Failure is the Key to Success

At lunchtime today Jo mentioned she was having trouble connecting wirelessly to our network. This has happened a few of times in the last couple of weeks, but retrying or in one case restarting the router resolved the issue.

Not today! Wired connection was working fine, but there was no wireless. After resetting the router and re-entering the configurations, I had intermittant wireless, but now no routing of wireless connections to the internet. Also, it was no longer logging any connection details.

I have had the router since February 2005, so it has been on for most of that time continuously. I updated the firmware from the default Linksys to Hyperwrt when I got it which gave me the ability to log the incoming and outgoing firewall connections and messages. This has had its uses; a few weeks ago I was able to identify a test signal from my VOIP service that was trying to connect every few seconds.

So, unexpectedly, I had to go out and buy a replacement router this afternoon. Linksys routers used to run Linux. There is a great support for 3rd party firmware upgrades to the Linux based routers, one good site for this is Linksysinfo. Unfortunately, a few years ago, Linksys changed their routers from using Linux, which means the 3rd party options are now limited.

I now have full connectivity restored, but have had to sacrifice the logging ability as this isn’t part of the standard firmware.

Tags:network router

I know my answer to this question, but I am not sure it is the correct way going forward as data quantity increases.

I have the majority of my data located on a server computer with a RAID hard disc array. This means that I can have a hard disc fail and not loose any data before I can replace it. I backup the data stored on this computer to tape every week to a pool of weekly and monthly backup tapes. This gives me the ability to restore previous versions of files that are deleted or overwritten.

My computer, with the software applications on, accesses the data on the server and doesn’t store any critical information locally. This means if I have a hard disc failure on this machine, I don’t loose any critical data and only have to reinstall the operating system and programs.

As I scan my film negatives, I am scanning them at the highest resolution that the film scanner is capable of and storing them in tiff format. For long term storage of the scanned images, I have created par files for each image, which will allow me to recreate the image if the original is damaged. Each film has been stored on DVD, 2 copies, each on different manufacturer’s DVD. One set will be stored at my mum’s and I will retain the other scanned set as well as the original negatives.

I know that there are other things I should be doing such as storing my tapes at a different location rather than at home. This locating of storage media remotely protects against data loss in the case of a fire. Although the original data would be lost, I would be able to recover it from backup.

Coming from an IT environment, I am aware of the importance of data backup and am able to implement a solution that will work for me. I often wonder what, if anything, most computer users do to ensure the long term protection of their data. There are USB flash drives, external hard drives, online storage and DVD/CD storage available. As the home computer becomes more important for storing digital photos and other information, I wonder what will finally be targeted at the home user as a out of the box minimal configuration solution.

What do you do to protect your data?

Tags:backup,data backup,data storage

Back in June last year, I changed over to using Voice over Internet Protocol phone (VoIP) for all of my calls. This has worked really well and has allowed several free international calls. This was due to the way that the VoIPCheap account works. When you add credit to your account, it allows 300 minutes of free calls a week to certain countries for the next 120 days after the credit is added. Calls to UK landlines used to be free also, but soon became 1p per minute. After the 120 ‘Freedays’ are over there is a minimal charge per minute.

Anyway, I was checking my account balance yesterday and realised that I was nearly out, so I added more credit. I should have checked their tarrifs first as most of the rates have gone up. For example a UK landline call is now 1.5p per minute; this is however cheaper than my land line provider, VirginMedia, who charge 3p per minute plus a 6p connection charge. I checked the tarrifs for the other VoIP accounts that I have, VoipTalk and SipGate and found that for UK calls, Sipgate works out best for me. I have added credit to this account and changed the dial plan on my Linksys SPA-3000 adapter to use Sipgate for all UK calls and VoipCheap for all international calls.

A couple of weeks ago, I had an unexpected premium rate call on my land line bill. As I use Sipura 3000 System Tray Monitor to monitor the phone adapter, I was able to confirm that we had not made the call and get a refund.

After 9 months of using VoIP for all my calls from home I am very pleased with the results. I also get the benefit, when I add credit, of the free international calls. If you are reading Lyall, I’ll try to call you next weekend.

Tags:call charges,sipura 3000,voip

About a month ago, Mum’s computer crashed just before we went on holiday. I managed to coax it back into life, but the disc was failing. Last Monday, I replaced the hard disc, but after copying that data over the system was in a worse state than I thought. On Friday, I took the computer away and rebuilt it.

The computer is now back and working. When I took the computer back today, I looked at the VOIP router that I got Mum for her birthday. I got a Draytek Vigor 2510V ADSL router with VOIP; this was an all in one solution for ADSL and had built in VOIP (Voice over IP). However, when I first installed it last weekend, the call quality was poor with a lot of echo on the line. I changed the codec used to G.711 today and now the call quality is fine. It is configured using VOIPCheap the same as our VOIP service. [previous post]

Since my trial of VoIP a couple of weeks ago, I have purchased a Linksys SPA-3000 from BroadbandBuyer.

I have configured this using the wizards at Voxilla to get me started, and then adjusted the dialing plan and added additional gateways for the alternate VoIP services that I have subscribed to. I have added a local area incoming number to my VoIPCheap account and this gives me outgoing caller id on all calls using VoIPCheap. Incoming calls also have caller id, better than paying for it with my existing phone provider.

I also came across a brilliant utility to monitor the SPA-3000 adapter. This is a free piece of software called Sipura 3000 System Tray Monitor. This will monitor the adapter to ensure that the VOIP service is registered and working and will also pop up a message with the caller id of incoming calls.

I rang Lyall today on this new setup and got a really clear line. Last time it was a cheap call; this time it was free. A 40 minute call to New Zealand for nothing!

My dial plan for anyone that is interested is currently:

(999S0<:@gw0>|<9,:>xx.<:@gw0>|<:00441582>[4-8]xxxxx<:@gw2>|

<01:00441>xxxxxxxxx<:@gw2>|<02:00442>xxxxxxxxx<:@gw2>|

<07:00447>xxxxxxxxx<:@gw2>|*xx.<:@gw2>|xxx.<:@gw2>)

This basically means that:

• 999 goes immediately via gateway 0 (my PSTN line)
• I dial a 9 to get connected to my PSTN line
• All local numbers get prefixed with the full dialing code and sent out
  via gateway 2 (VoipCheap)
• 01xxx ,02xxx and 07xxx (mobile) numbers get prefixed with the full
  dialing code and sent out via gateway 2
• Any other calls get sent out via gateway 2

If VoipCheap calls become more expensive than one of the other services I can adjust the plan accordingly.

(edited to make dialing plan wrap around)

I replaced the power supply and the computer started. That was a relief. I need to investigate an error message I get on shutdown, but other than that all systems go again.