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Recently I was in need of some CCTV for the home, I had a few choices on this, such as buying a complete kit for £300 which comes with 4 camera’s and a base unit to record everything. As I already have a Synology NAS Box which comes with Synology Surveillance Station, a feature to connect an IP camera and record 24/7, I thought why not buy myself a IP Camera? Looking through the list of supported camera’s, on that was listed was FOSCAM. The next stage was to figure out how much to spend and which one to buy.
Posts in category Review
Foscam FI8905 IP Camera
Dynamode 2.5inch HDD SATA Caddy
Recently after fixing (or failing to) the last laptop, the person asked me to get him a caddy to house the 2.5″ sata drive so he could at least access all of his data, my goal then was to spend the least amount while still providing a half decent case. The problem with most of the online stores was the fact that once you added the item to your basket, even though it was very cheap, the price doubled with the postage added on. After some searching I came across Kenable and they had a 2.5″ sata enclose for £3.69 the postage was as low as £1.99 using royal mail. I in fact ordered two of these, one for myself as I have some spare 160GIG sata drives hanging about.
Kingston DataTraveler 108
Recently I had to stock up at work on USB Flash drives, the capacity was not so important and the main aim was price I guess. I spotted the Kingston DataTraveler 108, the price was a s chap as the rest of the 4 GIG flash drives and it looked tiny. We bought five of these and I gave one a run through once it arrived.
Statcounter – Free website stats
If you ever wondered how many people have visited your site, what they clicked on, searched for and so forth then one such solution is StatCounter which can place an invisible counter on your site and track what people are doing. The Service is free but you can buy extra space for logs and so forth if you need more detailed stats. Installation requires you have a piece of code on your website (normally the footer) or you can add a wordpress plugin which will do the job for you.
HP Premium Digital Headset (XA490AA)
I noticed my previous Logitech Headset which I used for all voice comms (Skype and such) was still working, the foam had started to rip, this meant it was time for a new headset. I went to my local Tesco store and by chance noticed they had some HP Premium Digital headset for £25. I checked out the box and noticed it was USB, this was good as I prefer USB to jacks for headphones. I questioned myself would it be any good, will the noise stay in these one’s or escape like the last set I Bought. Would the microphone be good or some cheap low quality thing these things often have. I took a chance on the grounds if it was bad, I would take it back.
StarTech 1.8in USB to Micro SATA Hard Drive Enclosure
If you have a spare 1.8inch drive hanging about with a micro SATA Connector, it is handy to place this into a external case and use it as a spare drive. The case comes in a box which includes the instruction manual, some extra sponge bits for smaller drives, a screwdriver, a USB Lead, a pouch and the case itself. Size wise it is 96mm x 60mm x 12mm, so you can see it is very small indeed.
NetWorx – Free Bandwidth Monitoring and Usage Reporting
NetWorx is a simple and free, yet powerful tool that helps you objectively evaluate your bandwidth situation. You can use it to collect bandwidth usage data and measure the speed of your Internet or any other network connection. NetWorx can help you identify possible sources of network problems, ensure that you do not exceed the bandwidth limits specified by your ISP, or track down suspicious network activity characteristic of Trojan horses and hacker attacks.
The program allows you to monitor all your network connections or a specific network connection (such as Ethernet or PPP) only. The software also features a system of highly customizable visual and sound alerts. You can set it up to alert you when the network connection is down or when some suspicious activity, such as unusually heavy data flow, occurs. It can also automatically disconnect all dialup connections and shut down the system.
The incoming and outgoing traffic is represented on a line chart and logged to a file, so that you can always view statistics about your daily, weekly and monthly bandwidth usage and dialup duration. The reports can be exported to a variety of formats, such as HTML, MS Word and Excel, for further analysis.
Locate your Dell Service Tag
If you work in a company that has a lot of Dell computers and you are tasked with going around to get all the details, this is easy enough for the desktop as this is located in an easy to get at place but Laptops in docking Stations are a real pain. I came across this Utility which will not only display the service tag and the Express code (needed when you call up dell support) but also a link to the drivers and the warranty pages.
Playstation Move Starter Pack
I had been looking at buying the Playstation Move starter pack for some time and it was either out of stock or the price was too expensive. When the VAT went up in the UK to 20% – most retailers seem to be selling this now for £50 upwards and for some reason, I was not happy to pay that price. While out shopping today, I happen to notice one box for sale in my local supermarket (Tesco) going for £40. I bit the bullet and bought the Pack – would I be happy with what I had just bought or would I regret chucking money at some sort of gimmick device?
iPad review – the first few days
While this review is technically a year late – the iPad is not a new device and most people have probably seen one, tried one or actually own there own. The purpose of this quick review is to give a viewpoint of someone who had no interest in anything Apple including the iPad and even stating that I could not see a reason to go out and buy one. As you may know from the previous post, I managed to enter a competition GFI were running over the Christmas season and was the lucky winner. As I only had device a few days, it maybe is not a fair review so far, but as I said, it is a first impression of this magical device apple like to call it – does it live up to the hype?
