Archive for October, 2006
An Apple and a Lemon
Oct.11.2006
I was told by a friend of mine that Microsoft would replace any broken XBOX 360 consoles that were purchased before January 2006. I was pleased to hear this. Our new XBOX 360 had died after 90 days of use.
I will compare my experience with defective Microsoft technology to my experience with defective Apple technology.
We had experienced a defective issue with my son’s MacBook Pro. The Sony battery deformed as a consequence of thermal damage. The battery was viewed as defective by Apple. And they replaced it.
I went on the Apple website. I populated the form with the serial number of the MacBook Pro and the serial number of the battery. The Apple site confirmed that the laptop and the battery were eligible for a replacement battery. I then populated my shipping address, pressed submit, and a confirmation email was sent immediately and it indicated that the unit would ship within the next 3-5 business days.
I received the new battery the very next day. Impressive.
The Microsoft experience was quite different.
My wife called the 1-800-4MY-XBOX number and went through the typical chain of automated voice menus. At some point she was put on hold. And she waited to speak to a support person. She told them that the XBOX had stopped working a couple of months after we purchased the unit. The support person told her that they had to troubleshoot the problem over the phone. She told them that the unit did not work. She was asked whether the green light came on. My wife did not know how to respond. The long and short was that I had to call to confirm that the XBOX 360 was indeed a dead console.
When I got home, I made the call and went through the same chain of automated voice menus and then put on hold for a support person.
“Can I have your last name please?”
“Sure. Cleaver.”
“Sorry, what did you say?”
“Actually, I can barely hear you. You are in one loud call centre.”
“Yes. It is busy.”
“Where are you located?”
“I can’t tell you. It is against our policy”
“United States?”
“Yes.”
“But you can’t tell me which state?”
“No. What is your last name?”
I briefly reflected on the irony of having to reveal all my personal information, including my address, to a call centre that has some strange policy about telling me where they are located. Oh well.
“Cleaver.”
“Can you spell that?”
“C-L-E-A-V-E-R.”
“Ok. First name?”
You get the drill. I spent the next few minutes telling her my name, address, city, postal code and telephone number. Several times because she could barely hear above the din of this call centre located somewhere in the United States.
“Can I get the last four digits of your credit card?”
“Why?”
“So that I can authenticate you.”
“Why?”
“I have to.”
“My wife called earlier. I have a reference number.”
“Oh. Okay. That will do.”
So I provided her with the reference number. And then we got into the heart of the discussion.
“What is the problem with your XBOX 360?”
“It does not work.”
“Does the green light come on?”
Boy, these folks at Microsoft have some kind of obsession with that green light.
“No. The unit is dead.”
“Can you plug it in please?”
“Haven’t used it for seven months. And the reason why I stopped using it was because it stopped working. The unit is dead. No green lights. No yellow lights. No red lights. Nothing.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes quite sure. I tried to reboot the XBOX 360 but I couldn’t find Ctrl-Alt-Delete.”
I sensed my feeble attempt at humour was not working. So I started asking questions.
“How much longer is this going to take? I have been on the phone for over half an hour.”
“Not much longer. Please hold.”
At this point in time, dinner was being served in the Cleaver household. And so my wife took over. After all that time and interrogation, we ultimately received this email from Microsoft several hours later:
“XBOX_.X360.NA.00.EN.MVN.MSI.HW.T01.SPT.00.PI@css.one.microsoft.com” wrote:
Dear Xbox Customer: Thank you for contacting Xbox Customer Care. We have received your request for service. Please prepare your console and follow the instructions provided by our customer service department. You will receive an e-mail as soon as the next step in the process has begun. Thank you, Xbox Customer Care Note: This is not a monitored e-mail address.
After providing all that personal information my new name is “Xbox Customer”. I’m not sure what I am supposed to do in terms of preparing the console. Maybe I should be looking for a green light? I guess I will find out once I receive an email as soon as the next step in the process has begun. Only, just how many steps are there in this process?
Apple: simple, efficient.
Microsoft? I guess the email address says it all: XBOX_.X360.NA.00.EN.MVN.MSI.HW.T01.SPT.00.PI@css.one.microsoft.com
Retirement Planning
Oct.11.2006
I received a number of emails asking for resources on retirement planning.
The web offers extensive resources on retirement planning. My favourite online planning tool is BMO’s Investorline retirement planner. You will need an active account to use the tool. The other major banks and insurance companies offer similar tools. Diane McCurdy, author of How Much is Enough?, offers an online tool here. Even the government of Canada has an online planning tool. I keep going back to Investorline.
I have read over 50 books on retirement planning. From Bach’s Smart Couples Finish Rich, to Eisenberg’s The Number, there is no shortage of books to help you pull together a plan.
If you are relatively new to planning and investing, Bach is a pretty good bet. He offers a Canadian version of his financial planning books.
Digital Photography Workflow
Oct.11.2006
Looks like some of you struggle with a decent workflow for your digital photographs.
The book that I found really helpful for managing workflow is Tim Grey’s book: Photoshop CS2 Workflow — The Digital Photographer’s Guide.
For serious photographers only. Grey assumes that you use Adobe’s Photoshop CS2 and Camera RAW. He presents a comprehensive approach to image processing after the initial exposure. Highly recommended.
For the casual photographer? Get a Mac and use iPhoto. Workflow is very straightforward with this tool and it is hard to beat iPhoto’s ease of use.
Windows Vista RC 1
Oct.10.2006
I installed Vista’s Release Candidate 1 Build 5600.
I had two major issues with the install: networking and product activation.
Internet access just would not work. It took several hours with Google, on another computer, to find out that the new TCP/IP stack has a few required “tweaks”. So, after hacking the network settings, I was able to get network access.
However, product activation, that wonderful new feature which ensures that no person can ever run an “illegal” copy of Windows, would not activate.
Someone already has my key.
I have 10 days remaining before my Windows machine shuts down.
Joy.
Thanksgiving
Oct.10.2006
The long week-end. Turkey. Family. And more turkey.
When I wasn’t eating turky, I was working on two major activities: the Arizona photo shoot and the retirement plan.
The Arizona trip resulted in roughly 1,500 frames. I shoot RAW which means that each image is about 16 Megabytes. I get 120 frames per 2GB card. Roughly 25 Gigabytes of storage for the Arizona shoot.
When I travel, I carry a 100GB external hard drive. The images get downloaded from the Nikon to a laptop and and then backed up on to the drive.
When I get back to my office computer, my first step is to take all the RAW files and burn them to DVDs. Critical step. I now have my digital negatives secure.
I have a Terabyte of storage for my digital photos. And I keep a simple directory structure: one folder keeps a chronological collection of RAW images, the other keeps a chronological collection of processed images.
I use Adobe’s Bridge as my image management software. With digital photography, I find it absolutely essential to manage the data. I have tens of thousands of exposures on disk. And I fully expect to go into the hundreds of thousands. I know of photographers who manage into the millions.
I also spent time updating the retirement plan. This took a major effort as I plotted scenarios and performed various forms of analysis against the data.
I am targeting retirement in my mid-fifties. And I have to assume 30 years to draw from capital. The good news is that we have prepared well. I have been tracking progress of my portfolio since I turned forty. I turn fifty next year. I am currently ahead of plan.
During my planning, I referenced numerous websites on retirement. I came across several sites that focused on early retirement. Silly me. I thought early retirement was 55. There are folks who called retirement in their 30s.
Most of the sites were quite negative about work. “Wage slaves” was the term most often used to describe those who choose to work.
No doubt that debt and consumption requires an income. However, work also provides an opportunity to build character through discipline and effort.
But what happens when you stop being a “wage slave”? Candidly, I expect to be just as engaged in life as I am now. The only difference is that I will have more control over my calendar during the week.
It was wonderful to spend time with family. I enjoyed having my two oldest children home. I do miss them when they are away.
The Number
Oct.06.2006
The National Post has been writing a series on the Boomer effect. In today’s paper they cover needs at retirement.
Basically, there are three ways to get a high-level snapshot of what you might need to fund your retirement:
1. Take your retirement age and add two decimal places. The result is an approximate amount per year for each $100,000 invested. For example, at age 55, you would receive $5,500 per year for each $100,000 invested in retirement savings.
2. The twenty times method. Determine your required annual income at retirement, subtract your pension and multiply by 20. The result is the investment capital required in retirement. For example, if you need $80,000 per year in retirement and your pension will provide $30,000 per year, you have a gap of $50,000. To fund that gap, multiply by 20. A mere $1 million will look after the difference.
3. Quick and dirty method is to take your invested assets and multiply by 0.04. This provides how much investment income you can expect each year. Add in other income sources, such as your pension, and you will gain a picture of your ability to spend in retirement.
Obviously, a defined pension plan can really help. Otherwise, the investment required to fund a reasonable retirement is pretty substantial. I would not want a pool of capital less than $1 million. But it looks like Boomers are poorly prepared.
A recent study by BMO Financial Group found that only 28% of Boomers have investments worth $100,000 or more. One in five have no savings at all. 73% still carry debt.
Windows Vista
Oct.05.2006
I loaded up Vista RC1 on my test machine. I like it. Much faster than the previous beta. But I have noticed a real disturbing change to the UI: inconsistent standards.
Office 2007, Vista’s Windows Explorer, Windows Media Player 11 and Internet Explorer 7 all use different models of presenting their interface to the user. Some use button bars. Some lose the menu bar entirely. I found myself wondering how on earth the same company could drive so many different models of interfaces.
Microsoft outlines its design goals for Office 2007 here.
In previous releases of Microsoft Office applications, people used a system of menus, toolbars, task panes, and dialog boxes to get their work done. This system worked well when the applications had a limited number of commands. Now that the programs do so much more, the menus and toolbars system does not work as well. Too many program features are too hard for many users to find. For this reason, the overriding design goal for the new user interface is to make it easier for people to find and use the full range of features these applications provide. In addition, we wanted to preserve an uncluttered workspace that reduces distraction for users so they can spend more time and energy focused on their work. With these goals in mind, we developed a results-oriented approach that makes it much easier to produce great results using the 2007 Microsoft Office applications.
However, these goals are not consistently applied to other Microsoft apps. You can see how different these various models are here.
Sigh.
25 Worst Tech Products of All Time
Oct.04.2006
Here is a link to the 25 worst technology products of all time. Some of the ones I most remember:
- Windows Millennium Edition aka Windows Mistake Edition — I ran every version of Windows except this one
- Microsoft Bob — did anyone at Microsoft actually ever use Bob?
- Internet Explorer 6.0 — singlehandedly created an industry for anti-virus software companies
- dBase IV — slow and buggy
- IBM PcJr — remember the Chiclet keyboard?
- IBM Deskstar 75GXP aka “the Deathstar” — the hard disk that kept on failing
Tier IV
Oct.04.2006
I had the opportunity to tour a private Tier 4 data center earlier this week. One of the first and one of the largest to open in Canada. Very impressive.
Data centers fall into two main categories: private and public. A private data center is managed by the organization’s own IT department, and it provides the applications, storage, web-hosting, and e-business functions needed to maintain full operations. Public data centers provide services ranging from equipment colocation to managed web-hosting. Clients typically access their data and applications via the internet.
Data centers are built with carefully engineered support infrastructures:
- Power supply and backup
- Cooling and environmental control
- Fire and smoke systems
- Physical security
- Connectivity to outside networks
- Network Operations Center
- Cabling
- Grounding
The more “mission critical” the application is, the more redundancy, robustness, and security required. Data centers can be classified by Tiers, with Tier 1 being the most basic and inexpensive, and Tier 4 being the most robust and costly. According to definitions from the Uptime Institute and the latest draft of TIA/EIA-942 (Telecommunications Infrastructure Standard for Data Centers), a Tier 1 data center is not required to have redundant power and cooling infrastructures. It needs only a lock for security and can tolerate up to 28.8 hours of downtime per year. In contrast, a Tier 4 data center must have redundant systems for power and cooling, with multiple distribution paths that are active and fault tolerant. Access should be controlled with biometric readers and single-person entryways, gaseous fire suppression is required, the cabling infrastructure should have a redundant backbone, and the facility can permit no more than 0.4 hours of downtime per year.
Tier 1 or 2 is usually sufficient for enterprise data centers that primarily serve users within a corporation. Financial data centers are typically Tier 3 or 4 because they are critical to economic stability and must meet higher standards set by government. Public data centers that provide disaster recovery / backup services are also built to higher standards.
The data center that I toured was certainly world class and state-of-the-art. An impressive technical achievement.
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