tools « Anand Prakash

To hell with USB! Way to go eSATA!

Feb 15, 2007 Leave a comment

By now, I have been struggling long enough to run a Virtual Machine whose Virtual HDD is on external drive. I really can’t use the internal HDD (but had to) due to couple of reasons. First, storage limit as thats only 100 gigs (maximum available for laptops). Second, OS is running on internal disk and PC almost freezes at times. Third, I have to run minimum 2 virtual machines, one for Domain controller and another for SQL and TFS. It hardly works with one so forget about two.

But as the post title says it all, the bandwidth USB offers was an annoying bottleneck. Even though I managed an external HDD, it was useless. Theoretically, USB 2.0 supports 60 MB/s but the maximum speed I ever got is 12 MB/s.

There are a million people (at least) who have a lot to say (good and bad) about features in Vista. I really like few of them (but no praising now). The enhancements they did in file copying UI is one of them. First, it tells you the speed and second, it tells you the correct remaining time. This was something MS coudn’t do right since Windows 95. It takes a while to calculate the remaining time thats different story.

Now back to that USB pain. Well I guess gone are the days when I had to put virtual HDD on internal drive. Few days back I found that the SATA standard is upgraded to external SATA (eSATA). Technically it means a lot but for me, it was something which could pull me out of that USB hell. Theoretically, eSATA supports 350 MB/s. This is what I got.

I have read in some reviews that people got up to 60-70 MB/s. I have no idea whats that in my PC which is reducing it to 43. But still, its not bad at all.

What do you need to get this speed? For all of you who are frustrated with USB speed, you need an external drive which supports eSATA port. There are companies (Seagate and iOmega) who are selling these out of the box. But where Seagate is a bit costly, iOmega is only SATA and not SATA-II. Be care full when you buy stuff as SATA is half at speed compared to SATA-II. So, I bought an ICY DOCK eSATA External Enclosure and Seagate 500GB HDD. It saved me around 50 bucks.

Thats for the source of the juice but to connect it to your PC, you need one more component. You have to have an Express Card slot. Then you can get a SIIG SATA II ExpressCard. I am not sure if these controller are available for any other kind of slots. Don’t be sad if you have desktop. All you need is a spare SATA port on your motherboard. The eSATA drives and enclosures comes with an eSATA bracket.

Once you have these three components, you are all set to cruise.

Enjoy!

PS: The links in this post are for the components I selected. There are alternates available for all of them. Leave a comment if you have any question.

Filed under lab, tools

All your HDD needs!

Dec 24, 2006 Leave a comment

As I said earlier (in last post), HDD spinning speed is one of the most important factors to increase PC throughput. But I have experienced that spinning speed is not the only factor when it comes to HDD. I guess there are three most important tasks related to HDD:

1. Preparing the HDD with appropriate partitions. This can be done with windows. But there is one thing which windows cannot do. It cannot resize the partitions with data persistence. So, if you have to resize or split a partition without losing data, you need a specialized app.

2. Backing up the HDD for an unwanted situation when something got messed up and now you have to re-install OS. Believe me on this that the situation will come even if you are playing extra safe because those spy wares and Trojans are one step ahead. By backing up your HDD, you can be back with stable PC within minutes after disaster. I remember those days when every now and then I used to spend nights in re-configuring windows.

3. Keeping the HDD de-fragmented. I know people don’t give it a shit but I have seen the results of keeping HDD de-fragmented. The inbuilt de-fragmenting tool in windows sucks and it sucks big time. It’s no different story even in Vista.

So, what are the available options? Well, let’s keep it to the solution instead of comparing products here. Lately, I have being using three applications for each of the tasks mentioned.

1. When it comes to HDD partitioning, Partition Magic is the first thing which comes in mind as it is being used vastly. But I have been using another better app than this, named Acronis Disk Director Suite. The UI is more sophisticated and this allows you to split even the system (read OS) partition.

2. When it comes to HDD backup and imaging, Ghost is the first thing which comes in mind. Here again, Acronis has a way better software than ghost named Acronis True Image. This works seamlessly. Click here if you want see the comparison of these two posted by someone used Ghost extensively.

Both of these applications can either be used from within the Windows, or used as standalone tool without any operating system. The standalone tools are built on top of a compact Linux kernel and provides comprehensive window based UI.

3. And finally, when it comes to HDD de-fragmenting, first and only thing which comes in mind is Diskeeper. This application is amazing. It keeps your HDD healthy by scheduled and background de-fragmentation. So you don’t have to remember and run the good for nothing defragmenting tool manually. Don’t forget to read the myths about fragmentation on Diskeeper site if you go there.

My experience with all three is excellent. I will highly recommend these. Go grab these super star HDD apps. All of them are $50 each but Newegg will give around 40-50% cheap. Heck, go to torrent sites if you don’t want to pay. Though Acronis apps are as per your needs, Diskeeper is a must have. Your HDD will thank you every time Diskeeper will arrange bits on that platter surface.

Filed under software, tools

Notepad++

Oct 11, 2006 2 Comments

First thing first. Notepad sucks. It adds zero value to (read decreases) your productivity. There is only one reason to use it… its light.

I tried couple of options available but Notepad++ wins for sure. This is open source project, straight forward and easy to use. This can do whatever a normal editor is supposed to do. Adding to that, it supports syntax highlighting and syntax folding for C, C++, Java, C#, XML, HTML, PHP, JavaScript, makefile, ASCII art, doxygen, ASP, VB/VBScript, Unix Shell Script, BAT, SQL, Objective-C, CSS, Pascal, Perl, Python, Lua, Tcl, Assembler, Ruby, Lisp, Scheme, Smalltalk, PostScript, VHDL, FORTRAN, Ada, Caml, AutoIt, KiXtart, Matlab and Verilog. Couple of these I didn’t even heard of .

It has rich set of features. Such as:

Syntax Highlighting and Syntax Folding
WYSIWYG
User Defined Syntax Highlighting
Auto-completion
Multi-Document
Multi-View
Regular Expression Search/Replace supported
Full Drag ‘N’ Drop supported
Dynamic position of Views
File Status Auto-detection
Zoom in and zoom out
Multi-Language environment supported
Bookmark
Brace and Indent guideline Highlighting
Macro recording and playback

For me, the best use is when I say “View Source” from IE. To open source in notepad++, change your default program to open text files in notepad++ using Folder Options.

I know there are are more advanced editors than this. I haven’t tried them all but most of them are kind of real resource hog or complex. If you haven’t use it, give it a try.

All that said doesn’t mean I am saying notepad++ is advanced editorthan Vim or Emacs. But I really can’t think of a text editor for which I have to read tutorials. Really, tutorials for using a text editor. Am I missing something?

PS: There is a basic comparison of text editors at Wikipedia. If you can spare time, try as much as editors from the list.

Filed under opensource, software, tools

itasveer! Online photo printing service

Aug 31, 2006 3 Comments

I have been using an online photo printing service for quite some time. The best part is that this site works in India. So, I upload photos from here and they deliver in India. Kewl? You can upload and get the photos delivered in most of the metros.

No marketting! I am just trying to get some customers for them so that they don’t close the site due to lack of business. ) Jokes apart, I just thought this may also be useful for you. I know its a bit painful to go to Print Shop everytime. The quality is quite good with throw away rates . There might be some other sites but I have no idea about that. Please post if we have other options too.

Go on… use this good service.

Filed under photos, point of view, tools

Browser Wars… the list is long.

Feb 27, 2006 Leave a comment

In last post I said “the competition is on”. Infact its not competition, it is a War. When I tried to analyse about the best performing browser, I got to know that there are around 30 web browsers [may be lot more than 30] with noticable user base. Navigate to List of web browsers at Wikipedia for complete listing.

There is one more article at Wikipedia showing Comparison of Browsers for general and technical features. This article doesn’t give any comparison for the second most important feature, speed. [I'm considering security as first].

There is one more article written by Mark Wilton-Jones on browser speeds after putting them through a number of tests.

I personally feel that Opera out played every browser in the game. At least at Windows if not on Linux and other grounds. The only problem is the rendering problem we face while browsing the sites designed specific to IE.

I suggest Avant Browser for the guys like me who has to browse the sites designed for IE during to application development. This browser is a must have shell created over Trident layout engine. Trident is the layout engine for the Microsoft Windows version of Internet Explorer.

Though not related to this post, I would append one more fact to this post. This may be new to you too that even IE is not developed in Microsoft. Like lots of other applications, they bought the browser from ouside too.

For further reading:
Browser wars
Browser Wars II: The Saga Continues

Useful Link:
Opera 9.0 Preview 2 is now available for download

PS: Though I used Opera earlier, I thank Amit [my flat mate] for turning me back to this excellent browser.

Filed under point of view, software, tools

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