datacrush.info

This is a small portable wireless travel router from Linksys. It comes with 802.11b/g support and has a nifty HTTP based administration console.

I’m on the road probably 300 days out of a year, and most places that I stay in don’t have a secure Internet connection. If I discount the possibility of some demon spawn system administrator (like one whom I met in Malaysia) capturing every bits of my data, I’m only looking at securing my wireless transactions.

For the past 6 months, I’ve been running on unencrypted wireless connection in my hotel. One day I helped another guest with connectivity issues, and had a glimpse of his Windows desktop. That’s when it came to me. Anyone could intercept my wireless connection. I’ve known it all along, but just didn’t care.

For a while now, if I want to secure my Internet connection, I can start an encrypted VPN session to Japan and then redirect the connection to anywhere in the world. Anyone who attempts to track my IP would recognize me as a Japanese user, and my data is encrypted along the day. The only problem with this method is that I’d be wasting bandwidth halfway across the planet.

So I bought me one of these.

Linksys Travel Router WTR54GS features WEP, WPA, and WPA2 encryption. Unless you have old equipment lying around, there’s no reason to use WEP. It also has DHCP, DNS, NAT, and MAC filtering capability.

Now, being small and portable doesn’t always guarantee everything is as smooth as whip cream on lemon ice box pie. The VPN pass-through seems to have issues with Cisco client at the moment, and the HTTP based management console is horribly slow. What ever happened to Telnet based management?

So, with this router, I can easily hook up to a wired Ethernet port in my room and after some minimal configuration, I can rebroadcast the LAN over a WPA secured wireless. Sweet nibblets!

I like computers, I really do.

Back when I was in high school I used to fix school’s computers whenever necessary. Sometimes the teachers would invite me to their homes so I could fix more computers. As proud as I was of my wizardry, I hadn’t learned the most basic rule in providing technical assistance. I was a rookie committing the novice’s mistake.

I can think of a few reasons why techies wouldn’t want to help fix the average Joe’s computer, three of which I would discuss today.

1. The first reason, and also the most basic rule in providing technical assistance is that most people are stupid and those whom aren’t are probably dumb. They rely on the top few percentage of the human race to keep them entertained with movies, music, and Internet. They like techies to configure and fix their computers for them, but when things go horribly wrong they blame it on the last person that touched their machine.

2. Secondly, some people would take credit for something that they rely on techies to do. They make themselves look good while labeling us techies as indentured servants seeking their wise command and direction. We techies share our expertise for two reasons: Making the world a better place, and hard cold cash. We don’t do it for some dork who would show off in front of girls as if he did it all by himself (and I had a dorky colleague whom did it all the time).

3. The third and most important reason is that things are not always what they seem. Something so trivial could turn out to be more than a techie would want to spend his extra time on. Once there was this guy I met in a hotel I was staying in whom couldn’t connect to the Wi-Fi. It was such a simple thing to configure, except that he was using a non-standard Wi-Fi client, and he wanted to remain that way. Things could have been so much easier had he chose to revert to Windows network client, instead of fiddling with technology that wasn’t in his league. If you want to use something non-standard, don’t cry for help. You just have to figure it out for yourself like the techie you wannabe.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I still enjoy helping people solve their computer problems. Once in a while I would encounter a challenging problem, something that stirs my curiosity and is worthy of my attention. The feeling of being able to help someone behind the counter solve their computer problem is fantastic!

Yet it’s like a techie friend of mine said, “Computers are evil and humans are unpredictable.” Enough said.

Imagine. It was Friday morning on a cold icy day. You got into office, booted your laptop and executed a Windows program. Then your laptop stopped responding.

You tried Alt+Crtl+Del. Didn’t work. Tried the mouse. No luck there either. You picked-up the laptop and suddenly it shut down on its own. You pressed the power button and power indicator came alive for a couple of seconds before it died. Then you removed the battery and left only the power cable intact and tried again. The power indicator flashed and disappeared. There wasn’t any fan noise coming out of the laptop.

That’s when Dr. McCoy spoke. “He’s dead, Jim.”

So shall it be pronounced dead. As ashes to ashes and dust to dust, so it is silicon to silicon and carbon to carbon. God bless the circuits!

What would you do then? If you’re in that situation or going to be in one, here’s a tried and proven wisdom.

…

If the dead machine is a bulky one such as a Dell Inspiron 9100, the burden of all beasts, quickly perform your laptop burial rites and get over it. Then armed with a credit card (preferably not yours) head out straight to CompUSA and get a MacBook Pro. Long live Apple!

You’ll get at least 2.16GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 4MB level 2 cache in a sleek, sweet, smooth Apple notebook casing. If it comes with 1GB RAM, upgrade it to 2GB and never look back.

And it really doesn’t require that much memory, because unlike Windows, you don’t need to run demanding anti-virus process in the background. Speaking of which, McAfee does a better job than Norton, but they’re both consuming. Just so you know, Windows is the real virus.

MacBook Pro comes with at least 2 USB 2.0 ports and FireWire, and it’s got built-in Wireless, Bluetooth, video camera, and ambient light sensors on backlit keyboard. It’s just the sexiest machine ever built. You’ll also get ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 with 256MB of GDDR3 SDRAM on 2.33GHz machine configuration.

…

Just imagine waking up the next morning, having coffee while checking e-mails on your MacBook Pro and your laptop doesn’t burn your crotch anymore. Well, no more than a Dell laptop with explosive Sony battery that is. Anyway, all laptop burns. Literally. Plus, at that point Microsoft becomes optional, and so is your girlfriend or boyfriend. MacBook Pro is way cuter.

You have not known a machine until you’ve touched a MacBook Pro. It smells great out of the box. It smells even better when you turn it on, and let some electric through its circuits. There’s nothing like the smell of electrified microprocessor; probably as good as the smell of grass after rain in springtime.

Using Windows is not geekish anymore. Everyone hacks it. Get a Mac for a change, and be distinct from those whippersnappers.