The Linx 7 Windows 8 Tablet

The Linx 7 Windows 8 tablet can be found (at the time of writing) for about £60 from laptopoutletdirect on eBay.

I couldn't quite see why I wanted one but gave in to the urge and bought it.

The seller was great. UK stock and in my hand in a few days.

It's a bit narrower (in portrait) then my Asus HD7 but is nice to use. There is no apparent laggyness for simple Windows tasks like surfing and e-mails.

I suspect games would be a bit more taxing for it.

It is no desktop replacement but I can see it will replace my Android tablet for travel.

You can use HDMI for bigger screens.

Battery life seems OK.

All in all, a good purchase it seems.

There is a website which seems to be the UK distributors, Exertis (UK) Limited.

http://www.linx-tablets.com

This is generally helpful but I have one issue with the FAQs:

Q Can you add the tablets to a network?

A No, they do not support domain joining so you wouldn't be able to add to a network.

My beef with this is that from the perspective of an office/business network it is true, but for domestic use on a workgroup type network it plays fine. I had no problems finding network drives or printers. So, drag and drop material from any network share you like to and from the Linx 7 tablet.

Just in case their website goes AWLO, their support phone number is +44 (0)1282 858 893 and e-mail customerservices@exertis.co.uk

The EE Buzzard (Part 2)

Having used this for a few days it seems fine.

The "generic" administration window seems to come up if it thinks you are on a mobile browser. If it thinks you are on a desktop computer (correctly or not) it gives a "lightly branded" EE desktop.

The whole business of finding out how much data you have left seems slightly hit and miss, although this is essentially an EE problem not specific to the EE Buzzard.

Either in the car or used with a different power supply (for example a "Juice Pack" or USB charger) it works well in a hotel room or (subject to coverage) on a train.

The Huawei E8278 AKA EE Buzzard In Car WiFi (part 1)

This looked interesting when first advertised but was a bit pricy. Some months later EE are launching/have launched the EE Buzzard 2 (which is physically more of an "In Car WiFi" but arguably less generally useful) and the first model is/was available from Amazon for £30.

It comes in a plastic container which is cup holder sized (more of a marketing gimmick than a practical way of storing it) containing a car lighter socket to USB adaptor, the WiFi modem itself and a SIM card and instructions (in the bottom).

Ignoring for a moment the "in car" aspect, plugged into a USB power supply, it makes a reasonable WiFi hotspot. If you want the hotspot portable use a "juice pack" such as a Nokia DC-16.

If you put EE's supplied SIM in it (or a similar one bought from Amazon or Argos) it works straight away.

There is a simple (and it seems not operator modified) management page at 192.168.1.1 with login and password of "admin" by default. The o2 version (not sold for in car use) seems heavily o2 branded.

I've yet to experiment with another operator's SIM in it (and with EE doing good deals at the moment for 3 months of PAYG 4G) I've no reason to do so but initial impressions are good.

Mending iTunes "Genius" function

I quite like iTunes but I get my music either from CDs or Amazon downloads. Both of these sources seem to cause trouble with the iTunes "Genius" system.

There isn't much you can do if your song isn't well known so iTunes can't find out what songs go with it (I believe it uses playlists including songs to aid recommendation) but sometimes it just won't work with many fairly well known songs.

A form of fix for this seems to be to delete the Genius file in iTunes (not as scary as you might think).

Exit iTunes then find  iTunes Library Genius.itdb (probably under your profile).

Restart iTunes and it will re-download the Genius info.

Hope it helps someone.

A free giffgaff SIM

If you would like a free giffgaff SIM with £5 of extra credit when you top up then click this link.

http://giffgaff.com/orders/affiliate/stadium

Hope it is of use.

If you do order and activate a SIM I also get a £5 bonus.

I'm quite a fan of giffgaff, other than for very light use it is a reasonable offer in the UK mobile market.

To price your usage on giffgaff try:

http://giffgaff.screet.co.uk

To see if giffgaff suits you see: 

www.paygdeal.co.uk

Windows 8.1 and the Maplin LAN Disk

I have a couple of old IDE drives which were surplus from old computers in Maplin LAN Disk cases.

These make an IDE drive into a NAS device but don't play nicely with Windows 7 or, it seems Windows 8.

We have a new, rather plastic, Compaq laptop and after a degree of culture shock I've got the printers etc. working with only a bit of a tussle.

The Buffalo "herd" was found straight away (as curiously was the TV) but no sign of the LAN Disks.

My guess is that you have had a similar problem with these slightly anonymous devices.

Mine has firmware NAS-BASIC45, LOADER 67 and when you log in says "Network Storage Series".

Anyway, following the approach used for Windows 7, the way to deal with this seems to be to put the IP address of the device then the folder name so, if the unit has IP address 192.168.1.230 and the folder PUBLIC then open Windows Explorer (the file explorer not the browser) and enter \\192.168.1.230\PUBLIC the folder will open and you will see your files (I don't have passwords on the folders).

You can drag the shortcut from Windows Explorer to the desktop so you can get there again without further faff.

Hope this helps.