HPM276nw

I needed an office printer to scan & print, with a document feeder so I wouldn't have to stand in front of it. AirPrint support would be nice, but not essential.

 

I have always preferred laser to inkjet (generally for cost, speed and longevity reasons), which although up front costs more in the long run is easier and cheaper. I ended up buying the HP M276nw. What a great printer! Its not the cheapest, but setup and configuration was straightforward, and it has a direct scan-to-email feature, which I can PIN lock so that unauthorised users cannot scan things pretending to come from me.

 

My iOS devices can see it natively and it advertises itself as a Bonjour service, so configuration is literally non-existent.

 

For the price, excellent features!

Porting in 15 minutes

So back in South Africa, we're used to a number port taking a day or three, and usually failing or breaking. We've all heard the horror stories of the number in limbo, where the port failed or didn't go through. Not having personally experienced that, and ported twice, I was curious to see what the US experience was like.

 

I had initially taken out a T-Mobile voice and data service, having found their rates to be really good ($50 for unlimited voice, data and text) and more importantly, having a flat $10 service for unlimited land line and SMS to South Africa. But, their coverage in and around Silicon Valley has been average to mediocre, and often I would be without signal when deep inside a shopping centre, restaurant or building.

 

I decided to port to AT&T,  who have a mobile share plan which I decided to use. What a great experience - the porting that is. 15 minutes, all done :-) Now that is slick.

Bank accounts and car leases

So, a tale of good service, and a story that has an undecided ending. 

 

We opened up bank accounts with Wells Fargo, in the Mountain View downtown. The process, while requiring a lot of processes, was painless and made effortless by the very gracious bank staff. Although it took 2 hours, we left the bank with debit cards and cheque books, ready to transact as locals.

 

On the car front, things are a little shakier. We rented a Chevrolet Suburban, probably the largest SUV I've ever seen. It's the vehicle on the right in the picture below, taken at a stop at the local Sunnyvale market.

 

I had arranged to purchase two Volvo's before we left South Africa, an XC60 and an S60. The pick up of the XC was flawless; its a great car, very comfortable and the handover was very efficiently done.

 

The S was a similar experience, until I parked it after driving it. As I got out of the car, I noticed scratches on the bumper, which I hadn't caused.

Then, after a closer inspection, I noticed scratches on the textile B pillar of the vehicle, which I again didn't cause.

The dealer has been informed, so lets see how they deal with it and rectify the situation.

 

As an aside, we've also had a lot of fun taking the children to park's, which are plentiful and very well equipped. The kids are loving them :-)

Moving to Silicon Valley, California!

So, if you're wondering why this blog has been a little quiet, its because my wife and I have been executing on a rather bold plan; a move to Silicon Valley!

 

Work starts tomorrow, Tuesday the 3rd of September. I hope to post more as I settle down and get into the swing of things.

Jawbone Up

I'm not much of a health or fitness nut. To be honest, I tend to be rather pedestrian about affairs of health, only really listening when my wife (quite correctly) points out I shouldn't have that next slice of pizza, or to avoid that dread macaroni & cheese (yum!). Combined with both a genetic and extrinsic love of all things sweet and dessert-like, and very low levels of self control when confronted with the possibility of Italian kisses (for those non SA-based, small balls of ice cream generally covered either in chocolate, caramel or both), a fatalistic combination indeed. What you can't measure, you can't control.

 

Enter the Jawbone Up. In a word, I now have visibility in my movement during the day, how I'm sleeping, and a series of reminders and hints that effectively force me to think about my food intake (note, I said think, not necessarily dictate), and to provide some data and insight. I can highly recommend it!

The last HTC phone that anyone will care about

HTC was a credible, solid device manufacturer that not only made great hardware, but paired it with its customisations of Android that in past years made Android a credible option for business users rather than a geeks wet dream. But it feels like someone sucked out all the energy and dynamism out of HTC, and threw it into Samsung. Now don't get me wrong; Samsung, while they make great hardware, make some god awful UI's and add (in my mind) almost no tangible value to the Android ecosystem rather than numbers.

 

But you have to face reality; HTC is haemorrhaging its senior executive team, and despite announcing it before the Samsung S4, has delivered the HTC One it to market in most markets later (sometimes by days, but often by weeks) than its feared rival. So is this the last great phone HTC makes ? I hope not, but fear it is.

 

Onto the merits of the phone!

 

• Its gorgeous to hold in your hand, and feels so well built and less plastic than its rival
• Those stereo speakers are truly amazing - no more tinny noise, thanks to those Beats-inspired additions
• HTC Sense 5 is truly a breath of fresh air, providing a great skin on top of Android

But I'm afraid its not all roses :-(

 

• The battery life is miserable - try running out of juice (properly) by 4PM in a business day
• The lack of a large Calendar widget is a dreadful omission, given that its been there in almost every prior device
• The design gives the hint that its not life-proof compared to its rivals

 

I like it; enough to make it my primary ? Lets run the battery a bit longer and see. But if it continues to be miserable, no.

Nokia Lumia 920 (aka the peak of irrelevance)

I tried a Nokia Lumia 920 this week. Its well built, solid (I could use it as a traditional weapon its so damn heavy), and the unit I played with was a deep red (and came with a luminous yellow inductive charging pad). Quite eye catching.

 

LIke the Blackberry Z10 I played with a while ago, the Windows Phone has some great features. Its super responsive, the graphics are gorgeous, and its quite quick to get going. But, it doesn't take long for the Microsoft-ism's to come shining through. All the built-in apps only integrate with Skydrive; sorry Google Drive and Dropbox users, you're stuck. And Google users, there's no social networking, search, browser, Earth or maps. There's nothing. Unlike the Blackberry, this platform has been around long enough that if those applications were ever going to make it over, they'd have been there by now. The fact that they're not, indicates that they probably won't ever be.

 

And thats sad, because this could have been a great contender.

 

Emphasis on could have been. Adios, Nokia & Microsoft. It was, respectively, a great (Nokia) and fucking goddamn awful (Microsoft) 20 years in the mobile industry; by hitching the two horses together, they'll just drown faster.