Apple Backup

I have been thinking of backing up my Apple hard disk contents for the past nearly two years !

It is actually just over two years - I bought the iMAC G5 in early January 2006 !!

The backup options are plenty in a place like Singapore, wherein I could have just walked into Sim Lim Tower or Funan Centre, and purchased the drive. I did try to do that during my last two visits to Singapore, but surprisingly it was not easy. I wanted an Apple-compatible 500 GB hard disk with automatic backup, or pushbutton backup. I must have gone through the websites of Maxtor, Seagate, Lacie, and Western Digital multiple times, before I settled on Lacie. My esteemed Apple-oriented corporate colleagues in Singapore recommended either Hitachi or Lacie. One of them, who works for a computer services company, actually runs a mini Apple data centre and an entertainment centre at his house ! Everything about him is Apple !! So, there was no dearth of hard core technical advice.

However, Lacie was hard to get (atleast the model that I wanted). Once such things do not happen, there comes a time gap when other priorities take precedence. After a few months, I started shopping in Mumbai, and again Seagate was more easily available than Lacie. But Seagate was not appearing to be entirely compatible with Apple O.S., despite some confusing material on their data sheets. I tried Western Digital, but my company’s IT support specialist said that it is not a reliable product.

So, back to Lacie - I finally found what I wanted at two different places in Mumbai simply by what I call aggressive Google searches. Ofcourse, the prices were much higher than the USD pricing, and the Warranty Period was lower than what was stipulated at Lacie website “LACIE”

Some more dilly dallying, and finally here goes the order to a local Apple reseller……who has been diligently following up with me for such a small order !

Let me get the hard disk installed and “commissioned” for backup and then write a story about the new experience. In the meanwhile, I am going to figure out how to use the new “big” storage more effectively as a “photo” and “video” server, as well as partition the same for simultaneous usage with a Windows XP laptop at home.

Have a great weekend folks,

Cheers

Vijay Srinivasan
19 January 2008
Mumbai

Apple Leopard Experience - First Cut

Following from the previous post, I upgraded the memory in the extended slot to 1 GB, that left me with 512 MB extra which I would preserve till I get my next MAC, or give it away to another MAC enthusiast friend. The system profiler showed the upgraded memory, and the machine started working a little faster, I got back my purchased configuration. Hope Apple will refund the expense to me, or repair the motherboard memory for free (which they don’t since the entire motherboard needs to be replaced !).

That done, I upgraded the MAC OS to the Leopard version (OS X 10.5). It was a simple process to upgrade, but that one would expect from Apple anyway. It took a little under an hour, but it went through smoothly. Finally, here’s Leopard on my system, just after a month of its worldwide release !

I checked out most of the features in Leopard. It is indeed an excellent operating system, much better than what was there on OS X 10.4 (Tiger). I was impressed with the “Cover Flow” and “Quick Look” features. I could not use the “Time Machine” since I had no back up disk. I am ordering one next week, so hoping to have the automatic backup facility finally !

However, the Leopard experience was not earth-shattering. It provides a better way of organizing your own stuff, and a much better way to peek into what is there on your system. Miles ahead of Windows XP for sure (don’t know about Vista as yet). The “Search” facility also called as “Spotlight” has been improved in the Leopard version, and it was really cool to save your important searches to the “Finder” tool bar. The ability to see what is residing in your “Documents” folder in a “fan” fashion was uber kool !!

I always wondered about Steve Jobs’ capacity to raise the heat on the Apple crowd and make them pay for every upgrade - hardware or software. It does not happen that easily in the Windows world. For sure, he is a great marketer. One has to just take a look at his beautiful product launches which he does atleast twice a year. The presentation, in itself, is a great piece of customer communication, which continues to awe people all over the world. The Leopard Tour which you can take at the Apple website is a fantastic product tour - even a non-Apple user would be impressed no end. It’s a whole different world, altogether.

In a nutshell, I am not very impressed with Leopard. It’s cool, no doubt. It’s functional. It’s very helpful in organizing stuff. It’s stunning in its visual impact - in its “cover flow” impact. It’s fabulous with its “fan” type of depicting the contents of folders. But, is it something very different from what I was expecting in Leopard - you can’t ofcourse define that, but yes, the answer is “No”. If you can make sense of that response……..

Finally, I guessed it is no use sticking to “Tiger” when “Leopard” has arrived. You have to keep in touch with times, ofcourse. Only it costs a bit, but never mind. Let us progress !

Have a wonderful week ahead folks,

Cheers

Vijay Srinivasan
25 November 2007
Mumbai

Apple Update

It’s almost going to be two years since I bought my first MAC (I have an Apple iMAC G5).

I know of friends who deserted Apple at around the same time and moved to Windows XP, and I also know of friends who moved to Apple after years of Windows experience. My experience with the iMAC has been good, though I have had my share of problems. Generally, the iMAC gets a much higher rating for user experience as compared to Windows XP (I am yet to see the Windows Vista). At office, I use Windows XP like anyone else, and even at home, I have couple of other computers which run Windows XP.

Last week, I noticed something on the iMAC - its speed was considerably slow, I could feel it. It took much longer to even switch users which used to be rapid before. Applications took longer to open. I did not like it, so I decided to investigate.

The first place was the hard disk followed by the memory. There was nothing unusual about the hard disk utilization - it had enough space, so I checked the RAM. Was I shocked ? Yes, I was - to my utter dismay, I found that the memory recognized in the system was 512 MB. The system always has had 1 GB DDR2 SDRAM, from the time it arrived first. I downloaded a memory test application for the MAC called “rember”, and it revealed the same information - that the slot on the motherboard was “empty” and the extended memory on the additional slot was 512 MB.

I thought it was not possible - I recalled the hard disk drive replacement under Warranty coverage by a local Apple ASP, and started wondering whether they did anything to my system. Later I discovered no one could have taken out the chips from the motherboard without damaging it forever. So that angle did not work out. Then I went about finding out whether it is possible to upgrade the extended slot memory to 1 GB - yes, it was possible.

How can Apple make a system with RAM on the motherboard so unreliable ? I really wonder, it has never happened to my Windows systems. Apple also has made it non-upgradeable, being on the motherboard. I talked to couple of Apple ASPs in Mumbai, and finally did a deal with one for the RAM upgrade.

Having read a lot about the new Apple MAC OS X 10.5 (Leopard), I decided to upgrade the O.S. as well, the cost was only slightly higher than the Apple pricing in its online store. I was also astonished as to the availability of all the latest stuff in India at almost the same world prices. This is absolutely great for technology users. Even iPhone is available in the unlocked fashion from the Mumbai electronics market at Lamington Road ! Amazing.

I will write about my Leopard experience soon.

In the meanwhile, have a wonderful weekend.

Cheers

Vijay Srinivasan
24 November 2007
Mumbai

The Charming Dr with the Boyish Grin

It is a warm Saturday afternoon here in Mumbai, India.

I went out to get some stuff for the house and shop for a printer cable, et al……it is not a good idea to lose your printer cable and similar such things while moving houses. It took me several weeks to even think of locating a shop. There is no Funan Centre or Sim Lim Tower in Mumbai, to make things easier. In India, people believe it would be good to deliberately make your life harder (as though it were not already hard enough). So, like all things here, you go on a wild goose chase. I got some hint from my Apple technician, and went looking for the shop. Well, to cut it short, I got the cable for the equivalent of SGD 3 and returned home.

There were several things flashing in my head to blog about this weekend. One was the Pope, the other was about Indian Discipline, or the lack thereof. While I was raking my brain, I happened to remember my friend Dr Wing Lam, take a look at his profile at “Wing Lam
Director, MMIT Programme, Associate Professor”

It was a great experience working with a charming fellow like Wing. I have many fond memories.

When I left Singapore, he gave me this piece of his literary work (I always thought of him as an IT geek). Let me reproduce this piece here, though it is a bit wacky talking about me in particular. I don’t feel shy however !

QUOTE
There have been so many good things said about Vijay in the last few weeks that it is hard to say something unique that hasn’t been uttered in some shape of form already. Instead, what I have done is come up with a little poem that captures my key observations about the man. I just hope the tome of the occasion is not significantly reduced by the cheesiness that is forthcoming, and that sufficient quantities of alcohol have already been consumed that the peom will have been long forgotten about come tomorrow morning.

VJ Corny Poem

He is a man of great vigour, a man of action,
make any kind of statement, and expect an immediate reaction,
when he has a smile on his face, it means it gonna be a nice day,
a growling snarl however, means you had better keep away.

A deep-down intellectual, who ponders over the soul,
A man of all religions, who questions life’s role,
Better not get too deeply involved, with this kind of discussion,
or you’ll need a visit to the hospital, for severe head concussion.

Wearing shirt and tie, he is the thinking lady’s crumpet,
You get what you see, so ladies you can leave it or lump it,
There is no doubt however, he has left his mark on U21G,
Let us remember him, as the smooth hip-swinging VP.

UNQUOTE

That was fabulous poetry Dr Wing ! Amazing !! I am really taken in by your other talents.

I am definitely missing your esoteric company. All the very best in your MMIT recruitment efforts !!!

Have a wonderful weekend folks,

Best Regards

Vijay Srinivasan
23 Sep 2006
Mumbai

From Gateslife to Jobslife

Today, I finally got our Apple iMAC G5 from the repair centre, with a new hard disk replacing the damaged one. Almost all the applications and data were recovered, thanks to a dedicated Apple geek. Since Mumbai has many film studios and digital editing facilities, the number of Apples in Mumbai could easily be the highest in India, and so apparently the Apple skills available in the city are substantial as well.

It has been a problem for me to handle the vagaries of Windows XP on the home laptop for the past couple of months. Given that there is no choice in an office environment where Gates has a stranglehold, I was only too happy to retire for the day with my iMAC. The deprivation of Apple from the life’s routine does have an impact once you are used to the ease of use and elegance of Apple.

Further, some of my Singapore friends teased me as to the predicament of living in India - “I told you so” types. I am sure they will be surprised to learn that I got the iMAC fixed after all - it took around a week and costed approximately S$ 60 ! The hard disk replacement was free due to the existing international warranty. The cost was more for the labour involved in data recovery.

Now, I have commissioned the Apple iMAC at my home, and successfully connected the Airport to the wireless network at home, which I have learnt how to secure with WEP encryption (128 bits). Though there were just two other wireless networks in the vicinity of my apartment complex, I thought that the real “technical” Indian geeks would know how to tap into my PC or Apple for that matter, if I do not take the pains to encrypt my transmissions. Given that there were lots of young people working in the Mindspace Complex, it was a prudent decision, though I did not see any of them using a laptop in the “Cafe Coffee Day” coffee shop, India’s answer to Starbucks. This was surprising to me - in Bangalore, for instance, I saw many of the coffee drinkers surfing the free Wi-Fi internet at coffee shops. Mumbai does not seem to have the same buzz as Bangalore when it comes to IT people and adoption of IT/Wireless Networks either for home or the office. Offices are largely ethernet cable wired.

I am publishing this blog using the Apple Safari browser, which seems to have been recently updated. One of my favourites on the Apple is “Software Update” - I used to keep checking this facility once in 3 - 4 days to see whether Apple has provided updates. This is a much more elegant update facility than the Windows Update tool which is clumsy and non-intuitive.

I now also have iLIFE 06 and iWORK 06 though I haven’t extensively used them - not being a member of .MAC community, and having built my own website (with the help of my ex-colleague Gopi) - not this one you are browsing - I would like to figure out how to use iWEB to publish to my own server site at Bluehost. This is going to be interesting, and avoids some of the complicated tools that I got to learn otherwise, which Gopi often pointed out were actually in his realm of knowledge, and should not be easily learnable, otherwise what is the difference between a geek like him and an ordinary blogger like me ? Right, Gopi ?!

Well folks, I am now at peace with my Apple, though not fully utilising the same as there is a queue to use the same behind me, and would like to explore the intricacies if time permits. In the meanwhile, let Steve Jobs keep us Apple aficianados (Danesh, check the spelling please) busy and expectant. He is one hell of a savvy geek.

All the best for the weekend and the week ahead folks,

Best Regards

Vijay Srinivasan
9th Sep 2006
Mumbai

Apple Life

Late last evening, I looked around the mess of settling down in the new apartment, sent out the kitchen cabinet makers who had been trying to fix the same for the better part of three days (what an inefficiency compared to Singapore), and settled down to set up our iMAC G5. I have to acknowledge that I did pray a bit before switching on, even though the machine arrived in good external condition, having been crated and shipped by the well-known relocation company from Singapore to Mumbai.

I was happy to see the blue screen with our family members’ login names. But once I logged in into my account, something happened.

I got a white screen ! There was the rainbow-coloured spinning wheel, spinning eternally.

I switched off and on again, but just got the white screen with the Apple logo, but no more of the slow spinning grey colour spinning wheel this time before loading the MacOS.

If you have seen my earlier postings on the Apple, you would think I am an Apple wizard of some sort. But no more. I struggled with the Apple manuals, accessed the Apple support website via our PC, and spent almost two hours trying all the techniques listed somewhere or the other.

Then I hit upon the idea of the “Apple Hardware Test”. I ran that, it took almost 45 minutes to complete. The system announced that there is no apparent hardware problem. It is now established that it could only be a software problem.

I called the hotlines in India, Singapore, and the U.S. India and Singapore were closed, with the clear idea that support lines are meant for week days 9 AM to 5 PM, and customers do not really like to use their systems during weekends !

I got through to the U.S. support line, but was made to hold on for nearly 25 minutes in the first try, and another 30 minutes during the second try. Never made it to a live tech support specialist. I thought that Apple would atleast send the call to efficient Indian call centre operators, but no. Nothing seemed to be working.

I was a bit frustrated. I had a lot of work to do on the Apple, having been out of touch with it for more than 2 months. I had lot of plans for the Apple.

Finally, went to sleep on an “empty” apple !

Got up early today and again tried, but no luck. Then I called the Apple iShop in Singapore, and the support person picked up ! He advised me that if you start the Apple with the “C” key pressed while the Boot CD #1 is still inside the DVD drive, then may be it could boot from the CD, and why don’t you try ? If it does not work, you can always bring it into our iShop and we would fix it - no guarantee that your data will be safe though ! Ha Ha !!

It would be a tough thing to carry the Apple back to Singapore, ain’t it ?

Then I struck at the Apple Reseller locator at the Apple Asia website, and browsed through to India and found atleast 3 Authorised Support Providers near my current location in Mumbai.

Well, I am keeping my fingers crossed, and going to attempt my luck with one of these folks tomorrow ! Will keep you all posted on this journey towards Apple salvation.

Now I am back to my efficient Windows XP Professional PC and typing away. Apple is still far away at the Eden Gardens.

Have a great week ahead folks.

Best Regards

Vijay Srinivasan
27 Aug 2006
Mumbai

Back to Normalcy with an Apple

Today the Doctor cleared me to proceed to work with the proviso that travels can only start by March. He just wanted me to be cautious I guess, because he examined me and said that I was doing just fine, and should get into the pool rightaway for some mild exercise. While I have been working from home with two computers staring at me all the time for the past three weeks, it is a good feeling to actually return to office and meet with people every day. There is a lot to be done in the next three weeks than in the first three weeks of the year I guess ! Things are buzzing in the sales team with more energy amongst the team members than was existent in the waning days of December, and that’s the good news !!

Well, I am going to return to the favourite theme of “soul integration” in the near future. I feel not much attention is paid to this topic and the intellectual mafia desists from a serious discussion on the integration of the soul with the spirit. Nor is there an active discussion on the emerging topic of “intelligent design”, which I think is related to the existence of order in the Universe. I have touched on this area in the past, but would like to discuss in a deeper sense soon.

In the meanwhile, my knowledge of my new APPLE iMAC G5 has been enhanced due to the forced usage of its fine features derived from the situation which occurs when you are locked into a room with a beautiful machine. Wow, I don’t honestly think I can bring myself ever to return to Windows with my full informed consent - Apple is way, way ahead of Windows XP, or anything else the Seattle company can bring out — I don’t have to wrestle with my three-year old PC, cleaning it up almost every other day with “Tune Up Utilities”, ensuring Spy Sweeper runs every day, getting alarmed if the Zone Alarm firewall does not come up after booting up, always struggling to ensure that the Symantec Antivirus Live Update works, etc., etc.,

My productivity has zoomed from where it was before (I am only looking at the two system experiences here - not the inherent productivity of humankind), and not only that - the Apple machine has stolen my heart with its wonderful software tools and applications. It is simply the most outstanding personal experience one can endeavour to get. The system never hang once, except actually once when I fiddled around too much not knowing what I was doing.

Well, here comes the advanced story - it was always my concern how to pull data from the Windows XP home PC to the Apple system. Having made a decision that Apple will now be my central nervous system (and that decision was made in the first week of January 2006, before my accidental fall, which in the meanwhile made my acclimatization process with the Apple speedier), I was wondering how do I access my data on the Windows PC. Then I encountered my first serious technical problem with Apple. While I could see the Wireless Broadband Router (Linksys) from my Windows PC, I could not sight the same from my Apple computer. I went really mad trying to solve this problem, fiddled around with the Airport networking on the Apple during late hours (these things always happen late hours, don’t they - pushing midnight further), playing around with the various utilities on the Apple as well as the Remote Desktop Connection utility on the PC, et al. The wonder was my Apple was working fine, I was instantaneously connected to the “Linksys” wireless network out of the box as soon as I switched on the Apple. So, where was the problem ?

Unless I can “see” the Router and the Windows PC from the Apple side (by “pinging”), the three machines are not on the same network. And this puzzled me - I am no technical guy, and I decided to go look for solutions at the Mac Users Forum and other places on the web. But there was no solution to be found. And then, I hit upon an idea, which I think occurs to people on a calcium diet.

I decided to call on help desk of STARHUB, the broadband provider. Surprisingly they gave me a quick and dirty route out of problem - they just said that the problem is indeed beyond their area of expertise and it would be best for me to contact Linksys, and here is their help desk line, please talk to them. Well that was the best help I got. I called Linksys rightaway, and they asked me to describe my problem in great detail and then said here is a website called “Linksys knowledge base” - can you go and search and find the answer by yourself ? Well, I was stumped to say the least. I did search through the knowledge base (technology companies are fond of this term), and found nothing that would help me solve my problem, except that browsing around for an hour enhanced my networking competency !

Well, I went down and fixed some nice Chardonnay and got back after some time with the conviction that Linksys indeed has the solution, they just wanted me to go around the earth to find it in their knowledge base in California ! I called back and now came a sweet woman called Nikki on the line. She pulled up my case, and then spent the next 50 minutes to help me solve the problem step by step. That’s what I call “accurate, efficient, step-by-step technical assistance for the Dumbos”. It worked great !

And what did this Nikki prove to me ? That I was actually connected to somebody else’s network ! Ha Ha !! She said that if “Linksys” appears along with a whole host of other networks when your system searches for wireless networks, that means Dumbos around your house have not given a protective name to their home networks, and ALL Linksys networks will appear just as one “Linksys” including my own. Well, I named my network now, and selected my network only from the Apple, and Bingo - My Apple became part of my home network. Not only that, my Office Notebook PC also got connected to this very same private “Vijay” network. Finally here is my own network with three computers seeing each other and ready to talk.

But then how to talk from Windows to Apple or vice versa ? I fiddled around again another late evening, but to no avail. I kept getting “error 36″ from the Apple when I tried to access the files on my Windows home PC. Then spent a while trying to figure out what to do, finally hit upon the idea of writing an Apple Script - a simple two line program - which I set up on the Apple to access shareable files from the Windows PC. Again, it did give some troubles, but finally worked beautifully.

I accessed all my photo albums, personal files, presentations, etc., from the Windows PC to the Apple. Great ! I felt really good about this achievement.
Well, there is a lot more to write about Apple experiences, and I will do so in the near future. Now, getting ready for the office next week !

Take care, and have a wonderful weekend ahead.

2nd February 2006
Singapore