David Pollitt

RIM Ending development of 4.x OS in favor of 5.x

// April 29th, 2009 // View Comments // Blackberry

According to sources familiar with the situation(hey o) RIM has ended internal development of the 4.x series of their operating system. What this means is that we will likely see far fewer leaks for the time being, while they ramp up testing on the 5.x OS.  I’m all for dropping the 5.x series sooner rather then later.  It should bring many of the Storm only OS features to other devices as well.  Plus from what I’ve heard quite a few other nice additions.
Source: Crackberry.com Forums

-DPollitt

Blackberry Software updates using Windows 7

// April 28th, 2009 // View Comments // Blackberry, Windows

After Windows 7 Beta 1 came out many people were experiencing issues with OS updates on their Blackberries.  Most would end up temporarily bricking their phone till they did the full restore.  Now user bmerdinian via the crackberry.com forums has found a solution for us all.

Apparently the following fix applies to both Windows Vista and Windows 7.  I have been updating my Storm via Vista since the first leak came out, and have had no issues.  So for me at least, I’m just using this fix on my Windows 7 install.

Method 1

-Click Start, and type “device manager” in the Start Search box.
-Click Device Manager in the Programs list.
-If you are prompted for an administrator password or confirmation, type your password or click Continue.
-In the Device Manager dialog box, expand Universal Serial Bus controllers.
-Right-click USB Root Hub, and then click Properties.
-In the USB Root Hub Properties dialog box, click the Power Management tab.
-Remove the check from the Allow the computer to turn off this device to save power check box.Repeat steps 1 through 4 for each USB Root Hub listed in the Device Manager.
-Under Power settings, check the ‘USB settings’ -> ‘USB selective suspend settings’ and make sure it is disabled.

-Check Thumbnail, highlited: Open Deivce manager, Double click on Universal Serial Bus controler at teh bottom, Double Click USB Root Hub, Click Power Management on top right, Uncheck Allow Power…

Method 2

-You can disable the USB Selective Suspend feature as a workaround by editing the registry. The USB device may become unresponsive because of a rare issue in the Selective Suspend feature. The Selective Suspend feature suspends the USB device to efficiently maintain battery power by enabling the computer to turn off the USB device. However, sometimes this feature may not correctly wake up the USB device. Therefore, the USB device is unresponsive when you try to use it.
You might want to disable this feature for server products where power management is not important or required.
-To disable the Selective Suspend feature, follow these steps:
-Click Start, and then click Run.
-Note If you are running Windows Vista, click Start, and then use the Start Search box.
-Type regedit, and then click OK. Registry Editor opens.
-Locate and then click the following registry subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrentControlSet\Servic es\USB
-If the DisableSelectiveSuspend registry entry is present, double-click it. If it is not present, create the entry. To create the entry, follow these steps:
-On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD.
-Type DisableSelectiveSuspend, and then press ENTER.
-On the Edit menu, click Modify.
-In the Value data field, type 1 to disable the Selective Suspend feature, and then click OK.

According to resident experts on the Crackberry.com forums – Updating your Blackberry on Windows 7 is still not recommended.  But hey, it’s a Beta OS, and you are probably trying to install a piece of leaked Beta software on your Berry, so you know how it goes.  Just be ready to do a recovery if you brick your phone.

Source:  Crackberry.com forum thread

-DPollitt

Vlingo for Blackberry Storm and iPhone

// April 10th, 2009 // View Comments // Blackberry, Popular

The other day Keal found this awesome program for Blackberries(and iPhones) called vlingo.  Essentially the software allows you to do accomplish many tasks on your phone using voice commands.  Sure, we are all familiar with voice activated dialing, but how about updating your Twitter or Facebook status using only your voice?  I’ve also found it very handy to create a quick email to myself, using only voice dictation.  Sure, the software isn’t perfect, but it learns from you and over time it becomes more useful and accurate.  Another trick – just say “Google Minneapolis State Capital” and the software automatically brings up a browser with the search term you requested.  Quite handy if you ask me.  The most amazing thing, it is completely free to use this application.  Just head on over to vlingo.com and they will send you a message to download the software.

Blackberry Storm users will have to make a few tweaks to the settings due to the fact that they don not yet officially support this device.  Simply do the following:

Go to Options – Advanced Options – Applications
Highlight vlingo but don’t click.  Press BB (menu) button
Disable Compatability Mode.

Same as above, instead of Disable Compatability mode now Edit Perrmissions,
Scroll down to Interactions, Recording, Set to Allow.

-DPollitt

Artist Point

// April 9th, 2009 // View Comments // Photography, Popular

Artist Point, originally uploaded by dpollitt.

A shot I took out in Yellowstone National Park a few summers ago. Its quite the scene. If you have never been to the Grand Canyon, you could easily mistaken this for it. It was quite a sight.

-DPollitt

My Current Workout Playlist

// April 9th, 2009 // View Comments // Health

I’m not saying its good, but it works for me.  Maybe you’ll get some ideas, who knows.  In no particular order:

-Guns N Roses – Welcome to the Jungle

-AC/DC – Thunderstruck

-AC/DC – Hells Bells

-Jay-Z and Linkin Park – Numb/Encore

-Robert Tepper – No Easy Way Out

-Bob Dylan – Hurricane

-Bill Conti – Gonna Fly Now

-Bill Conti – Going the Distance

-Bill Conti – The Final Bell

-Survivor – Eye of the Tiger

-Survivor – Burning Heart

-Metallica – For Whom the Bell Tolls

-Metallica – Enter Sandman

-Metallica – Master of Puppets

Sharing NTFS with OSX

// April 6th, 2009 // View Comments // OSX, Software, Technology

Recently I gave OSX a shot on my desktop hardware. If you aren’t sure how that is possible, check out osx86project.org. Anyways, this posed a few problems if I wanted to use OSX for any amount of time. My Adobe Lightroom files were all stored on an NTFS formatted hard drive. Out of the box, OSX has no way of recognizing this file system. OSX uses HFS+ and can also read/write FAT and FAT32 drives. It cannot write to NTFS drives without additional drivers. This is where a program named MacFUSE can come in handy. MacFUSE allows you to extend the filesystems that OSX can handle.

The other piece of the puzzle is NTFS-3G. This is a type of connection between MacFUSE and your NTFS stored files.  NTFS-3G is a driver that is freely available and can read/write NTFS to multiple operating systems.  It is fast, safe, and has been tested against Windows XP, 2003, 2000 and Vista.

Using these two mac extensions, I am now able to read/write/delete to my NTFS windows formatted partitons. This includes all of my music, images, and Adobe Lightroom files that I have stored there. Now I can boot up into either Vista or OSX, and still share files between the two. If you are looking for the exact opposite of what I have described here, and you want to access OSX files on Windows, you might want to give MacDrive a try.

-DPollitt