New Laptop–Same Old Issues

As you may have read, I purchased a new laptop last week, and I said I’d answer the question am I happy with it. Well here are my first impressions and feelings on what I’ve purchased and will have to live with for possibly another 5 years.

The packaging of the Vaio can only be described as minimalist. Power lead, check – ooh great the power supply has connectors at right angles to the cable, why can’t all power supplies be like this, less chance of damaging them! Laptop battery – check. Laptop – check. A couple of pamphlets about warranty – and done.  Great not much to throw away.

The out-of-box experience of Windows has never been good – and laptop PCs have often been full of crap-ware. Sony annoyed me instantly – when it got to wireless network connection – um, I checked the store demo laptop and it definitely had 802.11a wireless, but it couldn’t find my 5Ghz network, not happy – this laptop is going back first thing in the morning! Once Windows setup had completed and the machine had rebooted a few times, I got to log in, first stop – network and sharing, change adapter settings and lo’ in their wisdom by default 802.11a is turned off! (The setting is under the advanced driver options – find that if you don’t know what you are doing!) Turn it on, and voila’ I’m on my 5Ghz wireless network – Windows update time (argh!) 2 hours later and multiple reboots, I think I’m done.

The next step is the removal of crap-ware. Sony even give the full instructions to completely remove the “complimentary” anti-virus software on the back of the invoice. This was highlighted by the man in the shop (score one bonus point for customer service), I guess they’ve had complaints. AV gone (three reboots), Microsoft Security Essentials installed and I’m away again. Add, chrome, acrobat, Skype (preloaded, but old version update me please), remove office and install my own copy with OneNote, Outlook et al. Getting there. Acrobat Reader (another preloaded needing update).

Set up Media Centre (no tuner – but the best way to watch Sky Player!) – hmm no Sky Player icon. Some Google time and a few reboots later, I found the solution here. Sky player is a must for couch surfing, but it gets confused if you use multiple browser sessions (or browsers), so it’s easier to use it within Media Centre, then you always know where it is.

Hmm, other things of note to add – GNS3 – it may not do voice interfaces, but for practicing everything else its fine. There are limits onto which versions of IOS you can usefully load on its emulated 3745 & 7200 routers for voice – 7200 for PSTN, 3745s for the rest. Wireshark of course, never know what you might need to look at. Of course putty.  Interestingly, I was able to find 64-bit versions of both of those! Not forgetting chrome  (preinstalled with an update me!).  VMWare – mental note – need more RAM.

I have added the latest Intel wireless drivers, so I can now use WIDI once I purchase the Netgear Push2TV adapter for the other end (surprisingly this is cheaper in the UK than the US – it is just hard to find). This is a feature not advertised at all by Sony – but the combination of wireless chipset and i3-370 provide it (along with the new driver and wireless display software that is).

So once all this was done (its been over a few nights as I remember what I’m missing, not all at once!) the important question – am I happy with what I’ve bought. The short answer is yes. I now use it on my commute (1hour on a train – not the tube/bike sections) in both directions, without having to carry a power supply. I can get a couple of lab problems worked through in that time, or write a blog post (like this one). The screen size (13”) doesn’t bother me, in fact its great as I can watch TV without it being obscured by the top of the screen.The keyboard is comfortable without being too large (although its taking a bit of getting used to the position of home/pgup/pgdn/end one above the other), typing on it is a breeze. As for performance, its handles everything I’ve thrown at it so far – its not a desktop replacement, so I don’t expect it to be one. Sony, you have one happy customer. Time to remove the stickers!

What has happened to laptops ?

Last week my 5th laptop power supply died (after two weeks this time – a new low!) I bought my Toshiba Portege M400 Tablet PC 5 years ago (give or take a few months) when they first hit the shores here in the UK. I was just starting consulting again and the Friday before my first gig was due to start there was a mad rush to Tottenham Court Road in London when my online order had failed to arrive even though it had been ordered for over a month. Anyway the M400 has served me well, been thrown across a car park (only a slight crack in the panel – didn’t affect the operation of the tablet) and survived, eaten a few batteries and destroyed a few power supplies. It owes me nothing now (I think it cost about £1500 when I bought it). It was time to get a new laptop.

My needs have significantly changed since that day, I now don’t need a laptop for anything other than couch surfing (consulting at a company where we are not permitted to connect our own devices to the network, been there for quite a while now) – oh and for the trip to San Jose for the IPExpert boot camp. So I wasn’t prepared to pay >£1000 for a laptop – and I am not prepared to have a Mac – much to the amusement of my anything i-loving co-workers.

I wanted something with a core i processor, at least 4GB of RAM, a decent screen and 5GHz wireless (802.11a/n), oh and not too big or heavy, battery-life must be reasonable i.e. > 3-4hrs. And therein presented myself with a problem.

Firstly what has happened to laptop screens in the last five years – I’m sure they should be better than the one in my tablet – higher resolution, nice to look at – but no! In to the stores with their high-powered fluorescent lighting and all the screens in my laptops of compromise looked washed out and awful. I commented to the knowledgeable gent in the store, and he said yes it is true there has been a significant decline in quality over time – unless you want a mac that is! He did however direct me over to what was to become my eventual winner (more on that later), which had a much more acceptable screen (although still far from perfect). I think it comes down to the obsession with HD 16:9 screens and glossy reflective coatings– which allows manufacturers to create low pixel density screens that’ll do 720p just fine – i.e. 1366 x 768 – now I know my tablet was expensive back in 2006 – but I got 1400x1050 back then (oh dear 4:3ish!) and that was on a smaller panel than on this laptop which I am typing! Want a very nice screen, get a mac, apparently!

What is the obsession with the 2.4Ghz unlicensed wireless band – everything is there! I have one concession to Apple in my house – the magnificent airport extreme. Why did I buy an expensive wireless router when there are plenty of cheapo wireless-N routers out there (and even “cheaper” freebies from ISPs). Because 2.4Ghz is crowded – even in my little cul-de-sac – and my wireless gear is in my study which is a long way (in radio terms) from my lounge – 802.11a was the solution, the airport provided it – right tool, right job! Fast forward 5 years (again) and try finding an Intel-based laptop with 802.11a/b/g/n as standard. Whoops, apparently that is the domain of  AMD processors or “professional”-grade laptops, oh yes and macs!

Laptops, along with the general population, appear to have put on weight, or become cheap plastic easy-crack paper-weights. A laptop with a numeric keyboard – I don’t want to carry around my desktop! I guess with those 15.6” screens at 1366x768 with pixels as big as your fist, there’s a lot of space to fill in the keyboard space! Again macs are built differently – if I remember correctly even the MacBook pro 15” doesn't have a numeric keypad – just a keyboard lost in a big space of silvery metal-looking stuff.

Battery-life, surely there should have been some improvement by now – but it seems the latest mid-range to high-end processors (or is it those dodgy screens again) suck batteries dry quickly. Go for something down the range (no Intel Core i5 or 7 then!) – or something plastic with very tricky power management, and they claim up to 10 hours – but I am just a little sceptical of these claims. Still a realistic 4 hours would be an improvement on my old Tosh, which could manage 2 at a push when brand new, so one for the 2011 models.

So, as you may have guessed, I didn't buy that MacBook air/pro no matter how many times it looked at me and said – “you know you want to!” I’m a Windows person at heart (for desktop / mobile), and I couldn’t handle the sniggering in the office or the extra cash it would have taken for me to purchase one. I ended up with an S Series Sony Vaio (“form over function after all” as one in the office said) – it meets all my criteria and comes in under the price bar. Yes its only an i3/4GB, but its not my desktop i7/12GB and its not meant to be. Am I happy with it ? Well so far, but that's another post!

vRack Thoughts

Since purchasing my IPExpert boot camp, I have started using the vRacks at proctorlabs.com. It has led me to some observations that I had never considered when I thought about how I’d use these and how they compare to my use of the home rack.

As I mentioned previously, I have a home setup that does not include everything that the vRack does, but it has enough gear to allow me to mock up most scenarios. I had expected the vRacks to be a top-up, but the more I use them, the more it is the other way round. Everything you need, so long as you have some physical phones at home that is! Score one to the vRack.

Firstly, I live in England, so I have only one timeslot on proctorlabs that suits – the 1pm GMT slot. This limits my vRacking to Saturday and Sunday, due to that other thing I do called a day job. Finishing (or starting) at 2am is not an option! So come on proctorlabs, can we either have more flexible start times, say starting every 4 hours – I know I’m not the only one who wants this! It would also be handy to be able to book up a time just after the start time for those of us who do just-in-time scheduling ! The always there-ness of the home lab wins on this one

Preparation is key to getting the most out of the vRack session. Read the lab you intend to do before the start time – have an idea of what you are aiming to achieve. Make sure you have those initial gateway configurations on you PC and have modified them to work with your own phones so that you can hit the ground running.

Once signed in and you have the VPN up, make sure your home phones are NOT powered up. This sounds counter-intuitive but when you have sat through a few phone upgrade/type changes (which can happen a bit if you are using a home lab too) you’ll realise that you could have used that 30 minutes better. TFTP is an unforgivingly slow protocol on high latency links – that’s why there’s peer firmware sharing and the Load Server option! Connect to the CUCM publisher, watch the vRack phones auto register, and then turn off auto-registration. Modify the preconfigured phone’s mac addresses to match your own phones – or if you don’t have matching phone types, the recreate the preconfigured phones with your phone type. Once you have your home phones configured, then power them up and connect them.

If you are using a mix of hard and softphones, then check out Mark Snow’s piece at INE on what you can achieve with the different phone types (note to proctorlabs– keep up and get some phone remote control software on your vRacks please!) I had a frustrating time this weekend with global/localization due to the end phone being an IP Communicator – I eventually worked out that it was a limitation of the softphone, but more time lost.

Log into the voice gateways and turn on debugging . Don’t be afraid - this is not a production environment! Being so used to not turning on debugging, it didn’t occur to me that this would be an absolute time-saver. I had an issue this weekend where I was sure my configuration on CUCM was correct – and it was – but didn’t have the dial peers correct on the gateway. Much time and frustration later I turned on debugging and the issue was found in seconds. For SIP/H323 gateways start with debug VoIP dialpeer and for all gateways debug isdn q931, between those two you should find >90% of your issues! I saw this tip from Matthew Berry a few hours later on OSL (check out his website it’s a goldmine of information from someone who passed first time!)

Don’t be afraid to use the proctor guide, you bought those workbooks for the answers as well as the questions! It is interesting to hear people who think using the answers is cheating – but this isn’t the real lab (that would be cheating!). I have found that the proctor guides are a great learning tool. It is also good to know that your solution also works even when it doesn’t match the proctor guide. I’m sure that will help on lab day when they say you can’t do it the way you have learned from the proctor guide. A tip seen many times elsewhere – know at least two ways to configure everything, three if possible!

Finally, enjoy it! What is the point of doing all this hard work, and spending all this money (even if it’s not your own money! – it is my own), if you don’t actually enjoy it! Every time you get on the rack you will learn something new – either about the technology or about yourself – and learning is fun!