Case example: the Sony SPK-HCE waterproof case for video cameras. I tried to find a good, in-depth review, or even just a blog post by someone who had used one and could shed some light into wether dumping over 200€ on this thing is worth it. However, searching for “SPK-HCE review” on Google returned 1660 results, of which the third goes to ZDNet, in fact, the Google summary says “Get the full unbiased review of SPK-HCESPK-HCE at ZDNet Reviews. Each review comes complete with video or image galleries, Camcorder Waterhousing …”. Bullshit! Click on the link, and land here (click for full-size version):

So…you are showing me ZERO ratings, and ZERO reviews, but at least a dozen links to online stores where I can’t even buy this accessory, but a whole different camera!! Google: you suck, you cannot tell SEO-laden pages apart from good review sites, and ZDNet: you suck too, for polluting the Internet with shitty useless content designed to fool users and drive revenue.

Had to buy a new DECT cordless phone today, as the kids finally managed to bust the only remaining good unit in the house – so I went shopping for a Siemens, as they have proven to be the most trustworthy and abuse-taking phones. This is the one I got, thinking how nice it would be to use the built-in Bluetooth to sync my agenda and use a headset for long calls:

Or so claimed the blurb, soon to be proven wrong. First attempt, sync my Mac’s address book, should be easy enough. The phone supports exchange of files in vCard format, but it failed to actually receive any, it just sat for ages with a ‘Transferring data’ message on the screen, until it bombed with not even an error message. Sending from the phone to the Mac failed equally well.

I then tried to pair my Jawbone headset with the phone, which was mostly uneventful (although it took two tries to get the headset into the preferred devices list). Dial a number. Press the call button on the headset so that it takes over. Watch nothing happen. Attempt to pick up an incoming call by pressing the headset button – fail again.

So off I went to the Bluetooth SIG to check the PICS on this piece of crap, and lo and behold, there it was – the SL560 supports Bluetooth 1.2, which in itself should not be a problem, if the right profiles are supported (and correctly implemented of course!). This is where things turn south, on the audio side, the phone only supports the Audio Gateway (AG) role, which is confusing to many headsets out there, which expect either a handsfree or headset profile to be available. Headset (HS) is specifically NOT supported on the SL560. Thus, expect many headsets to fail talking to this phone.

On the data front it doesn’t fare much better, with object push client and server supported, but only the basic requisites are implemented, being information on supported content, authentication and PIN exchange, object push, and vCard 2.1 format. Nothing else like business card exchange, or calendaring formats are supported. I have to try sending a contact from a Windows PC, as it wouldn’t be the first time Apple implements something in funny ways (maybe OS X supports vCard 0.1 Beta, who knows!).

Conclusion? This phone is going back to the shop tomorrow, and I’ll be getting a less fancy, more standard Siemens. Bluetooth SIG, it’s about time you start policing manufacturers with some degree of accountability, not merely watching the compliance reports come in. I can certify my Bluetooth device with just one test rig, and not test it with any real-world device, and still claim it is Bluetooth compliant, and I know from experience that such a device is bound to fail.

I wrote before about the Logitech MX5000 Bluetooth keyboard & mouse combo, and there are plenty of posts around the web that confirm that the product sucks – badly.

To recap a bit, the problems are random reboots of the keyboard, disconnections of keyboard and mouse, erratic mouse behavior (including spontaneous motion of the cursor), and repeated keystrokes after the keyboard has not been used for a few minutes (resulting in things like “aaaaaaaafter the news…”). In all, a very frustrating and annoying experience, for a rather expensive combo. Logitech seem to acknowledge the problem, but I have not yet seen any form of update that could fix this, and my theory is that the problem cannot be fixed with a simple software update.

Declaring the keyboard and mouse defunct, I performed an autopsy, which revealed a few interesting facts (details after the jump):

• The Bluetooth dongle has a very very strange RF design – it uses a normal groundplane meander PCB antenna, but then it has a copper-wire loop antenna on top.
• Dongle and keyboard use Bluetooth chipsets from different manufacturers (CSR and Broadcom), in theory interoperable, in reality…well.
• The touchpad uses a very crappy sensor design, which explains the lack of responsiveness and uselesness of the scrolling controls.

Let’s start with the dongle. Below are a couple of photos of the opened device, the first with the loop antenna in place, the second with it removed, showing the meander. If someone with better RF knowledge than me can explain why this makes sense, I would be grateful. The design of the loop itself is wrong for 2.4GHz, having a wire length about 10 times larger than what would be required given its size.

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Leaving aside regulatory issues that may turn this particular setup into an illegal operation, I will better not describe the quality of the installation to be polite. Check out this picture:

Spotted the problem yet? Radio antennas are affected by any element that is present around them, even non-metallic elements, such as the ground. In this particular case, kanijo, a Fonero, has attempted to provide more “range” to his FON hotspot, which is in itself commendable, however, the means may not result in the desired end – original FON forum thread here.

You can see that the vertical omni antenna, a carefully tuned radiating element, has been strapped to a metallic pole, which also runs a coaxial cable into a TV antenna right on top. The router is inside a sealed plastic box, with power and Ethernet going into it from below. There is no way that this antenna is radiating correctly, as the pole that supports it is probably grounded (if it has been installed according to regulations), and even if it is not, it is inducing an imbalance into the tuned element, causing a large amount of RF to be attenuated. The user reports good results with it, which are most likely due to good luck.

The second problem with this type of setup is that vertical antennas don’t emit downwards, and thus will provide very limited coverage to users below the antenna. There is some downwards bleed of course, but it will only reach lower users that are some distance away from the antenna.

Recommendations for these sort of setups: install the antenna right at the top of its own pole, and ground the pole. If you have no choice but to use an existing pole, get a T arm fitting and mount the antenna at least 1 meter (3 feet) away from the pole. A perfect example of such as setup, in this case with two supports as the antenna is rather large and care for wind load is needed, is this (credit to Roger Halstead):

Check out Roger’s page, it is a very good read if you are interested in radio installations.

Went to my local Vodafone store to pick up the new Huawei E220 HSDPA USB modem, which with a 49 Euro monthly contract gives you 1GB of transfer at 1Mbps maximum, and free mobile to fixed landline calls – pretty good deal if you ask me. For 59 Euro you get 5GB of transfer, at the full 3.8Mbps that HSDPA offers. These are theoretical rates, as they will depend on a number of factors, such as how many people are also using the same cell, your coverage and the quality of the link.
We can argue all we want about how convenient WiFi is, being omnipresent et al, but in reality, it’s rather hard to get connected while on the road. Let’s examine the following scenarios, and you tell me the chances of getting connected over WiFi:

• Riding the train or bus home.
• Getting a lift from a friend in his/her car.
• Opening your laptop at a random location (cafeteria, bar, etc. that you haven’t before scouted for open WiFi).
• On a plane, waiting for the next free takeoff slot that you hope the pilot won’t miss because he was checking the fatness of his wallet.

Let’s be honest – free open WiFi is great once you have identified the locations where you can get connected, such as a friend’s house or the local coffee shop. Other solid commercial alternatives make it easier to find WiFi, as they tend to be present at well-known locations. Walk into any Starbucks or hotel, and you’re bound to find at least for-pay wireless.
For me, on the 30 minutes to 1 hour it takes to get home on the train or bus, being able to get connected is great. The convenience of simply opening the Mac and getting online beats the guesswork of WiFi. I tried getting the Mac working with my Nokia N93 over Bluetooth, but it was just too unstable – one day it worked, the next simply refused to even connect. A more in-depth review of the device is coming, once I get a chance to roam about with it for a while.

So far, installation on the Mac was pretty straightforward, download the setup package from Vodafone’s site (they don’t tell you this in the manual), which then enables the modem as a networking device. If you don’t follow this step, it can get recognized as a storage device, which is not particularly useful for a modem. The one thing I don’t understand is why it comes with a miniUSB cable that ends in two USB connectors, my guess is it’s power-related (some USB ports don’t provide the full 500mA they are supposed to provide).

Finally, after months and months of hype and excitement, AllPeers launched. In Beta of course, lest it not be considered a Web 2.0 company.

Me and a friend installed the FireFox plugin, and fired it up. To start with, the buddy search mechanism is terrible. I actually typed my friend’s name, got a result, and added it to my roster – turns out it wasn’t even his profile. You cannot see details about the search results, which is a problem. With Skype, for example, sometimes you can turn up a dozen of hits on a buddy search, but at least you can get an idea of who is behind each result.

Once added a friend, it was time to share some files. I added a couple to my shared folder, and the files showed up there. My friend could not see them. I refreshed, and the files dissapeared. By the time I ended the test and decided to remove the plugin, I still hadn’t managed to get the files to stay put. My friend shared one file. It showed up twice on my screen (?!). The actual download of the file went well, but after that, the files also dissapeared from his screen.
There are a lot of bugs as it stands – at one stage, I had a buddy selected, but the screen showed “When ABC shares some files, you will see them here”, where ABC was my nickname. When I removed a buddy from my list, I could still see his shared files until I changed the folder view!
Frankly, platforms such as Pando work much better in terms of stability and ease of use. I am sure AllPeers will eventually iron out the issues, but right now, the service is a non-starter. This post also talks about the system being built upon a bug in FireFox, which when fixed will kill its ability to work as a P2P endpoint – any confirmation on this?

I have just returned from a vacation, interluded by a couple of trips – one of them to DEFCON, the world’s largest hacker conference. This year, it ran at the Riviera hotel and casino in Las Vegas at the beginning of august.

There was plenty to see and do, from conferences as interesting as war-rocketing to an insight into the US-VISIT program, and it’s plans to implement RFID tags into the green visa waivers, or the 2D barcode receipts given out at airports.

I participated in the wardriving events, organised by Thorn, and which consisted of the Running Man and Fox Hunt competitions. Our team was led by Renderman, and we had some backup that put up some noise (fake APs, floods, etc.) to make the contest more interesting.

The Running Man started well, but unfortunately the other team tripped casino security by walking past their booth with a magmount omni antenna on each shoulder, a laptop, several WiFi cards dangling from their belts, a YellowJacket, and other gear – apparently, the IT guys freaked out, and they wanted the contest shut down. After the intervention of Ross and Priest, we were allowed to carry on, but limiting the search area to the venue, and not the whole casino. After the contest resumed, we found the Running Man in around 15 minutes, and won!

The second contest, Fox Hunt, consisted of a hidden WRT54G that was only on for 15 seconds every minute. One was supposed to locate the fox, connect to it, and change the SSID after brute-forcing admin account. 15 seconds to do all that is not a lot! So, our plan was to locate the fox….and make a run with it to a safe place, so we could kill the 15 second timer circuit, reduce the amount of RF leaking out and have a go at changing the SSID. The first part of the plan went well, but then the other team got slightly miffed, called Thorn, who in turn called us to go back to the contest table with the WRT so the other team could also have a go at it.

Interestingly, Thorn had taped the admin password to the bottom of the router, but neither team noticed it! In fact, the other team ended up brute-forcing the AP and changing the SSID. We contested that since when we removed and reapplied power to the AP, the SSID went back to its default, we had in fact won, but Thorn wasn’t having any of it. The contest was a tie, which was decided by the question “Who owns the OID 00:00:00?”, the answer to which is Xerox. We got it wrong, and so we lost. Next year we will be better prepared for sure.

Here are a few pictures from the event:

Thorn and Renderman giving their presentation on the Church of Wifi, with CoWPatty, the WPA rainbow table generator, and the WRT54G mods, which included my WaRThog.

The war-rocketing guys, and their awsome rocket. I wonder how they got that thing past airport security.

The WaRThog on the left, with two more of CoWF’s modified WRT54Gs.

If you used DEFCON’s wireless network to check your email, access your corporate network, etc., but didn’t use any form of security (VPN, SSH…), you are bound to be in the Wall of Sheep. It displays captured user names, passwords, domains and access methods – I actually had the two colleagues travelling with me show up here, even though I told them to not even open their laptops while at the con.

See you next year!

Believe me, I tried. Frustration was high, but so were spirits. The challenge: to purchase videos from Apple’s US iTunes store, while not being a United States citizen, nor living in the country.

For some obscure reason which they don’t make public, but one can guess emanates from the RIAA, Apple does not allow you to purchase music or other content in their iTunes stores, unless you are from the country that the store belongs to. So, a UK citizen cannot buy music in the US iTunes store, and so on. Fine. Whatever DRM was for…

It is very frustrating to see that in your music store, Bowling for soup only has some 70 songs available, whereas the US music store has 150 songs.

Being based in Barcelona, Spain, I was stuck in the spanish iTunes store. The Office videos (both seasons), were however stuck in the US iTunes store. I would have been quite happy to pay the $2 they asked for each show. I firmly believe in paying fair prices for good, reliable content, and so I set about trying to break down the barriers set against being a satisfied costumer.
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