Jamie's Random Musings

My friend Grant recently pointed me to what I think is a very interesting and very under-promoted feature in SightSpeed - the ability to have someone call you on SightSpeed without having to install the SightSpeed software on their computer! Although I had seen this in the Account Information page, it hadn't really occurred to me what it was, and how useful it could be.

Basically what happens is that when you set up a SightSpeed account, there is a link established for you on the SightSpeed "people" server, such that when you are logged in to SightSpeed and anyone goes to that link with Internet Explorer, and allows the download of an ActiveX control, they will then be connected through to you as an incoming SightSpeed call, much the same as from any other SightSpeed user. The call will have most of the capabilities of a "normal" SightSpeed call, including bidirectional video, audio and text, and the quality is very good.

There are a few restrictions on how this works. The biggest is that it only works with Internet Explorer, I suppose because of the ActiveX control that it is based on. Of course, the person calling you needs to know the URL to go to. There are two obvious ways to do this; you can email the link to them, or you can include an icon and HTML code in a web page or blog which takes them to it (a sample icon and HTML code are included on your MySightSpeed page). In fact, SightSpeed creates two links for your account, one of which does not disclose your SightSpeed user name to the other person. Web users, as they are known in the SightSpeed documentation, don't have access to any SightSpeed status information, and the text messaging is only available after a connection is made, so the only way they have to find out if you are online is to try to call.

I find this capability very interesting, and potentially very useful - I can think of a number of situations where it would be quite handy. I wish that SightSpeed would make it more obvious, and promote it in their propaganda. Even after Grant told me about it, I honestly had a tough time finding anything on the SightSpeed web page - I finally found a decent description in the "How Do I ..." section of the FAQ.

jw 30/1/2008

I have heard from friends that Skype has been really struggling with a lot of video problems. So I decided to go back to the Skype forums and have a look, just for the month of January, to see what is being reported. Without making much of an effort (I got tired and depressed with reading every post and looking for multiple reports of the same problem), I counted well over 100 video problems reported this month! Now remember, these are only the people who managed to find their way to the User Forums to ask for help, and based on my previous experience in those forums this is an absolutely unprecedented number for such a short time. It appears that in rushing to get out their much-hyped "High Quality Video", they have managed to completely break the video on such a wide range of systems and configurations that no one is able to get a handle on it. When I was answering questions and giving help on the Skype Forums, we got to know that Skype video had problems with the Intel 915 chipset and Nvidia graphic cards and drivers, for example, and we learned that we could tell people to update to later drivers and the problems would be solved. But now the problems seem to be so varied, and across so many different platforms, that this isn't possible any more. The range of problems is telling (remember, these have all been reported, multiple times, this month):

- Incoming video not working (frozen picture, black window, etc)

- Outgoing video not working (frozen / black)

- Both incoming and outgoing video not working (frozen / black)

- "Start my video" button missing

- No video between Mac and PC

- Colored stripes in video

- Black bars in video (like a jail or cage)

- Video inexplicably comes up in Active Movie window

- Starting video causes extreme audio distortion

Even more telling than the number of problems is the lack of solution for these problems. One so-called "expert" has nothing better to say than "make sure you are both on the latest version of Skype", while another so-called expert says "the latest version of Skype has lots of video problems, try going back to version 3.5" - despite the fact that there are known serious security problems with Skype 3.5. (This is the same "expert" who is soliciting "donations" for such brilliant advice, by the way.)

It has been two weeks since I switched from Windows Vista back to Windows XP Professional on my Fujitsu Lifebook S6510, and two months since I made the same switch on my Fujitsu-Siemens Lifebook S2110. So, I suppose it is a good time for a status update. How is it working? Am I satisfied? Would I make the same decision again?

In a nutshell, yes, I am completely satisfied with both systems. They are both running perfectly with XP, and that is more than could be said about either of them when they were running Vista. As things stand now, I would undoubtedly make the same decisions again. I still have the disks with Vista loaded for both laptops, and when Vista SP1 is finally available (non-Beta), I will load and test that on both of them. I would still like for Vista to be "better" than XP, and I would settle for it if it were even "as good as" XP in terms of speed and stability. On the other hand, XP SP3 is also on the way, so when it arrives I will test it as well. In an ideal world, I will end up with one of these laptops running Vista and one running XP, but I wouldn't bet on that.

Here are some detailed observations about each of the laptops:

The S6510 gets a serious workout, because I carry it back and forth to work every day, use it at home and in the office on port replicators with external keyboard, mouse and display and on the bus/train in between on its own. I use 100 Mb wired ethernet in the office, 1 Gb wired and 130 Mb Wireless-N at home, and EDGE/UMTS/HSDPA cellular on the road. I use suspend/resume most of the time; I doubt if I have done a full shutdown or restart more than five or six times in two weeks, and most of those have been because of software installation or updates. I don't recall that I've had a system crash since loading XP, and I certainly haven't had a BSOD. That might be in large part because I never run Skype on this laptop, but I don't think that is the only reason.

The S2110 has been the real surprise. I was having so many problems with it when it was running Vista that I was convinced that there was something wrong with the hardware. In the two months since I went back to XP, it has been absolutely rock solid. Not one USB hang, which happened daily with Vista, and the only BSOD crashes have been when I was testing Skype video and/or audio (which I have come to expect from that rubbish software), whereas it was crashing on a regular basis when running Vista. I don't carry this one back and forth every day any more, it stays mainly in the office, but I still use suspend/resume every day, and seldom reboot. The truth is, if I had known that the S2110 was going to work this well with XP, I would probably not have bought the new S6510. Ah well, it's not the worst mistake I ever made - the Core Duo CPU, larger screen, and built-in camera and microphone are really nice.

One last thought, specifically about the S2110. Why was it having so much trouble with Vista? Granted, it didn't come loaded with Vista, but it is listed on the Fujitsu-Siemens web page as "Vista Capable" and "Vista Premium Ready", so one would assume that it should work properly. Is this a problem that is common to many, most, or all "pre-Vista" PCs? Or specifically to "pre-Vista" laptops? Or is it because of the AMD Turion 64 CPU and associated chipset in the S2110? I don't know, but I would love to find out!

jw 25/1/2008

I used to spend a lot of time answering user questions and problems on the Skype User Forums. I made over 1,000 postings in just a few months, until I finally started to realize that what we (the experienced users) were doing there was covering up for Skypes ridiculous lack of Customer Support. I seldom go back to read the Skype User Forums any more, because frankly I just find it too depressing. I got a lot of pleasure out of helping people get Skype working, and I certainly don't get any pleasure out of seeing them stuck now. But this evening, out of boredom, I was looking at them a bit, and shaking my head over the fact that there are still literally hundreds of problems being reported for the same old bugs that we were struggling with a year ago. Then I saw something that absolutely shocked me.

One of the "experienced users" who regularly attempts to help with problems in the Skype User Forums is now soliciting "donations" for his assistance, with a line at the end of every posting he makes, something like this:

Get Help ...... Donations Accepted Through PayPal

Now, this has got to be the absolute lowest of the low. Skype is producing a poor product, which crashes itself, other applications or the entire computer at the drop of a hat. They refuse to provide any kind of Customer Support, so desperate users are driven to the Skype User Forums looking for help... and then get hit for "donations", to get their supposedly free program working? I can't imagine how anyone with any sort of conscience could do such a thing.

The AirCard 880 PC Card is one of the latest in the Sierra Wireless line of mobile data communication products. I got mine as an OEM branded product from Swisscom, what they call their "Unlimited PC Card". I have been using these cards from Swisscom for a number of years (since they were first introduced) and it is interesting to see how they have progressed:

- GSM/GPRS/UMTS/WLAN (OEM Option GlobeTrotter card)

- GPRS/EDGE/UMTS/HSDPA/WLAN (OEM Option GlobeTrotter Fusion)

- GPRS/EDGE/UMTS/HSDPA/HSUPA (OEM Sierra Wireless 880)

The addition of protocols mirrors the expansion and upgrading of the Swisscom cellular network, with the most recent improvement being the limited availability of HSUPA service in large cities. On the other hand, the removal of WLAN (WiFi) from the adapter reflects the fact that the vast majority of laptop computers today have integrated WiFi support.

Sierra Wireless also makes Express Card and USB adapters equivalent to the PC Card that I got, which are also offered as OEM products from Swisscom and various other mobile companies in Europe, and an embedded module which is used in the Fujitsu-Siemens Lifebook S6410.

Although Sierra Wireless makes application software for the card, Swisscom provides their own Unlimited Data Manager software. That was good for me, because Swisscom has done a good job over the past few years of merging the software for their various cards, from various manufacturers, and for both Windows XP and Vista, so that now there is only a single version of the software. Because I have kept my laptop up to date with the latest releases, I didn't even have to uninstall/reinstall or otherwise update the software for the new card, I simply plugged the card in, XP loaded the drivers for it, and it was ready to go! Very nice.

Another positive aspect of the Swisscom Unlimited Data Manager software is the "seamless handover", not only between different cellular connections but also to a Swisscom WiFi connection when one is available. I use the card when traveling on the train quite a lot, and it's nice to watch the status change between EDGE, UMTS and HSDPA as we roll across the country, and even to WLAN when we are in some of the large train stations, all without ever losing the connection.

Sierra Wireless says that one of the advantages of the AirCard 880 is faster connection setup, and I can certainly vouch for that. The new card typically gets connected and is ready to use in less than a minute, while the older card often spent several minutes or more thrashing about, displaying "Searching for signal..." and "Working..." before it finally connected.

The nominal maximum data rate of the Sierra Wireless card is 7.2 Mbps. Of course, the actual data rate is going to depend on the kind of connection available. Swisscom has HSDPA (High Speed Downlink Packet Access) available in most of the country now (except for the tiny village where I live...), and is just starting to roll out HSUPA (High Speed Uplink Packet Access) in the large cities. The tests and usage I am describing here were all made with HSDPA connections. Based on tests from a couple of the major VoIP speed test web sites, I generally get about 2.0 Mbps downlink speed, and 1.0 Mbps uplink speed, both of which are slightly faster than I was getting with my previous card. More importantly, the Sierra Wireless card gets a better Quality of Service rating from the speed test sites, which is very important if you want to use the connection for VoIP applications. As I mentioned some time ago, I was never able to make usable audio call with the previous Unlimited Data card, the call was always badly distorted or extremely choppy, or both. With this new card I am able to make voice calls with no problem at all.

As David Meyer mentioned in his blog recently, it is very important to make sure you are on the right mobile tariff. This is particularly true of mobile data contracts. The basic data contracts generally include little or no actual use of the card, and have quite high per-megabyte costs. Deciding between volume-based and time-based contracts can be tricky, so you need to think carefully about not only how much you expect to use the card, but how often. Another thing that you need to watch out for is roaming data rates - they can be astronomical! Swisscom charges 1.00-2.50 CHF/Mb for data beyond whatever your contract includes, within Switzerland. But roaming data (outside Switzerland) costs 14.00/Mb!!!! This can be brought back to a rational charge by adding the "World Data Option", which costs CHF 5.00 per month and reduces the roaming data to CHF 3.00/Mb.

In summary, I am quite pleased with this Sierra Wireless (Swisscom Unlimited Data) card. The connection is fast and reliable, coverage is continually being improved - I seldom see that I have an EDGE connection any more, and more often than not I get HSDPA. I'm looking forward to the first time I see an HSUPA connection. For ordinary web surfing and email it is more than adequate, and I'll be using it more often for SightSpeed voice calls now that the quality is acceptable. It has quad-band GPRS/EDGE and tri-band UMTS/HSPA support. I've used it all over Europe, and consistently gotten UMTS or HSDPA connections, and although I've only ever gotten EDGE connections in the U.S., I've been told that there are areas where UMTS/HSDPA are available, and that should also be increasing.

jw 22/1/2008