Category Archives: Other stuffs

Tech Tip: Freeing Up Space on Your Hard Drive

Note that my desktop PC runs 64-bit Windows 7. This tip may or may not be useful for people running Macs.

My C: drive is a solid state drive. The suckers are expensive compared to traditional drives and come in much smaller sizes. Mine is 224 gigabytes.

I’ve got things set up so that only programs go on that drive. I’ve moved my Documents folder over to my E: drive so when I’m saving files, by default they’ll go there instead of on C. Some programs save data to the C:/Users/xxx folder without asking, and with many you don’t have the option to choose another drive. Lazy programming, I call it.

Anyway, I noticed today that my C: drive was running out of space. I do have a lot of programs installed but even so, I didn’t think I possibly have 210 gigs worth of programs sitting there. I searched through the drive manually (I know there are programs to help with this but I don’t have any).

What did I find? The back-ups for all of my various iOS devices were eating up more than 80 gigabytes of the 224 gig drive. And that was including back-ups for devices I had long since sold off. iTunes doesn’t know you’ve sold something off and no longer need the back-up; you have to manually delete the back-up yourself.

You’ll find the folder in YourName/AppData/Roaming/Apple Computer/MobileSync. iTunes won’t let you move the back-up to another drive and the individual backup folders have “helpful” names like b0d32fecd8d1fb3c8c4efb152f1dc243a2f27798. At least they have timestamps on them, so I figured I could safely delete the old ones.

I have 4 active iOS devices – my gf and I each have an iPhone and an iPad. Fortunately iTunes doesn’t back up everything – that would have destroyed my hard disk. Even so, the back-up for my 128 gig iPad (which has about 80 gigs of stuff on it at the moment) takes up 20 gigs. On the other hand, the back-up of my gf’s 64 gig iPhone took just 600 meg.

I now have just 4 back-up folders there, one for each device, each device newly backed up in the past hour. The total file size has gone down from over 80 gigs to 33; more than 45 gigs of space freed up.

I could “archive” these to another drive and then “restore” them if and when needed. But then every time I go to sync, (which I do almost daily) iTunes will think there’s no backup at all and do a new one and the deleting/archive process takes a little bit of time. I’ve recovered enough space on my C: drive for now, so I’ll let them remain. I’ve got 65 gig free now – also because the last time I created a new Lightroom catalog I wasn’t paying attention and that ended up on my C drive, but that was easy enough to fix.

So anyway, if you’ve ever sold off an iPhone or iPad, find the backup folder and see how much space you can recover this way.

12 Million Americans Think the World is Run by Lizard People

The Atlantic reports on a new poll by Public Policy Polling. They surveyed 1,247 Americans.

Do you believe that shape-shifting reptilian people control our world by taking on human form and gaining political power to manipulate our societies, or not?

And 4% of those responding said yes and another 7% said they weren’t sure. 5% said they think Paul McCartney died in 1966 (add me to that group, and I offer up “Silly Love Songs” as proof) and 13% think that Obama is the Anti-Christ.

Conspiracy	Percent believing	Number of Americans believing
JFK was killed by conspiracy	51 percent	160,096,160
Bush intentionally misled on Iraq WMDs	44 percent	138,122,178
Global warming is a hoax	37 percent	116,148,195
Aliens exist	29 percent	91,035,072
New World Order	28 percent	87,895,931
Hussein was involved in 9/11	28 percent	87,895,931
A UFO crashed at Roswell	21 percent	65,921,948
Vaccines are linked to autism	20 percent	62,782,808
The government controls minds with TV	15 percent	47,087,106
Medical industry invents diseases	15 percent	47,087,106
CIA developed crack	14 percent	43,947,966
Bigfoot exists	14 percent	43,947,966
Obama is the Antichrist	13 percent	40,808,825
The government allowed 9/11	11 percent	34,530,544
Fluoride is dangerous	9 percent	28,252,264
The moon landing was faked	7 percent	21,973,983
Bin Laden is alive	6 percent	18,834,842
Airplane contrails are sinister chemicals	5 percent	15,695,702
McCartney died in 1966	5 percent	15,695,702
Lizard people control politics	4 percent	12,556,562

You can hit this link to read the full text of the questions and a break down and cross-correlation of the answers.

Spotify Comes to Hong Kong

Spotify, the internet music streaming service, has finally arrived in Hong Kong. This is not a bad thing.

As I understand it, the free service allows you to stream an unlimited amount of music to your desktop at relatively low 160 kbps bit rate. If you sign up for their premium service, then you get it at a higher bit rate (320 kbps) and can stream to mobile devices as well. You can stream specific songs, get recommendations, create playlists and access other peoples’ playlists (e.g. celebrity playlists, if that sort of thing is appealing to you).

In the U.S. this costs $10 a month. In Hong Kong, it’s just HK$48 per month – roughly US$6.50. At the moment I have no idea how many songs are available and how the Hong Kong song library compares to the UK or US libraries.

In my case, I can’t begin to tell you how often I’m away from home and a song comes to mind and I want to hear it but it’s not on my phone. (I have over 7,000 songs on my iPhone currently but that’s nothing compared to the 92,000 songs in my iTunes library on my desktop.)

As I said, I don’t know how deep their library is but they do offer a 1 month free trial, so I think I’ll be signing up for that in the next few days.

This is the future. Not Spotify specifically but media in the cloud, accessible any time, from any where (at least as long as you have an internet connection). Why build a collection if you can stream any song or film from the cloud when desired?

Just one note about their web site. If you’re coming to it from Hong Kong, the landing page is in Traditional Chinese. There is no option to change the language. Don’t click on the big green button, click on the highlighted text underneath to get to the home page. At that point you have to scroll about two miles down to the bottom of the page. If you click on the Hong Kong flag, you’ll get a little pop-up showing a choice of 4 additional countries. Click on the line below that, which translates to something like “show all countries” and finally on that list you’ll see Hong Kong (English). But not in English. It says 香港（英語). Without Google Translate I never would have been able to figure this out (yes, I know the Chinese characters for Hong Kong, I even have them tattooed on my arm, but oddly enough I don’t know the Chinese characters for the word “English.”)

Seriously, Spotify? You have to make it that difficult? You couldn’t even include Hong Kong English as one of the top five choices in the pop-up? You can’t list each country in its native language rather than in Chinese?

I’m Now on SmarTone and ….

Having resigned myself to the likely fact that PCCW won’t run a wire to my house for longer than I care to think about, I went and got myself a mobile data account with SmarTone.

First things first, I went to the Wanchai Computer Centre to see if I could buy a 4G USB modem at a cheaper price than SmarTone’s. Turns out the WCC was $100 more expensive. What I did see there, that I hadn’t seen previously, was a 4G Router – you put the SIM card directly into the router, as opposed to the router I bought, that has a USB port that allows one to run it off a USB modem.

At any rate, over to SmarTone to get set up. Their signal seems to be much stronger where I live.

You have to admire companies that use technology well. Go to a 3 shop and you’ll see a bunch of people sitting behind desks typing customer info into computers. Go to a SmarTone shop and the staff are standing at podiums. As for info on a product and they whip out an iPad and show you all the details. Sign up with them and they don’t have to type in all your data – the guy used his iPhone camera to scan my ID card and address proof and then OCR software grabbed the details and populated the form appropriately.

And no paper. I signed the contract with my finger on the iPad. No paper receipt. As soon as I signed and clicked okay, the receipt was emailed to me. Sweet.

So once at home, I got everything set up and saw via SpeedTest that I was getting download speeds of up to 20 Mbps. This is huge for me, because in 5 years in Sai Kung I had an 8 Mbps line (which is all PCCW can give me in Lam Tsuen, too) and of course never got that kind of speed in real usage. Mobile data wasn’t an option at either of the places I lived in Sai Kung because I could barely get a 2G signal let alone 3G or 4G.

Well, it’s not all smiles. Because it took me less than 24 hours to hit the 5 gig mark and get an SMS telling me that for the rest of the month – 25 more days – my “priority to access the network” would be lowered but that they guaranteed that my speed would not go below 128 Kbps. 128k? Be still my bleeding heart.

At the moment (12:18 AM) Speedtest is reporting download speed is roughly 6.5 Mbps, down 50% or more from the speed I was getting earlier today. To be fair, earlier today, my village was probably 2/3rds empty with people at work and now could be prime internet time here, with people doing all sorts of stuff before hitting the sack. And, if I’m in the mood to be fair (actually no I’m not) then I could say that 6.5 Mbps is still double what I was getting with PCCW.

In my opinion, “unlimited data” needs to be “unlimited data without any fine print or asterisks.” The only people who benefit from the so-called Fair Usage Data Policy are the mobile companies; certainly not the public.

And if their networks are creaking at the seams because they couldn’t build fast enough to handle all the demand for streaming High Definition multimedia, is that my fault?

I’d also suggest that they need to adjust the numbers for subscribers who either cannot get a fixed line from PCCW or choose not to do so and are using wireless as their sole means of Internet access. I know, it’s probably a small percentage of users (but probably growing) but that should make it all the easier to provide for them/us/me. And honestly, if it’s a choice between HK$220 a month throttled at 5 gig or pay some higher amount, let’s say an additional 50%, for really unlimited data, I’d pay the extra amount.

Fun With Spam

Gotta love it when I get one of those Nigerian ripoff emails that pretends to be from someone in Hong Kong.

Dear Friend,

I am Dr.John C.C.Chan{JP}a South Korean citizen and one of the Directors of Hang Seng Bank Ltd here in Hong-Kong,i sincerely apologised for reaching you through electronic mail{Email},since all other efforts to reach you proved abortive.

I am making this business-deal offer to you based on strong instincts and believing that you are a honest and a trustworthy person.A customer of our bank who was one of the thousands of the victims of the 2004 Asian Tsunami had made a fixed deposit sum of US$22,500,000 with our bank in a private account and we want to invest this fund now into your present line of business,or into a profitable joint venture with you.

Our board of Directors had officially mandated me to search for the deceased next of kin,as i was his account officer before his death and also since all correspondences to the deceased last known address came back undelivered,i therefore seek your consent to present you to “act” as the next of kin so that we can have this fund paid to your account for investment/or sharing purposes.Upon your acceptance I will get all the legal documents in your favor as I will use my position and office to effect the payment to you via bank to bank wire transfer.Also,i will send to you my official picture I.D’s{International passport and bank I.D} .

To see more of my profile and resume,kindly log on to our official bank web site through this direct link:-

http://bank.hangseng.com/1/2/about-us/directors-organisation/board-of-directors

This business offer is legal as I assure you that this transaction will not for any reason breach local or international laws of both countries. I have secured my end before making this business offer to you, we shall share the funds on an agreed ratio or we co-invest the funds in your country under your management/supervision.

Details shall be forwarded to you as soon as possible upon your positive reply,but it is required that you keep this business offer secret and private,meanwhile send to me now the following:-

-Your Full Names
-Contact Street address
-Your Occupation
-Your age -
-Your nationality
-Your Private e-mail address .

Best Regards,
Dr.John C.C.Chan{JP}
Hang Seng Bank Ltd
83,Des Voeux Road,Central ,
Hong-Kong SAR
China
http://bank.hangseng.com

Not sure why he’s pretending to be Korean though? Chinese name, Chinese bank, Chinese address, Korean? I do appreciate his letting me know that electronic mail can also be called “email.” It’s because he sent me such a useful tip that I’m inclined to believe he is who he says he is. Anyway, here’s my response:

Hi Dr. John,

I’m a big fan of your music. Can we meet for lunch on Friday?

Don’t think anything will come back but you never know.

Bank of America Cheesing Me Off Even More

I posted the following on Twitter:

#bankofamerica sucks. and when I say it sucks, I mean it really seriously truly absolutely SSSUUUCCCKKKSSS

As I expected, they have someone monitoring Twitter and I got a response back from @BofA_help.

I work for Bank of America. What happened? Is there anything I can do to help?

I can’t describe my issue in 140 character bursts, so I sent them a link to the previous blog post. They replied:

Thank you for the follow up. Please DM your name, zip and phone number so we can call you to discuss your concerns in detail.

Except … you cannot send a direct message on Twitter to someone who is not following you. You’d think they might already know this? Apparently not. So I tweeted to them:

I can’t DM you since you’re not following me. you can send me an email at hongkietown at gmail dot com and I will send you the details.

You’ll never guess their reply.

We do not communicate via email. Please DM the requested info so we can call you to discuss your concerns. Thank you.

Holy crap. They don’t use email. So I then had to specifically tell them that they need to follow me so that I can DM them. Five minutes later they finally did that. So I’ve sent the DM.

Now let’s see if they’re willing to spend a dollar to make a call to Hong Kong.

Here’s How Much Bank of America Sucks

Those of us in Hong Kong love to rag on HSBC and sure, they deserve it. But they’ve never screwed me the way that Bank of America has. Here’s what happened.

I have a joint account with my mother with Bank of America in the U.S. I’ve needed the money in this account for my basic living expenses for the past six months. I am unable to initiate wire transfers over the internet from this account so my mother has to go into the branch office and sign the forms so that the money comes to me. It has always come to my account the same day she has sent it.

Until now.

Last week, she went into the same Bank of America branch she always goes to. The guy she sees there, the one who knows me personally and has handled all of the transfers, had the day off. So she goes to another person there who fills out the forms for her.

BofA has never needed the SWIFT code to complete the transaction. It goes through just fine with the bank name and a few other details. But this person took it upon herself to be “helpful” and put a SWIFT code on the form. The wrong code. If you look up SWIFT codes for HSBC, there are dozens, if not hundreds of them. And this person filled in the code for HSBC Investment Holdings Ltd, which is pretty far away from HSBC Hong Kong.

As such, the money left the U.S. but never arrived in my account. 5 days later Bank of America told us that they would inform HSBC and get the money transferred correctly. One week later they have told us that HSBC cannot transfer the money to my account and can only send it back to Bank of America and that they have no idea how long that will take.

Bank of America insists that there is absolutely nothing else that they can do and have helpfully suggested that I should find some more money and transfer that to HK while I’m waiting for this mess to sort itself out.

I know this will never happen and perhaps I am being naive but it seems to me they should say, “We screwed up, we’ll send the money to your account and we’ll sort out the other money when we get it back. It was our screw up and we will do what it takes to make it right.” But of course they’re not going to do it.

In the meantime I have bills that are about to be overdue and a doctor who needs to be paid this week to continue treatments that I need.

My mother wants to hire a lawyer but I’m not sure what lawyer would take this case given that it’s just been a week and, while the money may seem like a huge amount to us, in the grand scheme of things others might see it as a trivial sum.

Either way, it’s been one week. She doesn’t have the money. I don’t have the money. It has vanished into the ether and it could be weeks until this gets sorted out.

The Un-examined Life is Not Worth Living

Click over to The Wrap to see a clip from Bill O’Reilly’s show in which he says, “Thirty-five percent of the Hawaiian population is Asian, and Asian people are not liberal, you know, by nature.”

Omni Magazine Back Issues Are All Online

The Internet Archive now has every issue of Omni Magazine. You can read all of the issues online or download them in a variety of formats, including PDF, EPUB and MOBI. Don’t know what Omni was?

From Wikipedia:

OMNI was a science and science fiction magazine published in the US and the UK. It contained articles on science fact and short works of science fiction. The first issue was published in October 1978, the last in Winter 1995, with an internet version lasting until 1998.

OMNI was launched by Kathy Keeton, long-time companion and later wife of Penthouse magazine publisher Bob Guccione, who described the magazine in its first issue as “an original if not controversial mixture of science fact, fiction, fantasy and the paranormal”. Before launch it was referred to as Nova, but the name was changed before the first issue to avoid a conflict with the PBS science show of the same name, NOVA.

The magazine was initially edited by Frank Kendig, who left several months after the magazine’s launch. Ben Bova, who was hired as Fiction Editor, was promoted to Editor, leaving the magazine in 1981. After Kendig and Bova, Editors of OMNI included Richard Teresi, Gurney Williams III, Patrice Adcroft, Keith Ferrell, and Pamela Weintraub (editor of OMNI as one of the first major standalone webzines from 1996-1998). Kathleen Stein managed the magazine’s prestigious Q&A interviews with the top scientists of the 20th century through 1998. Ellen Datlow was Associate fiction editor of OMNI under Robert Sheckley for one and a half years, and took over as Fiction Editor in 1981 until the magazine folded in 1998. The very first edition had an exclusive interview with renowned physicist, Freeman Dyson, the second edition with American writer and futurist, Alvin Toffler.

In its early run, OMNI published a number of stories that have become genre classics, such as Orson Scott Card’s “Unaccompanied Sonata”, William Gibson’s “Burning Chrome” and “Johnny Mnemonic”, Harlan Ellison’s novella “Mefisto in Onyx”, and George R. R. Martin’s “Sandkings”. The magazine also published original sf/f by William S. Burroughs, Joyce Carol Oates, Jonathan Carroll, T. Coraghessan Boyle, and other mainstream writers. The magazine excerpted Stephen King’s novel Firestarter, and featured a short story, “The End of the Whole Mess”. OMNI also brought the works of numerous painters to the attention of a large audience, such as H. R. Giger, De Es Schwertberger and Rallé. In the early 1980s, popular fiction stories from OMNI were reprinted in “The Best of OMNI Science Fiction” series and featured art by space artists like Robert McCall.

OMNI entered the market at the start of a wave of new science magazines aimed at educated but otherwise “non-professional” readers. Science Digest and Science News already served the high-school market, and Scientific American and New Scientist the professional, while OMNI was arguably the first aimed at “armchair scientists” who were nevertheless well informed about technical issues. The next year, however, Time introduced Discover while the AAAS introduced Science ’80.

You’ll have to click through issue by issue to get them all but at least the archive is searchable. The world was a very different place when Omni was being published and it should be interesting or at least nostalgic to look back at a different (albeit recent) era.

Loud Music in Bars

You may or may not have thought about this. It turns out there’s a reason for it.

Via Boing Boing, an article in Popular Science notes that “when the music in a bar gets 22 percent louder, patrons drink 26 percent faster.” Boing Boing says, “When you can’t talk to anybody, you always have booze to be your friend.”