CTO Tech Blog

At some point in our lives I think everyone faces this question in one form or another.  In many cases the answer is obvious and in others it is very complex.  With PCs and servers the answer tends more toward the complex end of the scale.  We need to first find the reason for asking the question.  Is the computer performing poorly?  Is it not working at all?  Does a new application call for higher specifications?  Many questions immediately come to mind when faced with a broken or poorly performing computer.   How old is the system?  Has something recently been added that may have caused the problem?  How is the system used?  Is it a home computer used for email or games or is it used to generate income?

Poor performance may not indicate that a system is ready for retirement.  Performance can be affected by a number of factors including malware, fragmentation, or even the number of icons on the desktop.  When you consider that replacing a computer will require reloading of all programs and restoring data, it makes sense to first attempt to do the same to your existing computer.  Most PCs now come with recovery disks that will wipe the system out and restore it to the original factory condition.  You may even find that when you start to reload your programs there are a number that you no longer use.  Restoring the system to factory condition will ensure that files are not fragmented and any malware that may have been present will be eliminated.  This is also a good time to make a copy of your data to store in a safe place.

If restoring the system to its original state does not make enough of a difference then it may be that current operating system and software demands are too high for your hardware.  This can happen because newer software and operating system updates are often more demanding on resources.  At this point you have reduced your system to only the bare necessities and have gathered and tested all of your applications by doing the earlier restoration.  Make a list of your applications to have available when you look at new PCs to make sure there are no compatibility issues.

In some cases a system is too old to even consider restoring to its original state.  If you are running an operating system earlier than Windows XP or Server 2003 then you are due for a replacement.  Systems this old are at risk of hardware failure and most are also very large power consumers.  CRT displays are also more power hungry than their flat panel equivalents, which also provide clearer and brighter images.

How a system is used is another factor to consider.  With malfunctioning hardware on a business PC or server, it would be wise to consult a technician to estimate the cost and time involved to repair a system compared to replacing and restoring it.  The reduced cost of down time combined with potential productivity gains can often outweigh the expense  of repairing a failed system.  Home PCs are usually not as critical although some would argue that point.  A home PC that is used for video games would benefit from newer and faster hardware, where a system that's used mainly for email and web browsing would not see as much.  I should also touch on the cost of data recovery when a hard disk fails.  If you don't have a current backup of your data you can expect to pay anywhere from $900.00 to $3000.00 to have data professionally recovered and even these services are not always successful.  Once again I can't stress enough how important it is to backup your data on a regular basis.

On a final note, some may have noticed that there was no blog posted last week.  Ironically my home computer failed half way through writing my blog (about computer failures) and I lost my current work.  Fortunately I was already preparing to replace my system and had the new one almost configured.  Of course I also had a current backup to restore my data from.

On January 1st the British Columbia government imposed a new law restricting drivers from using handheld devices such as cell phones and GPS units.  The need to create this law and the associated fines might seem a bit surprising considering that 15 years ago hardly anyone had a cell phone and only a very small percentage of those who did had any kind of electronic messaging on them.  It seems that there has been a change in people's expectations when they communicate because of the increased availability that cell phones create and tolerance for someone being "unavailable" is low.  So how does someone stay connected while still being a safe and legal driver?  In short we can't yet, but there are technologies to fill some of the gaps.

Bluetooth is probably the most well known and used hands free solution for cell phones.  Originally designed as a wireless replacement protocol for RS232 serial connections, it uses multiple frequencies to transmit data making it more resistant to interference.  Since voice data is time sensitive in that the listener can hear delays and retransmissions, Bluetooth is an excellent technology to carry voice to cell phones. Many other devices such as GPS units and computers are equipped to use Bluetooth as a unified standard for communication.  Unification is the main intention of the designers as noted on Wikipedia:

"The word Bluetooth is an anglicised version of Danish Blåtand, the epithet of the tenth-century king Harald I of Denmark and parts of Norway who united dissonant Danish tribes into a single kingdom. The implication is that Bluetooth does the same with communications protocols, uniting them into one universal standard.^[1][2][3] Although blå in modern Scandinavic languages means blue, during the Viking age it also could mean black. So a historically correct translation of Old Norse Harald Blátönn could rather be Harald Blacktooth than Harald Bluetooth.

The Bluetooth logo is a bind rune merging the Germanic runes  (Hagall) and   (Berkanan)."

Many cell phones and GPS devices use speech recognition to dial numbers and enter destination addresses.  Combined with Bluetooth earpieces or microphones built into cars, they can be used with very little manual interaction.  In fact, some devices such as the Apple iPhone and RIM BlackBerry also have available applications to read emails aloud.  Speech recognition for dictating emails and text messages is in limited use on some devices as well.

I personally find it difficult not to pull out my BlackBerry when a message comes in, but the new law has not only made me think about the possible fines associated with succumbing to this distraction, but also the danger to myself and others.  If society doesn't allow us to revert to being unavailable when we're driving, then hopefully technology will quickly come to our aid and keep us safe on the roads.

For more information on Bluetooth visit Wikipedia or the official Bluetooth site below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluetooth

http://www.bluetooth.com/bluetooth/

Was it hype or just good planning?  Ten years ago I went to a New Year’s party armed with my cell phone and car keys ready to take off at midnight to help deal with whatever it was that was going to happen.  Nothing did.  It’s true that we had spent many months checking our clients’ PCs and servers to make sure that they would roll over the millennium properly and even tried tricking a few servers into thinking that it was the year 2000 a little early to see how they would react.  It’s also true that many computers and software packages were upgraded to thwart the potential bug that threatened to cripple business in the new year.  In the end, however, we still didn’t know if all of that work and money spent was really worth it.  I can only speculate why computer designers would not have factored in the year 2000 and how it would affect their designs.  Possibly they thought that technology would be so advanced by then that computers based on their algorithms would only be found in museums.  It might also have just been an oversight that grew into the proverbial elephant in the room.  Looking back I wonder what we as an industry learned from it.

If we roll forward a few years, you may remember a government inflicted change that seemed to have a bigger, albeit less publicised, effect on computers and software.  In 2007 a decision was made in much of North America to change the dates that daylight saving time starts and stops.  Various government agencies had been studying the potential energy savings since the mid 1970’s so this was also not a big surprise, but again the industry was not prepared.  In the case of the Y2K “bug”, it was fairly simple to test hardware, operating systems, and applications to see if they would work.  A number of testing tools were available and even when the tools were inconclusive, we could always force clocks ahead to see what happened.  With DST things became more complicated because of a number of factors.  In Microsoft Windows operating systems, users had the ability to manually turn DST on and off as well as change the time zone that a computer was in.  For travelling users the time zone might be changed on a regular basis.  With email and calendaring software becoming more prolific we also had to look at interaction between users who may be in different time zones some of whom may not use DST.  The email and calendar client and server software had to recognize the correct time zone and know whether DST was on or off.  To complicate things further still; with so many computers being used in homes as well as businesses and complicated methods to patch systems, many users would simply change the time on their PCs when they noticed that it was wrong.  This also happened on servers when IT staff did not know how to correct it or simply didn’t have the time.  I could continue describing the complexities and ongoing issues, but clearly the computer industry had not learned how to plan ahead or chose not to.

A decade has now passed since the Y2K “scare”.  The beginning of a new decade seems like a good time to look back at what our experiences have taught us.  My job and the main goal of our company is to make computers work.  That should mean that the people and companies that rely on them should not have worry about anything beyond using the applications that allow them to do their jobs more effectively.  I wonder what I will learn looking back over the next ten years.