Surface Pro 3 Firmware power problems
The May 2016 firmware upgrade had a problem whereby some batteries reported false (lower) battery levels. The August firmware release should fix that: https://www.thurrott.com/mobile/microsoft-surface/78031/microsoft-issues-surface-pro-3-firmware-update and https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=38826. Execute the appropriate msi.
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech, Win8 Tags:
surface pro power problems
I have a surface pro 3. It’s gorgeous and I love it. However sometimes it gets confused and does not start up. I use this page to help me.
When it does start, I notice that the clock has lost some minutes / hours (basically since it was last working). So remember to update that.
Recently on the new patches for win8.1, it seems to power down rather than sleep. I have not quite figured that one out yet.
This is a useful info page on power states and InstantGo. And also windows club.
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech, Win8 Tags:
Outlook multiple email account problems only showing 1 email with Outlook 17.7167.40818
I have multiple email accounts. On the recent wp10 upgrade (14393.189) which I think occurred on September 23, I could only see contents of 1 email account. Various combinations of that: Sometimes all email accounts were shown in the list, sometimes not. When I switched to another email account, it only displayed the title and then the contents showed my Hotmail. Sometimes it just needed to sync. Other times it crashed.
I knew the emails and folders for the other accounts were still there as I got some notifications on the notification screen that I had emails only gmail. When I clicked that, I was able to see the gmail but nothing else. (So that is work around: Send yourself an email and see the notification – but did not seem to work for exchange/outlook based emails).
I tried hard reboot but that did not work.
Fix was to delete the account that was showing (my Hotmail account, luckily with no contacts attached to it) and then reinstall it (had to do that twice, as the hello/pin authentication ended up with a blank white screen. Inbetween the 2 times, I also used the edge browser to log on.
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech, Windows Phone, wp10 Tags:
win10 upgrade and rollback and upgrade
🙂
I had some problems upgrading to win10. I thought I would write down my experiences as I dont think I will be the only one 🙂
I had win8 on my personal laptop, so I decided to take advantage of the free upgrade offer to win10. I have a tool rmprepusb that allows you to boot the image off of a usb. As the iso for win10 is large, I decided to go that way and download it to the usb key, so I would have a way to do the upgrade on other computers.
Problem was that, even though I used the usb key and selected upgrade, it did not do an upgrade to win10, but instead did a new install. This meant that my license key was lost (forever?) and I was now in win10 without a license.
Luckily win10 comes with a rollback feature. Unluckily that did not work for me.
Dont panic.
The trick here is to look into c: drive and rename the windows.old directory. I then reinstalled a virgin win8 with a license key. Once I had that in place, I used my usb key to reboot and get a dos prompt and renamed the existing windows directory to windows.8new and copied the windows.old directory to be windows. Then rebooted into the machine again – and it all seemed to work ok (even had all my programs on the start menu, etc).
I then did the upgrade option for win10 (as I should have done right from the beginning).
I now have a legit license for win10.
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech, Win8 Tags:
Traveling with your baby by plane
As many of you frequent flyer parents know, many of the internet sites and magazines are full of advice and what is said in one country might be very different in another country. Being a frequent traveler family means that what is good according to your friends and colleagues back home may not end up working for you if the need is to be mobile.
We first went with a car seat from the same maker as our pram, Emmaljunga. Emmaljunga is a go to pram if you live in cold and snowy conditions (most of Scandinavia). When using the car seat (Emmaljunga First Class 0+ Base Car Seat) we always felt that the seat wasn’t quite right for us and additionally that the seat was slightly too big to carry around the airport and shops, especially for me. Then we got a car seat from our friend (Maxi-Cosi CabrioFix infant carrier) to borrow for our visit to the UK. After a week or so of usage we upgraded to the Maxi-Cosi Pebble. The Pebble has since travelled with us on several airlines and rental cars (with and without the ISOFIX base) and has been a perfect travel companion for us. It is slightly narrower than some car seats, making it a perfect fit for today’s airplane seats.
So, if you are a frequent traveller, here are a few questions to ask about an infant carrier or baby travel system before you decide what to buy unless you wish to end up with multiple child seats as we did.
1. Do I wish to travel with the baby by air – if the answer is yes, then look at the car seats approved by airlines which you most commonly fly with. Also check the width of the car seat: the Pebble is slightly narrower than the CabrioFix although both are approved by the airlines that we use commonly.
2. Who is most often carrying the car seat – if the mother is carrying the baby, check that the seat is manageable even with weight (take for example 8kg weight and place it onto the seat to test)
3. Does the main user have the patience to use the seat belts to attach the seat to the car – if not an isofix base is a must, but check if your car is isofix compatible. If travelling with taxis or rental cars frequently, a seat which can do both seatbelt and isofix sounds like a perfect match.
4. Do the accessories match your frequent travelling patterns – we have noticed that it is best to have a seat which provides the most frequently needed accessories for example a rain cover, mosquito net and summer cover for sunny and hot places.
5. Does the seat match to the pram/travel system/stroller which you are planning to buy? Nowadays adapters are frequently available but we noticed that some brands have adapters to more models and brands than others.
When travelling by plane with a child with an infant carrier, always check if the airline allows the carrier to be taken into the flight or only up to the gate. If a carrier is allowed to the plane, this might be time to show your loyalty card to see if you could have a row of three seats to yourselves.
A tip: fly on less packed flights and there is more likelihood that the baby carrier can be taken into the flight and there might be a seat available for the carrier between the parents’ seats.
Categories: Frequent Flyer Mum, Mobile Living Tags:
Microsoft band first thoughts
I was in Seattle 2 weeks ago so I bought a band. Here’s my first thoughts:
1. Heavy. It is quite heavy – I feel it when I go running.
2. Battery. Requires charging every 2 days.
3. Waterproof. Cannot handle shower but can handle rain.
4. Heart rate. I’ve noticed big differences between band and and an HRM belt.
5. Pedometer. Big differences between Garmin vivosmart and band – but I am wearing them on different wrists.
6. Cortana. Cant figure out how this works, nor twitter.
7. Music. Why cant I start and stop music?
Things I like:
1. Ecosystem. Its part of the ecosystem so it should get better.
2. Data. It collects a lot of data – including gps when running. Where does it all go? Would be great to have Endomondo interface…
3. Sleep %. Ok one for data freaks but quite interesting to see % efficiency of sleep and how many times you woke up…
Categories: Feeling At Home in New Places, Mobile Living, Nokia Development, Tech Tags:
I lost my Apple TV (ATV/iTV) remote. Here is what to do next…
A few options – most require some pre-prep…
1. PRE-PREP. make sure you have turned on home sharing and you know what the userid is. SOLUTION: Then you can download the remote app from apple: https://www.apple.com/apps/remote/
2. PRE-PREP. add a bluetooth keyboard – better for searches anyway.
3. PRE-PREP. program another remote (eg: your dvd player): http://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201856 – make sure you do not program the power button (because then you can use same remote for apple tv as well as dvd)
4. PRE-PREP. buy a universal remote – I had a Logitech Harmony 550. I had to update s/w: http://support.logitech.com/product/harmony-550-advanced-universal-remote. Setting you use is Media Center.
** top tips for #4 ***
If after updating your Harmony Remote the Apple TV does not respond, please follow these steps:
1. Press the Device button on your Harmony.
2. Select the Apple TV. It will be listed as a Media Center PC.
3. Hold the Harmony within 3 inches of the Apple TV.
4. From the LCD of your Harmony, select the command Unpair.
The Apple TV should now respond to your Harmony Remote. Problem is that this then replaces the AppleTV remote (which we found later :-)) But it is simple job to add it back again (which of course then removes the Logitech :-~)
Categories: Mobile Living Tags:
setup new win8 laptop dell xps12
I wanted to add instructions for setting up a laptop in win8, sort of quick start. Started off by being a quick start for our company. I thought I would then remove the specifics as it makes for quite a general list.
Here are my “top 5” tips for setting up dell xps12
- Laptop. For first few days, bring your other laptop with you – you will need it. Boot it up now. You will need it for the company intranet html pages. A memory key is a good idea too.
- Support. If CIO do not support your laptop, notes below are essential…
- Win8. No point in upgrading an existing virtual machine (or any other win7) to win8 – you lose all your apps anyway.
- Swipe. Learn how to swipe from right, and use search.
- Bitlocker. Before putting in any data, set up bitlocker. Type bitlocker in the swipe search panel & go to manage bitlocker. Bitlocker is really good – it works between win7 and win8. Also works on external drives too.
- F-Secure. Install anti-virus. If you can install already using the memory key.
- Network. There is no fixed LAN connection – use wifi. If you need a fixed connection, get this: Asus WL-330NUL USB All-In-One Wireless-N Pocket Router.
- Wifi. Connect to wifi
- F-Secure. If you did not do this already, do it now.
- WinUpdate. Swipe and search for windows update. Get your system up to right patch level (will probably need multiple reboots). Weird thing – if there are updates pending, win8 freezes on any new installs – but wont tell you why.
- DellUpdate. Dell update client is quite good and I use that (or rather I go to Dell website and get the patches from there)
- Desktop. To get quickly to desktop (traditional windows mode), hit windows key + E – this will launch explorer
- Win8. Download pokki for Windows Start like functionality. http://www.pokki.com/windows-8-start-menu
- Control Panel. Hit windows key + X for quick menu to control panel
- Pinning. I use app pinning (right click icon on bottom bar whilst program is running, to pin to taskbar – essentials are firefox, cisco anyconnect, control panel, onenote/evernote, powerpoint, office stuff)
- Keyboard. (Use control panel & keyboard – might also want to do language & region too). Get Finnish language if it’s not set already. Windows key + space swaps languages.
- VPN. Install your VPN – best option I have seen so far is CISCO AnyConnect.
- Firefox. Use firefox browser for all intranet pages – nothing else really works on Win8: http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/
- Domain logins. Don’t forget to login as
\ – if you don’t do the \ at the beginning, then it assumes you are a local user and you wont get anywhere - Office. I use Office 365 to get my Outlook client, Lync, etc (mail is still stored on company servers). Otherwise you will need to get version (remember that normal company install eg via BMC is not supported). You can access to fileshares if you are on the vpn though.
- Email. Get details of the email server from your old laptop and copy those into Outlook.
- Printers. You are not on Active Directory, so you need to enter the printer ip, eg: \\
\ – usually print server will have most of the printers behind it (install new printer from control panel/devices and printers) - Acrobat. Download adobe acrobat and install – and then make it the default pdf reader. Otherwise you are doomed to always flip back to the Win8 reader (which is not so good).
- Create restore point. This is where I would do the first backup of my system and create restore point. Swipe from right & search for restore in settings.
- Migration. This is first time I would migrate my previous stuff over.
- Displayport. Cheapest & quickest is from Claus Ohlson (but still 20+ EUR). Or from amazon: http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00AAUNHGE/ref=oh_details_o07_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 (10 EUR – but quite chunky). Other options shown at end.
- Handwriting. For tablet to recognise handwriting, it needs to be set to correct language. I pin the keyboard icon to the taskbar to switch often.
OneNote. Seems to have best tablet support. I’ve not tested Evernote in tablet mode. - Performance. Pretty good – but I have had some challenges recently when I leave the laptop on a long time without rebooting & replug to a new display (it could take 20-30 minutes to recover). I updated al patches recently and it seems ok again now.
Some other displayports…
Mini DisplayPort DP to VGA Adapter for Apple MacBook Pro Video Ceed Cable**Supports New THUNDERBOLT Port*
The smallest black HDMI TO VGA with Audio Adapter for PC Laptop to VGA Monitor, Power-Free Support Raspberry Pi…
Mini DisplayPort DP to HDMI Adapter Cable for Apple Macbook, Macbook Pro, Imac, Macbook Air, Mac Mini Laptop *…
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech Tags:
hyper-v: vhd vs vhdx, dynamic vs fixed
Over the last week I’ve installed win8 about 10 times trying to get the right combination. Some things I’ve found out:
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech, Win8 Tags:
Nokia amber lumia updates region availability
Amber update is now available. As of today, only 920 had been made available and then only on a few countries, eg: UK, Ireland, etc. Check this page for updates: http://www.nokia.com/global/support/software-update/wp8-software-update/availability-in-europe/
I have a sim free lumia 820 bought from UK, but live in Finland and normally travel frequently. As far as I can work out, the update depends on which country you are currently in. My guess is that if it is not available for your carrier then you can download via wifi with the SIM card out. And of course you could look on the web, eg: Juan’s sky drive, for Nokia care and download the rom yourself – but I would not recommend it. I have lived through the pain of trying to get my lumia 820 on SFR and it was a horrible experience…
From the page above you can also get a list of new features. The 1 thing I want to see is possibility to save apps to the sd cars on 820, but I don’t think it is there 🙁
Categories: Mobile Living, Tech, Windows Phone Tags: