Technology Ramblings

In the home security market - wired alarm system have been around for decades.  While originally evolving from fire alarm systems, adding the ability to support door & window sensors as well as keypads for entering arm/disarm codes created that market. Folks like Honeywell (now Resideo), DSC, etc built and sold untold thousands of these units.   Over the years the sensors got a little more sophisticated with things like motion sensors, glass break detectors, etc augmenting the traditional "normally closed" door and window sensors. From a communication standpoint all of these system support traditional tip/ring wiring to a land-line and companies, like ADT, AAA, Sonitrol and others then provided centralized monitoring services and would forward events to the local police or fire department as needed. The good news is these system overall were very reliable.  The bad news is - as they aged - sensors would fail or wiring would get damaged and the system would have u...

  A few years back I published a 2 Part post discussing Solar Energy systems.  The discussion focused on all the due diligence and prep work needed and what were some of the key considerations around designing and implementing a solar system. One of the discussion points was around solar storage or batteries.  What were the use cases for batteries and if they were a good investment and should you incorporate them into your design. Back in 2020 - the math around batteries said no - that you wouldn't be able to break even on the cost of a storage system over its normal warranty life of 10 years. So here we are three years later and so I figured it was time to revisit.   There are two primary uses cases for solar storage.    First is what's called peak offset or peak shifting.  This is a concept where you utilize stored solar generation to run your home during what many utilities call Peak Periods that are part of a general category of rate plans kno...

Like many of you, I have a portfolio of PCs, Laptops, Tablets, Phones, etc.  The challenge often is as these devices age, they have a harder time supporting the latest OS revisions from the major OS makers.   So then - you refresh a laptop let's say - but the old one still runs fine, albeit maybe slower or maybe doesn't support the latest OS (Windows 11 for example) so you start asking your self - how do I keep this device alive, but still current.. For many years - I would install a Linux distro like Linux Mint or Clear Linux as an alternative OS.  99% of the time those OS would install perfectly, support all the internal devices like WiFi, Bluetooth, Sound, etc and so great you kept that device running.   Linux on the desktop has come a long ways - the UIs now are excellent, there is a good selection of apps and they run on older hardware great.   But if you were trying to do a hand me down of that device to another family member - Linux ca...

On July 11, 2023 - Intel announced it was "discontinuing direct investment" in the Next Unit Computing (NUC) business. Much like it did with it's server business - selling it to MiTAC - Intel is expecting it's "ecosystem partners" to continue NUC innovation and growth.  Asus will take over board and device building for it's current commitments. With that being said - the NUC experience for me will just not be the same.    Intel announced the NUC in 2012 and then released the first generation of devices in 2013.  The goal was to show that you didn't need some big tower PC to have a great computing experience. While Apple had introduced the Mac-Mini several years earlier - for the Windows/Linux communities at the time there really was no equivalent device.   Based on what ended up being called the Ultra-Compact Form Factor (UCFF) and the 4" x 4" footprint the NUC was simple and inexpensive and allowed Intel to showcase CPUs, GPU, NICs, Wifi, ...

For those of us who have been involved in automating homes by adding "smart" devices from light switches to thermostats, cameras, sensors, controllers, etc - there was always a challenge with managing the wide range of devices. While each OEM had their own app that would allow you to control their devices - you'd often end up with anywhere from 4 - 10 apps that were required to manage the entire home.  And depending on your product choices you also had to have hubs to communicate from your Wifi network to other RF networks like Zigbee or Z-Wave.  With many of these "hubs" they had native support across multiple vendors or you had to add plugins or provide specific OEM support. Some OEM apps were great, some sucked, but it became challenging to provide a solution for a client where they could easily manage their home on their own.  Between having to maintain multiple credentials/logins across the apps and even communicating which app controls what - it sometimes ...

Hey folks.. Back in late June of 2021 - I started down the Windows Insider track with Windows 11 and installed build 22000.51 on both an Intel NUC 8th Gen and a Dell Inspiron 2-in-1 laptop. Back then I made the comment that effectively Windows was just a Chromebook/MacOS mashup and that really I had noticed any major performance improvements over the Windows 10 builds I had been running... Okay so here we are some 18 months later and I'm running build Windows 11 Pro build 25267.    So what's changed ? To be honest not much.   Sure there have been some improvements with the overall start menu and task bar, there is now tabs for Windows Explorer and the extremely glacial migration of system settings from Control Panel has continued The biggest thing that Windows 11 had forced me to do is to upgrade my NUC as Intel effectively stopped upgrading the Iris 655 Graphics drivers for my NUC 8 and I didn't want end up with a platform that wouldn't support newer builds. So the ...