Custom Computer Parts List For Windows 7 PC

I just built a PC that I wanted to be small-ish, quiet, powerful enough to play the latest games, and reasonably priced. While one can spend many hundreds more and eek out a bit more performance, the additional gains will be minimal. This setup plays current games, including my favorite Starcraft 2, like a champ and costs under $1370 as of this writing:

Parts List

Samsung XL-2370-1 23-Inch Widescreen LED LCD Monitor $310

Intel Core i3 CPU i3-530 2.93GHz $114

MSI N460GTX Cyclone768D5/OC 768 MB Overclocked Graphics Card $185

Corsair CMPSU-450VX 450-Watt Power Supply $70

Corsair 4GB DDR3 RAM $94

SilverStone MicroATX Midsize Tower Case TJ08B $95

OCZ 60 GB Vertex 2 Solid State Drive (SSD) $150

Gigabyte GA-H57M-USB3 Motherboard $120

Lite-On 24X SATA DVD+/-RW Dual Layer Drive $25

SIIG USB Mini Keyboard $22

Logitech Wireless Performance Mouse MX $80

Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit System Builder $100

AT&T 3G MicroCell Review and Recommendations

The MicroCell is an interesting product. Some believe it is a product filling holes in a carrier’s network that shouldn’t exist. No carrier has blanket coverage and often even when there is coverage, it is worse indoors so it is nice that products like this do exist.  For $150, you can pick up an AT&T MicroCell from any AT&T store.  This is a cheaper option than some alternatives and worth consideration if you have little coverage at home or work.

Setup

Account setup is rather simple and done through a website.  You provide your address and phone numbers and that’s it.  You are limited to 10 phone numbers that can work through a MicroCell.  The good news is that it is locked down by phone numbers so your neighbor can’t use it.  Your address info is verified by GPS in the MicroCell during startup.  Unfortunately, this means the device needs to be near a window so it can get a GPS signal.  This is the oddest thing about it but apparently a requirement by the FCC.  If the GPS light does not come on, you need to move it closer to a window.  In some cases, you may need to try various windows at your house until you finally are able to get GPS.

Once you get GPS and are connected to your Internet, you can move the device as long as it doesn’t lose power.  This might be easy if are just relocating it in the same room.  If you are moving to an area with no windows, you’ll need a battery backup solution.  A cheap good option is the Tripp Lite Compact UPS.  Once you get GPS by a window, you can unhook the ethernet and move the MicroCell and UPS (uninterrupted power supply) wherever you like.  Of course, if you ever lose power for longer than your UPS can last, you’ll have to go through that whole process again to set it up.  This battery backup approach can make sense though because placement is very important.

Performance

AT&T claims a 40 ft range.  This is pretty decent and works out to an area of about 5,000 square feet, even more if you have 2 floors.  You’ll drop about 1 bar of coverage per major obstacle (like a wall) so to cover a whole house, you’ll want to put the MicroCell in the most central location.  Unfortunately, central often means no windows, hence the need for the UPS approach.

Even if you’ve got 5 bars and are sitting right next to the MicroCell, your call quality might be awful if your Internet isn’t good.  This is often the cause of any VoIP (voice over Internet protocol) issues and everyone’s assumption that their Internet is good.  To test the VoIP quality of your Internet, visit this VoIP test site.  If you don’t do well on those tests, you shouldn’t consider any VoIP products.

Assuming you’ve got good Internet and good bars, the MicroCell performance is very good.  You’ll know you’re connected because your phone will say something like AT&T M-Cell instead of just AT&T.  If you’re far from the MicroCell or have many walls between it and you, your performance may suffer so be sure to place it near where you expect to make most calls.  If you’re heavily using your Internet, streaming a video for example, your call quality may suffer if you don’t have your router setup properly.

Router Optimization

The MicroCell can go between your router and DSL/Cable modem but additional routers is rarely a good thing.  We recommend you hook the MicroCell up to your router so it can plug in anywhere on your network. We don’t recommend the use of a wireless bridge as wireless can be too sporadic for VoIP.  To optimize MicroCell performance, it should be given high priority in your router’s QoS (Quality of Service).  The MicroCell MAC address is on the bottom of the device.

Alternative

Before the MicroCell, the best alternative was the zBoost YX-510 Cell Phone Booster.  This is around $300 and requires that you have some signal near a window or in an attic.  Coaxial cable is run from an antenna to the zBoost repeating antenna.

Conclusion

If you’ve got poor Internet but some outside signal, the cell phone booster is your best bet.  If you’ve got good enough Internet, the MicroCell is a cheaper and superior option.  You may not like having to pay for such a device but it is a one time fee that should simply make your AT&T phones work at home.

DC eCycling April 24 2010

Celebrate Earth Day by Recycling Computer Equipment this Saturday

From the EPA’s eCycling Day 2010 page:

Join us in celebration of Earth Day as we host our 4th annual eCycling event. Bring your unwanted computer and computer-related equipment (computers, monitors, keyboards, printers, etc.) and cell phones for free recycling. This year, EPA and cooperating organizations will collect unwanted computer equipment on Saturday, April 24, 2010, from 10:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. at the Plateau, National Harbor (PDF) (1pg, 147 KB, About PDF) in Prince George’s County, Maryland. Don’t forget you are responsible for removing data from computers before drop-off.

Paperless Office in a Snap

Simplicity

The paperless office is the holy grail of organizers. It would be great to scan paper and then throw it right away, only to rely on the electronic scans.  In my experience, these paperless implementations typically fail because they are too complicated and don’t offer real improvements over paper filing.

For the system to work, the workflow should have 1) very few clicks, and 2) the ability to create files that are fully searchable because they have embedded text created through OCR (Optical Character Recognition). Without this OCR function, you would need to properly name and categorize every document to be able to find it easily. That just takes too long. But with documents created with embedded text, you can use your computer’s search to find the document based on any text it contains.

ScanSnap S300M

There are many ways to go about creating such a system.  My favorite is to use a Fujitsu ScanSnap S300M paired with a Mac. It is fast, scans in duplex, and can be part of a simple automated system through the use of Apple scripts.ScanSnap S300M

Setup Steps

Below are my steps to setup everything. Thanks to Joe Kissell of MacWorld for this post and the update post which I used heavily.

  1. Buy a ScanSnap S300M and Apple computer with Mac OSX Snow Leopard.
  2. Install ScanScap software (for me v2.2 came with the ScanSnap).
  3. Download ScanSnap upgrade to make it compatible with Snow Leopard.
  4. Install Adobe Acrobat (not included with ScanSnap S300M)
  5. Open System Preferences. Open Universal Access. Check off Enable access for assistive devices. This is necessary for the script in the next step. (NOTE: SEE UPDATE OF THIS STEP FOR OS X MAVERICKS)Enable Assistive Devices
  6. Download ocr-this-acrobatscpt.zip and extract the Action Script file which I modified from MacWorld. Copy the scpt file into the folder /Library/Scripts/Folder Action Scripts. (NOTE: I modified this file so that it would work on the scan after it was finished. On long scans, the original MacWorld script failed because it tried to open the file while it was still being created. I also have this run only on pdf files and have Acrobat close when the process is finished.)
  7. Right-click (Control-click) on your scans folder (I use Documents/ScanSnap) and click Folder Actions Setup... Select OCR This (Acrobat).scpt, and click on Attach. Click Enable Folder Actions. Close the window. Folder Actions Setup
  8. Open the ScanSnap Manager Settings. Here is where you set up your Profiles to be able to quickly choose scan settings. I create profiles for Single Sided, Double Sided, Continuous (see Step 12), different qualities (Step 10), and Pictures Step 11). See Workflow Step 1 below for all the profiles that I use. Unfortunately the Standard profile can not be deleted or renamed.
  9. On all the Profiles (except Continuous scanning; see Step 12), in the Applications tab, I select Scan to File. This option does not ask where to save the file and simplifies the workflow. It simply saves the file with the location and name format used in the Save tab. I use the Documents/ScanSnap folder that has the Apple Script enabled.ScanSnap Application Tab
  10. On the Scanning tab, note the options for Image quality: Normal (Fastest) (Color: 150dpi, Monochrome: 300dpi); Better (Faster) (Color: 200dpi, Monochrome: 400dpi); Best (Slow) (Color: 300dpi, Monochrome: 600dpi); Excellent (Slower) (Color: 600dpi, Monochrome: 1200dpi). I use Better for most documents and Best for Pictures. This tab is also where you set Single-sided, Double-sided (Duplex), and Continue scanning after current scan is finished for the profiles where you want those options. The continue scanning option lets you scan documents, then add more documents to the feeder, keeping all of them in one file.
  11. For pictures which don’t need to be OCR’d, I save that to a different file location (I use Documents/ScanSnap Pictures) . Under the Scanning tab chose the Color mode of Color. The File Option tab should have jpg selected for the format. I also compress the file less (making a larger file).
  12. If you want to use the Scanning tab option Continue scanning after current scan is finishedContinue Scanning.. that profile should have the Application tab select Scan to FolderScan to folderThis is because the pause in scanning could be too long and the script would attempt to OCR the file while still being created. The Scan to Folder option should be used with the Save tab saving the file to a different temporary folder (I use Picturtes/ScanSnap Temp but anywhere works. Nothing is stored here permanently). Then when you scan a document and the scanning is complete, you are asked where to save the file (by default the last location is shown). Then save it to the ScanSnap folder that has the Action Script enabled. Note: the Continue Scanning feature allows you to scan documents, then provides you with the following message in order to continue scanning into the same file until you are complete. Continue Scanning Message
  13. On the Paper size tab, I leave Automatic detection selected and check off Scan mixed paper size.Paper size

Workflow Steps

Now to the workflow for using this.

  1. Select a Profile if it changed. Before scanning, click the ScanSnap Manager icon in the dock. Choose the appropriate profile. The profile stays the same unless you change it, so if you are scanning the same kind of document that you last scanned, this step is not necessary.Select a Profile
  2. Scan. Put the document in the ScanSnap scanner. Press the SCAN button on the ScanSnap. That’s it. If everything is set up correctly, the document will be scanned, opened automatically in Acrobat within 7 seconds (I have a delay in the AppleScript to make sure that the scanning is complete), have text recognition performed, and then saved with the date and time of the scan.
  3. Move file to a folder. I then take the newly created file and move it to one of 10-20 folders, remembering that file categorization is not critical because any file can be found through a search for the embedded text using Spotlight. I create folders under the scan folder just to keep everything in one spot. (Note: This required me to modify the Apple Script to only look for pdf files. Otherwise, it would attempt to OCR anything, including a new folder.) By using Cover Flow, you can see the files without opening them, making it easier to categorize them into folders.ScanSnap files in Cover Flow

Done

That’s it. Okay, it’s not quite a snap to set up. But once you have it working, it is a system with very few clicks that should encourage you to get rid of paper.

There are many other approaches to simplify the scanning and OCR process. You can look at the MacWorld article referenced above or this DocumentSnap article on creating a Droplet. Let me know if you have improvements to this process or have other ideas for a simple scan/OCR workflow.