of a 512 machine that’s efficient with it’s memory use! Whilst it’s true that 2GB is better than 512meg, that comparison is only true when each is pitched fairly against each other… ie. it’s not the only factor in good computer performance!

The same can be said for the size of the CCD on modern digital cameras. 6 megapixels is, on paper at least, considerably better than 2mp, and a 10 megapixel beast is better still! Unfortunately though, the CCD is just one small component of the camera. And despite what the retailers would have you believe, it’s not nearly the most important.

In fact, the number of megapixels on your camera pretty much only defines how large you can print or view your photos. Simplified, there are about 1.3 million pixels on the average computer monitor (1280×1024), so a photo from a 1.3 megapixel camera could, in theory at least, be viewed at full screen on your average monitor, with no loss in quality. Any more pixels and the monitor must start merging them to render the image, which actually begins to compromise the quality that you see. For viewing on your monitor, the benefits of 6 megapixels over 1.3 are hard to see.

When printing, the difference is easier to see because printing machines work at much higher resolutions. But for most people, printing at 6″x4″, 2mp will be more than enough. A 3 megapixel camera will normally print up to about 7″x5″ and so on.

On the face of it then, the more megapixels, the better the quality. No?

Nope. As I said before, it only affects the size you can print to without seeing any decrease in sharpness. The quality of the photo depends on the camera. Specifically the lense, the focus, the camera settings, conditions and of course, the photographer!

The most important piece of kit (if you ignore the guy operating it) is by far and a way the lense. This is what focuses the image onto the CCD in the first place, and thus what determines the sharpness of the image you get out at the end. That’s why my 3.2mp compact takes much better photos than your 5mp mobile phone. It’s also why a 6mp DSLR produces sharper images than the 8 or even 10mp compacts you can get these days.

It’s probably clear by now, that for you and me, 5 maybe 6 megapixels is more than enough in a decent camera. The only conceivable reason to put that same CCD in a mobile phone though, is that bigger numbers = better in just about everyone’s head. Whilst you and I may know that such a CCD in a phone is comparable to polishing turds, your average consumer will be drawn in by the big numbers and just assume that it’s better.

Essentially, a little more money on the CCD means a lot more sales, even if the pictures aren’t any better at all.

All the time you hear and read about people complaining about things. Everything from a bad customer service experience to being fully ripped off! Almost never though, do you hear praise for a company or service.

Well, right now I want to do just that. I recently signed up for O2 broadband and quite honestly, it’s been about as simple as it could get! (not to mention relatively speedy) The only glitch I had was getting the wireless box delivered, and that’s because I wasn’t in. I called the guys up, they offered to send it to a work address (this was around 3 in the afternoon) and it promptly arrived the next day. To get connected, you just plug it in, and it works. Easy!

Good service. Simple to set up. Quick. …what more could you want?