Studio711 - Ben Martens : Gadgets

GoPro Wireless BacPac

bwmartens — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 07:30:00 GMT

In an earlier post, I explained that my new skis were partially paid for by my company with a new part of our benefits package. You only get the credit if you decline the gym membership, and since the gym membership is quite a bit more money than the credit, I think HR wants more people to pick this credit. They recently contacted me (and some other people) about doing a short video on us and sending it out in a newsletter to all the employees. That in itself seemed pretty cool to me, but they also said they would send us GoPros to capture footage of us using whatever athletic equipment we bought with the credit.

My camera arrived in the mail, and while it wasn’t the new Hero3 model I was hoping for, it did come with the Wireless BacPac. There are a variety of BacPacs that you can attach to the back of the camera, and obviously this one provides wireless capabilities. You can connect to the camera via a phone app or a remote control (not included). It lets you control all the various settings of the camera as well as starting and stopping recording. If you’re using one of the phone apps, you can even see a live view of what the camera is seeing. This is incredibly useful for setting up shots since there is no viewfinder on the camera.

I was originally a little bummed about the wireless kit because GoPro currently only has an app for iPhone and Android. A Windows Phone app is supposed to be in the works and was demoed at CES, but it’s not out yet so it doesn’t do me much good. The wireless protocol must not be too difficult to decipher because there were a few homemade GoPro apps for Windows Phone and to my surprise, they actually work quite well. The UI design leaves something to be desired, but hey, it works. Basically you start up the wireless on the camera and it creates a WiFi network. You have to switch your phone to connect to that network and then you can communicate with the camera. The BacPac contains it’s own power source, but if it runs out then it will suck power from the main camera battery.

I was also able to try out the proper GoPro app for Android thanks to Ken. He traded me one of his old Android phones (HTC Thunderbolt) for one of my old Windows Phones (HTC Trophy.) And additionally I’m finally able to experience the world of Android.

As for the HR video, I’m hoping that when it’s completed, I can get a copy of it. But since it’s an internal video, I doubt I’ll ever be able to post it publically. It’s probably for the best. They want us to interview ourselves and no matter what I do, I end up looking like a complete tool. There’s a reason I prefer being behind the camera.

Ford Escape Technology Review

bwmartens — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 07:30:00 GMT

Our new 2013 Escape SEL is full of gizmos and gadgets. Now that we’ve had about a month with the car, I figured I’d review some of the technology in the car.

There are three versions of Ford’s interior computer system: 1) SYNC 2) MyFord Touch 3) Navigation. If you pick a higher number, you get the lower numbers too. So for example, you can’t get a navigation system without also getting SYNC and MyFord Touch. Sync is the part of the system that is responsible for voice prompts and listening when you talk to the car. You can tell it to play music, read you the news, get the latest weather, give you audio based turn by turn directions, or read and reply to text messages over your phone. It’s mostly done via audio though you might also get a simple one or two line display on your radio.

MyFord Touch adds a visual touchscreen to Sync. The functionality is roughly the same except now you can do everything either via voice or with the touch screen. It also adds internet connectivity. If you have a USB mobile broadband modem from your cell phone carrier, you can plug it into the car and your car turns into a rolling Wi-Fi hotspot. When the navigation upgrade is added into the MyFord Touch system you get an on-screen display for route guidance. It will come as no surprise that our Escape has the fanciest tech package we could get, but how well does it work?

It’s a bit overwhelming when you first get into the driver’s seat. There’s an 8” touch screen in the center of the dashboard drawing your attention to play around with climate settings, entertainment options, navigation or cell phone connections. And then there is an LCD screen in the center of the dashboard between the speedo and the tach. It can show you a ton of different info light miles per gallon, distance to empty, a little flower showing how efficiently you’re driving, which wheels are currently receiving power from the engine, etc. and it is controlled with buttons on the steering wheel. Once you get used to it, it’s really handy, but while you’re getting used to it, you really need to remind yourself to focus on the road!

There is a plethora of ways to connect audio to the (very nice!) sound system: HD radio, CD, Sirius satellite radio, USB, SD card, RCA jack for audio and video, and Bluetooth audio from cell phones. It’s nice to have so many choices! It’s the first time I’ve ever heard HD radio and it really is impressive, though I’d never pay extra for it since I rarely listen to the radio. We bought the world’s tiniest 16 GB USB stick, loaded it up with MP3s and that will stay in the car. Tyla’s Zune is connected to the car via the RCA jacks because it’s actually easier to control using the Zune itself than going through the car menus plus for some reason it kept trying to re-index the music on the Zune. It’s our first time with Sirius and that has some great channels. Unfortunately reception cuts out as soon as you get into the threes (like Hwy 522 up to Monroe or out in the San Juan Islands.) I’m guessing it’s because we’re on the edge of the country out hear in Seattle. It’s annoying enough that we probably won’t keep paying for it after the free 6 months are up.

The voice part of SYNC is the part that has taken us the longest to figure out. There are a lot of things you can say, but it’s not anywhere close to a full natural language interface, When you speak, you’re navigating through a series of menus and if you don’t know ahead of time what you can say, you have to listen to it read out all the options. That's pretty ineffective. I found a button on the touchscreen which will display the various things you can say when you push the voice prompt button and that has been helpful in the learning process. I don’t think we’ll use voice too often, but there are times when you really do need to use it. For example, when the car is moving more than 5mph, many of the touchscreen functionality is disabled. So if you need to do something like navigate to an address, you need to do that with the voice commands (or pull over and use the touch screen.) You can do silly things with the voice system like control the temperature in the car, but I don’t know why you’d do that instead of reaching down and using the physical button (and yes, it’s on the touch screen too.) I feel like the voice system could be really cool, but I’m not that impressed at this point.

Car features are kind of like cable TV. You pay for some specific features you really want and then get a bunch of other stuff bundled in. Here are some gizmos that we didn’t specifically seek out but came bundled in our car:

You can pick from a variety of colors for the ambient lights that show up in the foot wells, inside the cup holders, and behind the door handles. Tyla loves this because her car glows purple.
There’s a 110v power outlet in the back seat which cranks out about 150 watts.
There are three memory settings for the driver’s seat and side mirrors. This is way more awesome than I thought it would be considering the height difference between Tyla and me.
The car came with remote start. Since it rarely gets below 35-40 degrees, I don’t know if we’ll use this but it’s there.
There are three buttons on the visor that can be programmed to control garage door openers. We have three garage doors so this fits us perfectly.
It’s the first time I’ve owned a car with automatic climate control. It’s so convenient! I now get annoyed driving my Subaru and fiddling with the fan and temperature controls.
The ignition is just a push button that will activate whenever the key fob is present. Likewise if you walk up to the car with the key fob, the doors unlock when you reach for the handle. It’s handy, especially for Tyla who doesn’t have to dig through her purse to get in the car or start the engine. Shortly after getting the car she asked if I could make our house doors do that too!
The power tailgate is another feature that is more useful than I expected. You can raise the tailgate with a button on the dash, a button on the key fob, or in the hand grip under the license plate. Likewise there are about three buttons you could press to close the tailgate. You can also set the maximum height that the gate will open in case you have a low garage.
Lots of cars have that power tailgate, but Ford took it to the next level with a foot sensor. You just walk up to the rear of the car with the key fob in your pocket and wave your foot under the bumper. It took a little practice to figure out the location of the sensor but now it works great. Walk out with bags of groceries in your hands, kick your car in the butt and watch the tailgate open.
The rear bumper has sensors that beep if you’re backing up into something.

Believe it or not, even with all the tech we got in the car, there are a bunch of features that we didn’t get. For example, there’s an option that will automatically parallel park the for you!

For a non-techy, I think this could all be a bit overwhelming. I was a bit nervous putting Tyla in a car like that but I think she’s getting it figured out and enjoying the various features on the car. It will never replace the love she felt for that Beetle, but I think it’s growing on her.

Personally I love the form factor. It’s big enough that I can fold the seats down and get some good utility out of it, it has a roof rack that will carry skis or the box, it has their fancy four wheel drive system that activates automatically only when you need it and it gets 30 mpg on the highway thanks to the EcoBoost engine technology. Plus, on the invoice it says “FORD TRUCK”. I told Tim I finally owned a truck and he replied, “Yeah, but it has purple lights inside.”

Surface RT Review

bwmartens — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 07:30:00 GMT

Tyla and I have had the Surface RT for a few weeks now. I’ve been putting off this review, but I’ll explain that later. First off, the device is great. If you want to step into the world of tablets, I have no trouble recommending this. It’s competitively priced and it has some strong differentiators.

Our device came with the touch keyboard. The first thing I did when I pulled it out was try a typing test. On my desktop keyboard, I average 100-110 words per minutes. On my first test with the touch cover, I got 66 words a minute and that includes backspacing to correct my errors. So yes, it’s slower, but it’s very usable and I expect that the type cover would be even faster. This unique keyboard/cover is the probably the single biggest win for the Surface. It removes one of my biggest complaints with tablets. You’re never going to type a two page email with an on-screen keyboard, but with one of these covers, it’s not too bad. However, unless you really want the super thin cover, I'd recommend getting the slightly thicker "type cover" which has keys that physically depress.

Word and Excel are included in the price of a Surface RT. I don’t use them a ton on the device, but if that’s something you need, your search stops with the Surface RT because no other (non-Windows) tablet can do this.

If you’re already heavily invested in the Apple world, stop reading and go buy an iPad. We know that’s what you’ll end up with anyway. Yes, they have more apps. I haven’t had a problem finding apps to do what I want on the tablet, but if you have some very specific app that you require, you should see which platforms carry it. You’ll only be able to run CascadeSkier if you’re on Windows 8. I’m sure THAT will drive millions of Surface sales.

So why did I say I’ve been hesitating to write this review? Well, it’s because I’m still trying to figure out why I want a tablet. Even Tyla will grab the laptop first if that’s closer. The only reason I pick up the Surface is because I’m bored while watching TV and it’s a novelty. Pretty soon I think it’s going to start gathering dust in the corner. I’m either in the mood to really use a computer in which case I’ll use a laptop or desktop or I want to kill time or play a game. In that situation my phone is already in my pocket. Why would I get up to get a tablet? That problem isn’t specific to the Surface. We don’t have an Android or Apple tablet for the same reason. The sweet spot for me seems to be as child entertainment or as a small device to take on planes. Neither one of those things apply very much to us at this point. I’m much more excited about devices like the Dell XPS 12 which functions most of the time as a laptop but can lay flat like a tablet.

I’m not going to complain about a gift from my company, but having a tablet in my house has convinced me that I’ve been correct in not spending my money on any device like this. If you have a need/desire for a tablet and want to try out a Surface before deciding, let us know! We can’t gift or sell this device, but you’re welcome to come play with it.

HTC 8x Review

bwmartens — Thu, 27 Dec 2012 07:30:00 GMT

My company has kindly bestowed quite a few gadgets on us recently and one of them was a brand news Windows Phone 8 device for all employees. A few weeks back, I picked up two HTC 8x’s for myself and Tyla. Now that I’ve spent a few weeks with it, I figured I could share a review.

The phone is sleek. I’ve showed it to a number of people and that’s the first comment I get from everyone. The screen is large at 4.3” but it’s only 10mm thick and weighs 130 grams. It’s main competition is the Lumia 920. Nokia took the opposite approach with the Lumia. The screen is slightly bigger but the phone is a lot thicker and heavier. Some people like the solid feel of the Lumia and other’s prefer the sleekness of the 8x. Verizon carries the 8x but not the 920 so my choice was easy.

Speaking of the screen: it’s beautiful! The resolution is 1280x720. That’s as many pixels as the 32” HD TV in my house. And I’m going to try really hard to not make this a “buy Windows Phone, iPhone stinks!” review, but I will note that the screen on this device has a higher pixel density than Apple’s Retina Display. So if you love your new iPhone display, you’ll love the 8x (or the 920.)

The phone has Verizon’s 4g LTE network service. If you haven’t heard of LTE before, it will basically give your phone similar data speeds to your cable modem at home. Some users are getting 20-30Mbps, but I’ve “only” seen 6-10Mbps. It’s pretty incredible.

The camera takes great photos. The Lumia got all the hype about it’s camera but the 8x is just as good except that it doesn’t have image stabilization. Good image stabilization will give you about one extra f-stop. That would be nice to have but it’s not going to work magic on your photos. I think the Lumia is the de facto camera champion right now because they had a huge marketing push around it before HTC gave more info on the 8x. But whichever one you choose, you have the capability of creating very nice looking photos.

The 8x incorporates an NFC chip which you’ll only find on Android and Windows Phone at this point. I won’t got into a full explanation, but it opens up scenarios like tapping your phone to another phone to share a photo, tapping your phone to your visor when you get in the car to turn on Bluetooth automatically, or tapping your phone to a magnet on the fridge and automatically adding milk to your grocery list. It’s a cool technology that is just starting to gain some traction. Expect to see more of it in the coming years.

As for the Windows Phone 8 operating system, I’m really enjoying it. Windows Phone 7 and 7.5 were great and this is icing on the cake. Here are some of my favorite new features:

From any text message, you can attach a map of your current GPS location.
Kid’s Corner: Want to let your kid play games but don’t want them reading your email or buying apps? Instead of swiping up to enter your pin, have them swipe to the right. They’ll get a separate screen that only contains the apps you’ve given them access to.
Rooms: Set up a “room” with family members or close friends. Everyone in the can quickly send messages to everyone else, and share a calendar, photos and a OneNote notebook.
Settings and apps backup: So one ding against the phone is that I did a factory reset already. Somehow I got into a state where my email wasn’t updating. I’m pretty sure it was somehow related to the Skype app or possibly some other goofy stuff I was trying after I developer unlocked it, but since I had just gotten the phone, I decided to blow it all away and start over. It was also an excuse to check out the new backup features. When you reset your phone (or switch to a new phone) and type in your Microsoft account info, it will find your backup and ask if you want to restore. If you say yes, every setting on your phone will go back to the way it was and every app you had installed will be queued up for download and install. It’s awesome! The only thing it didn’t do was reset my tiles on the front page to the same order and size.

All in all, I’m thrilled with the device. It’s a solid product. Getting anyone to switch from Android or iPhone to Windows Phone is pretty difficult, but those I know who have made the switch are happy they did. Microsoft shows no signs of throwing in the towel and I will happily keep using their phones if they’re all as great as this one.

GoPro Timelapse

bwmartens — Thu, 22 Nov 2012 07:30:00 GMT

The GoPro Hero2 has a timelapse feature on it so I decided to give it a whirl. Tim’s garage shelving project seemed like as good an excuse as any. I set it to record at the max 11 megapixel size and take a photo every 2 seconds. Unfortunately, my 16GB card filled up after about 90 minutes. Considering we worked for eight hours, that obviously didn’t work out so well. Next time, I’ll try it with the minimum photo size of 5 megapixels since a 1080p video is only 2 megapixels anyway. A 5 megapixel file is about 3MB on the Hero2 so that means I should be able to take about 5400 photos on a 16GB card. The key thing to remember is that if you’re doing a 5MP photo every 10 seconds, you’ll get roughly 1 hour per gigabyte. Taking a photo every two seconds, the battery will last a little under 3 hours. The wide angle setting is incredibly useful for a setting like this so at least I got that part right.

I realize that if you don’t have one of these cameras, these numbers are pretty pointless, but I’m sure someone out there in the interwebz will find it useful, and at the very least, it will be a reference point for me in the future.

The video that we did get shows us prepping the wall and me staring at it for a very long time trying to figure out exactly how we were going to line up with the wall studs.

Wireless TV Audio

bwmartens — Mon, 12 Nov 2012 07:30:00 GMT

The kitchen in our home extends out into the family room where we have the TV. I enjoy watching TV while I cook, so we have a lazy susan under the TV to rotate it towards the kitchen. But in order to hear it, I have to crank it up very loud. Even then it’s sometimes not enough if the stove vent is turned on. Plus, if Tyla walks through the family room she gets blasted by the noise.

I installed a Sony radio under the cabinets in our kitchen. This is the same model that I have by my workbench out in the garage. It was essentially a freebie as I had a bunch of points built up on our Sony credit card. I then picked up a Scoche FM transmitter for about $15 and plugged that into the TV. The kitchen radio gets tuned to that station and voila! We can listen to the TV while cooking without cranking up the sound. The sound isn’t quite as pure as if I had run a cable under the house and up into the kitchen, but it’s a lot simpler!

This solution has a few bonus features. During parties, people in the kitchen will still be able to hear the football game. We could watch TV with wireless headphones since our phones have FM tuners in them. I can listen to football games out in the garage by turning on the TV and then tuning the radio in the garage.

Not only was the solution cheap, but it’s very unobtrusive.

The Other Side

bwmartens — Mon, 29 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

You’ve now been through four posts about Windows 8. A launch guide, company strategy, tips for getting started, and tips for power users. These are all written from an admittedly pro-Microsoft point of view for the most part. But what if I attempted to take the other side of the argument?

The thing that sticks out most for me is the train wreck around naming. If you walk in and say you want to buy Windows, do you really know what you’re getting? If you buy a Windows RT tablet, do you know that you can’t run ANY applications that run on today’s 1.3 billion Windows computers? You can ONLY run apps that you buy through the Windows Store on the device. It’s very similar to if you picked up a phone and want to put apps on it. If you’re browsing to a website and you need a plugin, too bad. You can’t just find stuff on the web and install it. And you can’t just pick up a unit and quickly tell if it’s running Windows RT or Windows 8. Both of them will have a Desktop tile on the start screen, but on Windows RT, the only apps you can start on the desktop are the Office apps. I wish we could have skipped the Desktop tile for RT devices and just made the Office apps start full screen.

While I understand why Microsoft wants to ease people in to the Windows RT metro app world, the overlap with the existing Windows 8 desktop story is super confusing and the naming just makes it worse. If they had called the new tablet stuff with metro apps “Foo” (for example), the story would be a lot cleaner. Do you want a tablet that only runs Foo or do you want a tablet that runs Windows 8 AND Foo?

There’s so much push behind Windows RT (a.k.a Foo) that I think a ton of people are going to run out and buy these tablets, get home, and wonder why they can’t go install their favorite desktop application. It could create a huge backlash of confused consumers as they realize they can only run stuff from the Windows Store. At some point we’ll have a huge suite of metro apps that match up against the selection on Android and iOS devices, but we’re not there yet. Will the current selection be enough to appease consumers?

Anti-Microsoft users will say definitely not. Pro-Microsoft users will say that the current selection is enough and most people spend their time in browsers and email anyway. The truth is, no one knows yet and we won’t know for a few months. Obviously I hope this does great in the marketplace, but I think that we’ve dug a bit of a hole for ourselves with the confusing names.

Epson GT-S50 Scanner Review

bwmartens — Fri, 26 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

The October 12 post requesting feedback on duplex scanners took an unexpected turn of events, and the end result is that we are now the proud owners of an Epson GT-S50! Thanks to JonathanC for the tip.

This is the first time I’ve dealt with a purpose built document scanner, so maybe some of this is normal, but let me list of a few of the features that had me giggling with glee as I unpacked it:

25 pages per minute
Scans duplex in a single pass so those 25 pages are actually 50 if you’re scanning duplex
Customizable presets so you can scan with one or two button clicks right on the device
Creates a PDF of all your pages
Optical Character Recognition finds all the text in your documents and creates searchable PDFs
Automatically figures out landscape and portrait pages and inserts them properly rotated into your PDF
Automatically leaves blank sides out of your PDF

There’s a lot more to love about this, but to really appreciate it, you need to see what I used to go through with the document feeder for my Canon printer/scanner/copier. I’d have to scan one side and then flip them over and scan again. The video below shows a side by side comparison for a two page duplex document, but it doesn’t even tell the whole story. With the old Canon, I’d end up with 4 JPEG files and I’d have to manually combine them into a 4 page PDF file for storage. With the Epson, it not only creates the PDF file automatically, but it recognizes all the text and I can search through it! The old Canon would only let me feed about 20 pages through it before the feeder assembly started making a grinding sound. This new Epson claims that it can hold 75 pages in the document feeder and is rated to scan 100,000 pages over it’s lifetime.

Yes, it’s a lot of money for a gadget, but I already feel like it’s worth it. We don’t save paper. We scan everything. This is going to equate to a lot of saved hours!

Windows 8 Power Users

bwmartens — Thu, 25 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

For those of us who use keyboard shortcuts for everything, a new touch-enabled interface feels like a slap in the face. The truth is, Windows 8 is designed to be used equally well with touch, a mouse, or keyboard. There are three ways to do everything!

We’ve already talked about using the Start key on your keyboard to get back to the start screen or come back to your desktop. It’s super handy, but it’s also the first half to a ton of great keyboard shortcuts. Some of these are in Windows 7 and others have been added:

Win+D - Sends you back to the desktop no matter where you are
Alt-Tab, Win-Tab - Switch between apps
Win+W - Search Control Panel and Settings stuff
Win+F - Search Files
Win+C - Charms (right side menu) then arrows to move and enter to launch.
Win+I - Settings in any app plus brightness, network and other useful system features
Win+P - Press this after hooking your laptop to a conference room projector
Win+Arrows - Snap desktop apps to the sides
Win+(period) - Alternate sides to "snap" Metro Apps. Add shift to reverse it.
Win+PageUp or Win+PageDn - Move full screen apps to other monitors. Super useful for News apps and Readers. The Start Screen can be moved as well.
Win+X - This is so powerful that it probably deserves it’s own paragraph. Press this to get a context menu in the lower right that gives you quick access to power user features like Disk Management, Device Manager, Command Prompt, Power Options, etc.
Alt+Home - Using Windows 8 over a Remote Desktop session takes some getting used to. It's hard to hit the corners of the screen so memorizing the keyboard shortcuts helps a lot. Alt+Home is a replacement for the Start button when you're in a Remote Desktop window.

One huge feature of Windows 8 that doesn’t get a lot of press is Hyper-V. This used to be relegated to server versions of the OS but now it’s right there in the client version for free! Hyper-V lets you run virtual machines inside your main machine. You can assign multiple CPU cores to the VM and adjust it’s RAM. As a tester, I use this feature every day at work because it’s so fast to bring up a VM with a different OS and then kill it when I’m done. At home I use it to combine multiple computers into one. My file server runs Windows 8 and then in a VM on that same box I run Windows Home Server for backups.

You’ll want to check out is Storage Spaces. Picture this: your computer has a hodge podge of various hard drives. Storage Spaces will take all those drives and make one big drive out of them. Then you can tell it to make sure every piece of data is stored on two physical drives so that it one fails, you don’t lose your data. Instead you just get notified that a drive needs to be replaced. (There are other options besides mirroring too.) Think of it as software RAID. Sure it’s a TINY bit slower than hardware RAID, but unless you’re running a datacenter, you’re never going to notice and the benefits far outweigh that. This feature is the core of my file server.

Now let’s say you come home and your wife’s laptop is giving some nasty error. No worries! The Refresh feature will clean up all the Windows files without losing your apps, settings and files in your libraries. It only takes 10-20 minutes and you should be ready to go again. The refresh feature works so fast that I heard from a presenter who hit a problem when he started his presentation and he finished a refresh while talking before he got to the demo part of this talk! If the problem is more severe and you need to do a fresh install, skip the disks. Use the built in Reset feature. That will do something closer to a fresh install and you’ll probably lose your files and apps.

There’s a lot to love in Windows 8 and I’ve only scratched the surface. If you want more, I recommend that Scott Hanselman’s “Who moved my cheese?” post about Windows 8. It’s fantastic and covers a number of things that I didn’t cover here. You’ll also notice it was a source for some of the tips I used in this series.

Whether you upgrade tomorrow when it hits the shelves or you wait until you buy your next device, I hope that your Windows 8 experience is fantastic! It’s the biggest thing to happen to Windows since Windows 95. It’s probably not perfect and will be refined with the next version of Windows, but I’ve been running it for months and when I go back to Windows 7 I find myself missing Windows 8. Give it a couple weeks and hopefully you’ll feel the same!

Tips For Your First Day With Windows 8

bwmartens — Tue, 23 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

You’ve just fired up your computer with Windows 8 for the very first time. Augh everything is different! Now what!? There is a little bit of a startup video/demo to introduce you to the basics, but I’ll do it here in a much slower and more boring way. This post might not make a ton of sense now, but come back to it once you get your Windows 8 machine.

Sidebar: Those special new apps that run in full screen and are sold through the Windows Store still don’t have a great name. They used to be called “Metro” apps until there was reportedly some big trademark lawsuit and Microsoft tried to change the name. There still isn’t a great name so I’m just going to call the Metro apps. (Metro is the codename for the design style that these apps use. It’s also used on Windows Phone and Xbox360.)

Tip #1: If you only remember one thing about Windows 8, remember that the corners of the screen are special!

Bottom Left: What was in the bottom left corner of Windows 7? The start button. In Windows 8 there is no visible start button, but if you click down there, it will take you to the start screen.
Top Left: Hold your mouse in the top left corner of the screen to easily swap between running Metro programs. The Windows Key + Tab will also bring up this list. I don’t use this very often when I’m at my desktop, but it would be very important on a tablet where you’re using only Metro apps.
Top Right and Bottom Right: Anything along the right edge will bring up the charms bar. There’s a consistent set of choices: Search, Share, Start, Devices, Settings.
- Search: Get used to loving the search button! It’s how you can quickly find any program on your computer, but it’s so much more than that. Along the right side you get to tell it WHAT you are searching for. The default ones are Apps, Settings and Files. Apps that you install can also tie into this search feature. So you could also search for songs, apps in the store, a photo, etc without opening those specific applications.
- Share: If you’re in an app and find something that you want to send to a friend, use the Share button. You can also use this to pass data between Metro apps. For example, highlight some text, press Share and then send it to a translator app or dictionary.
- Start: In addition to the lower left corner of your screen, Start shows up here too.
- Devices: As the name implies, this lets you see, interact and manage all the devices attached to your machine.
- Settings: You’ll want to spend some time picking around here. First of all, this is where the Shutdown button is hiding if you need it. Also check out the PC Settings button at the bottom of the Settings screen. There’s lots of goodness in there including telling Windows what settings it should sync across all of your Windows 8 machines! When you’re inside an app, the Settings menu can contain app-specific settings.

Tip #2: The next thing to remember is that the Start button on your keyboard or tablet is your friend. Lots of people have gotten tripped up when they are in a Metro app because there is no obvious way to close the application. That’s because you don’t need to close Metro apps. If Windows decides that you are running low on memory, it will automatically close the apps that you haven’t used in the longest time and when you restart them, you’ll be right back where you were. It’s a pretty seamless experience. So if you’re in a Metro app and want to get back to the start screen, just press the start button on your keyboard! (And if you really HAVE to close that app, press Alt-F4 or grab near the center top of the screen and pull it down to the bottom of the screen.)

Tip #3: You’ll also want to get used to using the start button to quickly bring up new apps. This works exactly the same as Vista and Windows 7 but I still watch people click the Start button and dig through the menus to try to find their app. That’s such a waste of time! Instead, press the Start button and just start typing. Let’s say you want to start the calculator app. Press start and start typing calculator and then press Enter. BAM! You’re in the app. Easy.

Tip #4: If you’re in a Metro app, explore the top and bottom of the screen. Right clicking while in a metro app will bring up the app bar along the top and bottom if the app supports them. It will contain frequently accessed tasks for the application. For example, in the Metro version of Internet Explorer, this brings up the address bar, favorites menu, a preview of all the tabs you have open, the back button, a button to pin the page to your start screen and much more. If you're on a touch device, just drag up from the top or bottom.

Tip #5: Finally, when you come back to your PC after a while, you’ll see a lock screen. It has a clock, shows how many new emails you have and a few other things. Some people think you have to physically swipe the screen up with your finger or the mouse. While that works, you can also just start typing. Press Enter or ESC or anything and you’re ready to start typing in your password.

There’s a lot more to discover and I have a hard time stopping without telling you to try to pin stuff from various apps to your start screen for cool extra functionality or hovering your mouse near the bottom of the screen to get a horizontal scrollbar to appear in apps like the Store and a billion other Windows 8 features, but these are the five biggest things that I think everyone should know as they get started! If you want even more, I recommend Paul Thurott’s book called Windows 8 Secrets.

In the next post, I’ll cover some tips for power users.

Windows 8 Strategy

bwmartens — Fri, 19 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

Yesterday’s post covered the differences between Windows 8 and Windows RT. Since very few people have actually gotten their hands on this new operating system yet, most of the discussion has centered around the strategic implications of the changes in this version. What follows is my take on Microsoft strategy. All of this is based on public information and is 100% conjecture on my part.

Windows 8 is a huge, bold bet for Microsoft. This isn’t just some tiles plastered on top of Windows 7. It’s one of the biggest moves in this history of the company and ranks right up there with the move from Windows 3.1 to Windows 95.

35 years have passed sine the Apple II was launched, and for the most part, the personal computer is still a geeky tool. It’s way too complicated and difficult to maintain. You shouldn’t need to have your resident geek stop by a few times a year to help you figure out why your Ethernet card isn’t getting an IP address from the DHCP server or tweak the size of your page file. With Windows 8, Microsoft is acknowledging that people want devices that “just work.”

It doesn’t take Nostradamus to see that the market is headed in that direction. Apple sold 84 million iPads and people are doing more and more of their computing from smart phones. Content creation is still better on standard desktop or laptop, but for most of your time is probably spent with content consumption. Surfing the web, reading email and playing games are the sweet spot for tablets and phones.

So why not switch 100% to this new start screen/Windows Store model and ditch the desktop? While it looks like we are heading there, it’s hard to turn a ship in one release. The desktop has huge momentum, so Microsoft had to give existing users and comfortable path to keep things relatively similar while also engaging them in the future. That’s why you launch to the new tiled start screen whether you’re on a tablet, a desktop PC, or even a server operating system. It all works fine whether you’re using keyboard, mouse or touch, but you’re still getting introduced to it in your regular workflow. And if you really want that device that “just works” without the old PC hassles, you can buy a Windows RT tablet.

This decision strikes fear/anger in the hearts of geeks everywhere. We love our nerdy PCs. Tablets and PCs are just toys. No self-respecting computer professional would spend most of their time on one. There will always be a place in the market for power users. We just need to realize that the rest of the world doesn’t need the same things that we do. The tablet/phone market is going to grow bigger and bigger. The powerful PC market is going to shrink, but it won’t die.

Apple and Android have a huge head start in the tablet world so it’s going to be a difficult up-hill battle for Microsoft. I believe that including the start screen and Windows Store in every version of Windows is an acknowledgement of the current state of affairs and also a key piece of the strategy to gain market share. We hear over and over again that people choose platforms based on the app selection. How many developers would write apps for Windows 8 tablets if you could only run them on a Windows 8 tablet? It’s a chicken and egg problem. But what if you could write an app that would run on every single computer that has any version of Windows 8? Now your app is available to hundreds of millions of users AND you’re helping Microsoft build up a great selection of apps to help their tablets succeed.

This will all take time, but as usual, Microsoft is in it for the long haul. Be prepared for the attention grabbing “Microsoft is doomed” headlines when Windows 8 launches next week. Writers get paid by the click and people love to click on wild headlines. Yes, it’s a change, but it’s a positive change. Welcome to the future.

In my next post, I’ll give you some tips for your first couple hours with Windows 8!

Windows 8 Launch Guide

bwmartens — Thu, 18 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

It’s probably no secret to you that the next version of Windows is about to launch. I’ve prepared a series of posts to help you get ready and understand this exciting new product. The posts range from non-tech to super geeky so hopefully somewhere along the way you’ll see something targeted to you. For this first post, we’re going to take a 10,000 foot view and try to understand the different versions of Windows 8.

The new version of Windows is called Windows 8, but you shouldn’t think of it has Windows 7 + 1. It’s a completely new operating system and new direction for the company. Some parts of it might resemble what you’ve seen in Windows 7, but don’t think of it as Windows 7 plus some new features. Ever since the launch of Windows 95, we’ve had a desktop with multiple windows open on it and a button in the lower left that lets you access your programs. That model is 17 years old. Windows 8 is an acknowledgement that maybe there’s a better model out there.

When you launch Windows 8, you’re taken directly to the “start screen.” This is where you can go to launch any of your applications, but it’s so much more than that. The tiles for many of the apps will update to show you information without having to open the app. For example, the news application will cycle through pictures and top headlines. If you have a friend’s contact info pinned to your start screen, you’ll see their latest Facebook profile picture and status updates from Twitter, Facebook, Linked In, etc. It’s a great way to get an overview of what’s going on in all of your favorite applications without having to click anything. Additionally, you can buy apps in the Windows Store that will run in this new start screen environment. While these apps will work on any computer, they are generally targeted toward tablet style devices. You may also notice that this tiled interface aligns well with the interfaces in Windows Phone and Xbox.

After you decide to go with Windows 8, the biggest choice is whether to go with “Windows RT” or “Windows 8.” Personally, I think the names stink. Windows 8 is not only a general term for the new operating system, but it’s also used to differentiate between two different versions of the operating system. Hopefully I can clarify things a bit.

Windows RT is a version of Windows 8 targeted directly at tablets. It will only be available when you purchase a tablet. You can’t buy Windows RT and install it on something you already own. The Windows RT tablets do NOT have the standard desktop environment and won’t run your existing apps. Instead, you’ll be diving head first into the new way of distributing and running apps. All apps for Windows RT are available for purchase through the Windows Store right from your device (the same way as on an iPad or a phone.) These are beautiful full screen applications targeted for a touch environment. It’s a much more controlled environment so you aren’t going to be monkeying around with finding the right drivers for your device or updating your virus scanner.
Windows 8 is the version that you’ll be running on all your laptop and desktop computers. You’ll still launch into the same start screen as Windows RT and do everything that Windows RT does, but also have the traditional desktop environment. That will look very similar to Windows 7 and allows you to run all of your current apps.

Just to confuse you a little more, companies will actually be making tablets that run this “full” version of Windows 8 that includes the desktop. Microsoft is releasing it’s own tablet called the Surface and you can either buy the Surface RT tablet or the Surface Pro tablet. Surface RT has you running only apps from the new store, and Surface Pro includes those apps from the new store and adds a desktop environment.

So which one of these is right for you? As I said before, if you’re running on a laptop or desktop, you will go with the full Windows 8 version that gives you the new start screen environment and the desktop environment. That’s your only choice for upgrading, and it’s the best of both worlds. If you want a tablet, you have to decide if you want more of an iPad experience (constrained app choices targeted specifically for tablet devices) or more of a laptop experience (those same app store apps plus the ability to run any standard Windows 7 style desktop applications.) If you are hesitant about all this stuff, it’s fine to stick with Windows 7 and see how this plays out. Most computer users only upgrade to a new operating system when they buy a new device. If you do decide to upgrade to Windows 8, you’ll only have to pay $40!

In my next post, I’ll discuss my thoughts on this strategy of breaking away from the standard desktop environment and creating a new experience.

Buying a Tablet

bwmartens — Tue, 09 Oct 2012 07:30:00 GMT

A couple people have come to me recently asking what kind of tablet they should buy so I’ll write up my thoughts here. Before I start, I’ll say that Tyla and I have a Microsoft home. For the most part, if Microsoft has an entry for a product category we’re looking at, that’s the one we’ll choose. They pay my paycheck so it’s only reasonable that I use their products and help to make them better when they aren’t already the top of their class. But hey, you probably already knew that and you still asked me for my thoughts, so here it goes.

Phone

Before we start talking about what tablet to buy, let’s talk about your other gadgets. Do you have an iPhone, Android phone, or Windows Phone? If not, you need to stop and reconsider your purchase. Personally I think a modern phone is infinitely more useful than a tablet (which is probably why I’ve had smart phones for a long time and still haven’t owned a tablet.) No longer will you be stuck away from home wondering where you are, when that store opens, or what the number for business X is. It’s almost a requirement in today’s society. The downside is that in the long run, a phone is going to cost you more than a tablet. Forget the initial cost of the phone. It doesn’t really matter if you get it for free or pay $200. You’re going to end up with a ~$70-80/month contract for a minimum of 24 months. It’s probably about $30-40 more than you’re paying for your cell phone right now. But still, my recommendation is that you get a good cell phone before you consider a tablet. If you want a cell phone, I’m happy to chat about it, but my recommendation (especially if this is your first phone) is Windows Phone. I’d use it whether I worked for Microsoft or not.

Books

But let’s say you either disagree with getting a phone first or you already have a phone and you’re ready for a tablet. Why do you want a tablet? Is it for reading books, playing games, surfing the web, watching movies on a long flight, or entertaining or your kids? The list goes on and you’ll probably end up doing all those things with the device. The biggest one in that mix is books. If your primary purpose is to read books then you’ll be much happier if you get a Kindle. The new Paperwhite model looks incredible and it’s only $119. If that’s too much you can get the base Kindle for just $69! If you like to read, this is almost a no-brainer. If you don’t already know, these devices are like reading a physical piece of paper. You can read for hours and hours without much eye strain. Reading on a regular tablet is the same as reading on a computer screen. You’re looking at light shining into your eyes and that gets uncomfortable before too long. Plus the battery on your Kindle will last weeks and weeks, but the tablet will only last a few days at best.

Tablet

So you don’t want a phone and you don’t want a Kindle, now what? Here are your major choices. I’m sure my summaries are guaranteed to frustrate everyone with an opinion on the topic!

iPad
There’s no getting around it. This is the industry leader. They’ve got a ton of apps, and though I mock iOS for being a huge grid of icons, that’s also a strength because it’s so simple to use. See the app you want to run. Click on it. Done. It’s expensive though. The cheapest version of the current model is $499. Buying an iPad is the safe choice right now. It’s been out for a while, it has a good ecosystem, and it has a ton of users. I have a hard time faulting anyone for buying an iPad, but personally, I think there are better options out there.

Android
You can’t just walk out and buy “the Android tablet.” Android is a free operating system from Google and dozens of different companies manufacture their own versions of the tablet with customized versions of the operating system. If you’re choosing an Android tablet over an iPad, it’s probably because an iPad is too expensive. If that’s the case, you’ll probably want to check out the Amazon Kindle Fire. The cheapest one is $159 but I’d recommend the $199 version. If you’ve used an iPad, you’ll be a little underwhelmed with this device, but if it’s your first tablet, you’ll love it.

The app selection is going to be comparable to an iPad and it’s all very easy to use. Think of this tablet as a portable Amazon shopping experience that can also play games, watch movies, and yes, read books (but remember it’s not great for long reading sessions.)

On a side note, it’s unfortunate that they called it a Kindle. It’s completely different technology from the Kindle e-Readers that I mentioned earlier and I think it just leads to confusion.

Windows 8
The next version of Windows launches at the end of October and it was designed from the ground up to be a great experience on tablets. However, it’s still largely an unknown. I’ll have a couple posts specifically about Windows 8 in the coming weeks so I won’t go into the details, but if you haven’t seen any screen shots, it looks a lot like the tiled interface that you’ve seen on XBox and Windows Phone. That being said, this is another case where companies will be able to license the operating system and build their own hardware. Unlike Android, there won’t be many crazy customizations so they’ll all look very similar.

Microsoft is making their own tablet hardware too. This is the first time that Microsoft has produced their own hardware (aside from mice, keyboards and the XBox), but the initial reviews are stellar. Their tablet is going to be called the Microsoft Surface. Unfortunately we still don’t know how much it will cost or if it will really hold up to the hype, but we’ll find that out at the end of October when they are released. Tyla and I will have one and you’re welcome to play with it if you live around here.

The benefits of going with the Microsoft tablet are that if you have Windows computers in your house, this will play very nicely with them. Also, I think the user interface is a generation ahead of iPhone and Android. iPhone and Android are based on grids of icons but Windows 8 is based on a series of “live tiles”. Without starting any applications, you can look at your start screen and each application’s tile will show you the top information from that app. It might be the current weather, top news stories, how many mail messages you have waiting, latest pictures from your Facebook friends, or what word your opponent just played in Scrabble.

The downside to choose a Microsoft tablet is that it’s going to take a while for the app ecosystem to get built up. That’s probably going to be the biggest argument you hear in the news against the device. All of the basics will be there and there will be thousands or tens of thousands of other apps, but is the specific game that you loved to play on the iPad going to be available on Windows 8 when it launches? Probably not.

Conclusion

Remember that you asked a Microsoft employee for his opinion on what you should buy. I’m sure the Apple and Android fans are foaming at the mouth if they’ve made it this far. Do your own research and make your own decision. But if you want my opinion, I think you’ll be happiest with a Windows Phone, a Kindle for reading, and then… I don’t know on the tablet yet. I hope I can recommend the Microsoft Surface, but I have to get it in my hands before I can pick a winner in that category.

Go Pro Slow Mo Yo!

bwmartens — Thu, 20 Sep 2012 07:30:00 GMT

I’ve been having an awesome time playing around with this Go Pro. Last night I was playing around with the slow motion capabilities.

You can select a number of different video resolutions and frame rates. I decided to see how well the higher frame rates looked when slowed down. Here’s a test shot at 120 frames per second, 60 fps and 30fps. In the video editor, I slowed them all down to quarter speed. That means that the 120fps clip on the left has exactly one frame of input for every frame of output whereas the 30fps version has 1 frame of input for every 4 frames of output. The motion on the left is really smooth while on the right it’s jerky and more blurry. Of course to get the extra frames, the camera drops the resolution quite a bit so the video isn’t as clear. I’m really impressed with the 120fps mode though. There will be some fun applications for that!

P.S. As I shot the video and wrote this post, it did occur to me that normal people don't act like this. I'm a dweeb but not only that, I post it online for everyone to see!

Go Pro HD Hero 2 Review

bwmartens — Mon, 17 Sep 2012 07:30:00 GMT

You’ve probably seen people wearing these Go Pro cameras on mountain bikes, motorcycles, skiing, kayaking, etc. They’re very small, waterproof, rugged, and they take good HD video. In fact, lots of TV shows are using these because the video is pretty good and it’s not a huge deal if they break them. They’ve been used on Man Vs. Wild, Dirty Jobs, American Chopper, lots of ski movies, and numerous other shows.

These cameras have been on my wish list for a long time but I could never pull the trigger. A huge thanks goes out to Tyla and her family who got one for me for my birthday!

Go Pro sells a wide variety of mounts for the camera. It’s currently affixed to my motorcycle helmet via some super strong adhesive, and I’ll be doing something similar for my ski helmet. The downside to using one of these things is that you look like a dork, especially if you’re not doing something that’s worthy of being recorded. Thankfully the mounts allow you to easily remove the camera when you don’t want to record anything.

The camera only has two buttons which seems simple, but it can take a little while to get the hang of going through all the menus. The main things you’ll want to set are the resolution and frame rate of your recording and the field of view (wide, normal, narrow.) The wide angle view does a fantastic job at capturing all of the action in front of you so you don’t have to worry about exactly where it’s pointing. Even with the camera on top of my head, the wide angle view can see all the way down to my speedometer.

The battery lasts for about 2.5 hours and that will fill up a 16GB card at the highest resolution.

All in all, it’s an impressive little package. I’m going to give it a good workout soon on my next motorcycle ride across the mountains.