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What’s Going On With My Sites?

In case you haven't noticed, I've been having issues with my site lately. I've been getting hacked lately AND my hosting provider Network Solutions has been having Server issues at least two weekends in a row. Let's just say there have been a lot of sleepless nights in the past couple of weeks.

The Hacks

The hacks have been coming in two flavors. The first is some how they've hacked the titles of my post that get indexed by Google. So if you were to Google "terry white tech blog" you'd get some interesting titles to my site. The links sill work, so I'm not sure I see the purpose behind that particular attack. The other more recent attack has been far more troublesome. It's an injection of code throughout my site files that point to a different server know to serve up malware to unsuspecting visitors. That's the one that is yielding the warnings above in both Safari and Chrome browsers and that's the one that's been the biggest pain to deal with.

Chrome users – To make matters worse Google has now flagged my main domain terrywhite.com as a "suspicious" site. Therefore until that times out or until they rescan my site from my request you'll be "warned" about visiting ANY of my sites at the moment. Even if the infections are completely cleared out there's nothing I can do to get rid of this warning until Google rescans it and clears. I have to wait it out.

 

Moving Forward

While I think I'm on the other side of all these problems now and I'm starting to see my way clear of these issues, I was once again reminded of one of he principles I try to live by and that is "always have a backup and a plan B!" I don't expect technology to always work or to be perfect. Nothing is. This is why we have backups and contingency plans. So I started thinking about that a lot lately when it comes to my websites. I also haven't been extremely satisfied lately with my hosting provider as I don't feel like they've had my back during these issues as much as they could have. So it made me start to shop around for other hosting companies. While I'm certainly not settled in on another company just yet, I do now have a backup to this blog!

 

Plan B

For the time being while I sort this all out I will be posting my content in two places. Here on the existing tech blog AND on my new (backup) tech blog:

http://terrywhitetechblog.com

The NEW (backup) blog is hosted by GoDaddy.com. While I'm not 100% sold on them yet, they do come highly recommended by my buddy RC over at Layers Magazine. I know that no hosting provider has 100% up time. However, I do expect issues to be resolved as quickly as possible when sh*t happens! So for now while I continue to weigh my options, you have another place to see my posts in case this server goes down again and until I ultimately decide what to do. Files have been cleaned and ALL passwords have been changed. Fingers crossed!

Thanks for your patience and continued support!

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Charging Your iPad: What You Should Know

The good news is that so far the iPad battery life is really good.However, there are some things you should be aware of when it does come time to charge it. When Apple introduced the iPad and subsequently put the specs up on their website, the first thing that jumped out at me was that they were specifically calling the fact that the supplied charger was a "10W USB Power Adapter".  

The fact that they were announcing the wattage was an alert to me that the iPad had different power requirements than the iPhone and iPods. Typically if a manufacturer calls something out it's for a reason and I was right. So here's what you need to know:

Continue reading “Charging Your iPad: What You Should Know”

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GoGo In-flight WiFi

Last week I finally got a chance to experience in-flight internet via GoGo WiFi. I had been hearing about this service from my buddies for several months, but was never lucky enough to be on a plane that actually had it. My main carrier is Delta. Delta acquired Northwest Airlines and while they now operate as a single company and make no mention of NWA anymore, the former NWA planes seem to be last on the list to get upgraded with WiFi. So I waited. Not much of a choice when you live near Detroit. It's a Delta hub. 

 

I'm online!

 

How much does it cost?

Continue reading “GoGo In-flight WiFi”

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Apple iPad Review: WiFi Model

It's here! I just spent the weekend with my New Apple iPad: 16GB  WiFi model (I'll also review the WiFi+3G model when it ships) and wanted to give you my in-depth review. It's exciting! As a matter of fact my buddy Bruce was waiting at his office on Saturday for his iPad to be delivered and when the UPS guy got there, they started talking and the UPS guy shared with him how people were following him in their cars and begging him to give them their iPads early before getting to their homes. I can't think of too many products that cause this kind of frenzy. See my Unboxing Video here (it's different than any other iPad unboxing video you've seen 😉 ) On to the review and keep in mind that I've only had the iPad for two days, so I haven't touched every single feature yet, but here's what I've seen and touched so far…

The Hardware

The iPad is another example of Apple's attention to detail. Everything from the packaging to the actual design of the device is top notch. There are just a few hardware buttons. The home button is there just like on the iPhone and iPod touch as well as hardware buttons for the volume controls on the right side, on/off switch on top, a screen/rotation lock on the right and built-in speaker on the bottom as well as headphone jack and microphone on top.

My first impression when I picked it up out of the box was "it feels heavy!" Although it's only 1.5 lbs, I was looking at it from a "hold it with one hand while reading" angle. Since it's a book reader, I would want to hold it with one hand while flipping the pages with the other. I would be easily fatigued if I had to hold it in one hand for more than a few minutes. Holding it with two hands won't be an issue and holding it with one hand as long as you have your knee or a table to rest on should be fine.

The iPad comes with a USB sync/charging cable and a wall charger. 

It's FAST! The iPad is VERY RESPONSIVE. I haven't seen any lags whatsoever. Photos, Apps and everything I've tried so far have been very speedy!

Battery Life – So far so good. Keep in mind that testing for a weekend is not real-world regular use. However,  I can easily see this thing going for 10 hours straight. I haven't run it all the way down yet, so I'll have to report back later on the actual battery life I get when I using it under normal conditions. Also very few will run it for 10 hours straight without a break.

Wi-Fi – The iPad takes advantage of 802.11n. So both range and network speed are GREAT! I must also remind you that this is the WiFi version and therefore will only connect to the internet via a WiFi hotspot. I know that sounds like a "duh" statement, but there seems to be a lot of confusion over the difference between the two models: WiFi and the WiFi+3G model that's coming out later this month.

Continue reading “Apple iPad Review: WiFi Model”

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My iPad is here!

I've been playing with the iPad all day and working on my Full Review that will be posted on Monday. In the meantime I thought you might want to take a look at this unboxing video that I recorded earlier. I think you'll like it 😉

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NGEmRk87qkA

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Nikon DSLR GPS Smack Down Results

 

While there are are several ways now of geotagging your images and some don't care about this at all, I'm a fan of having this location metadata added to my photos as I take them. I applaud Nikon for building this important feature into their DSLR cameras and I also want to thank the various vendors that sent me units to review. However, like anything there are going to be some gadgets that I prefer over others. The good news here is that you really can't go wrong with any of the choices below. They all do what they say they do! While I've used them all and had good results, if I had to narrow it down to a single choice (and I do since I'm not going to carry them all), I would choose the Solmeta N2 GPS. Although I got off to a rough start with it and although I absolutely LOVE the di-GPS mini L and PRO series, if I had to only have ONE of these models it would be the Solmeta. Why? As I indicated in the Solmeta review. I have TWO Nikon bodies. The D700 and D5000. Unfortunately the connector to attach a GPS is different on each one. So while I do really like the di-GPS, the cable is hard wired into it. In order to use theirs with both my cameras I'd have to have two of them (one with each type of connector). The other reason I'd give the nod to the Solmeta is the fact that it does have a compass built-in for Heading. Again, not a big deal to me, but it is a feature that the di-GPS doesn't yet have. Now with that said, if I were only going to use this on my D700 (or if I replace my D5000 with a 300s), then I may lean towards the Dawntech di-GPS Pro L model. It has one feature that I love over all of these other ones and that is a built-in 10 pin terminal pass-through right on top of the unit. This way I can use the remote trigger and extension cable that I've already invested in. Lastly if you want ONE GPS that will work with both your Nikon DSLR AND any other camera, then I'd probably go with the Easytag. It has a generous 2GB MicroSD card and can be used directly with your Nikon OR capture the data and merge it with images from ANY camera later in post.

While I do like the compactness of the Nikon GP-1, it is my least favorite. It doesn't have any of the modern features of the newer models and feels antiquated when compared with the rest. Nikon, it's time to bring out the GP-2.

 

The GPS data is displayed in Lightroom with a link to the actual location on Google Maps

Continue reading “Nikon DSLR GPS Smack Down Results”

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Easytag GPS for Nikon DSLRs

It's Geotagging week here on my tech blog. So today we'll take a look at the latest Nikon DSLR compatible GPS unit I've received and it's called the Easytag. 

The Basics

Like all the rest, you turn it on while you're outside and it picks up the GPS satellite signals and then adds the Longitude and Latitude to your shots so that you'll know where you were when you took them.

 

What I like about the Easytag… Continue reading “Easytag GPS for Nikon DSLRs”

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Solmeta Geotagger N2 GPS for Nikon Cameras: Take 2

It's Nikon DSLR GPS review Week!

I'm a Nikon shooter (you knew that) and I have a fascination for Geotagging. I love the BUILT-IN support that Nikon DSLR cameras have for GPS modules. I've tried a few different ones and of course this lead to different manufacturers wanting me to review theirs. My policy has always been if you want to send me something I'll take a look at it and I'll review it honestly. So you may or may not like what I have to say and as long as you're OK with that, ship it! So I decided to dedicate today, tomorrow and Thursday's posts to this topic and on Thursday I'll declare a winner! By winner I mean that I'll put up a comparison chart detailing what you get with each of the ones I've tried and I'll tell you out of the 4, which is my favorite.

 

Let's start off with a second look at the Solmeta GPS

You might remember a few weeks back I reviewed (or attempted to review) the Solmeta Geotagger N2 GPS unit with direct support for Nikon cameras. My initial review was cut short due to a cable mishap. Turns out I had the wrong cable and while the cable that shipped with my first unit worked, it was in the wrong orientation and therefore caused unnecessary stress that ultimately broke the connector at the base. I reported the problem to Solmeta and they were very responsive and offered a replacement unit. The replacement has arrived and I decided to give it another shot.

 

You're not going to believe this… Continue reading “Solmeta Geotagger N2 GPS for Nikon Cameras: Take 2”