Upgrading Ubuntu 6.06 LTS to 8.04 LTS

My Music/File server has been running 6.06 for some time. Now that Ubuntu 8.04 LTS is out, it would soon mean an end for security updates for 6.06, so it seemed like the right time to upgrade to the most recent LTS version.

The upgrade itself ran smoothly, although a bit slowly (the server runs on a VIA 1.2 Ghz processor, so no surprise there).

What did fool me though, was that during the upgrade Slimserver was uninstalled. I didn't notice any messages about this during the upgrade. After trying to connect to Slimserver via a browser, it was apparent that it wasn't running. Trying to start the Slimserver service resulted in a load of errors. The confusing thing was that although it had been uninstalled, there were plenty of Slimserver files left behind, which made it look as if everything was still there.

After about an hour and a half of messing around I found a post on the Slimserver forums which stated that Slimserver was uninstalled after upgrading to 8.04. Once I knew this, it was easy to download the Slimserver deb and install it again. Fortunately all my previous plugins and settings had been left untouched, so I didn't have to set it up all over again.

That leaves me with two other machines to upgrade (desktop and laptop), although there is no hurry for them as they both run 7.10 so are still getting updates.

Broadband: Part 2

After getting a MAC code from Orange to enable me to change suppliers, the next step was to sit back and wait for the changeover date. My new supplier, IDNet, had advised me within an hour or so of signing up when the switchover would happen. After my previous experiences with Orange, I was a bit skeptical as to whether the changeover would happen when it was supposed to.

But lo and hold, at the appointed date/time, I checked my router and saw there was no connection to Orange (not that unusual of course) so I tried logging my router in with my new IDNet details. Voila! The connection was there, and a massive improvement in speed too. I was typically getting around 400kbps with Orange - now with IDNet I was getting around 4Mbps.

Now after a couple of weeks, the connection has settled down and runs at around 3Mbps, without the continual disconnections I was getting with Orange. This has made the Internet usable again, and it is a relief to be finally rid of Orange.

Orange Broadband

A few years ago, when before Orange took over Wanadoo, I signed up to Wanadoo Broadband. I initially had a 512KB connection which compared to the old dial-up was amazing. Then an upgrade to 1MB followed, and again another upgrade to 2MB. All this time there were never any problems with the connection, and speeds were consistent and fast.

Sometime last year, Orange (having subsequently taken over Wanadoo) announced I was to receive a free upgrade to the 'up to 8MB' service. Great, I thought. It would be especially handy when downloading files.

After the upgrade was completed, I saw that my line speed was around 2.5MB. While this was a bit of a disappointment, subsequent reading of how ADSL works showed up the fact that unless you live right on top of your local exchange, you are unlikely to get anywhere 8MB. Still, at least I wasn't paying any more for it.

Then around Christmas 2006, I started to notice that the connection was dropping regularly. This is a real pain, especially if you are in the middle of an online transaction - did the transaction go through or not? My hardware hadn't changed, so I was confident the problem was either down to Orange or the exchange. I was due to move house in February, so didn't do much about it, as I thought moving house would at least rule out the possibility of dodgy internal phone wiring.

So I moved house, and it took Orange 3 weeks to get the Broadband up and running at my new address. Once it was up and running, what did I find? Surprise, Surprise, regular disconnections. Not only that, but the speeds were abysmal - typically between 200-400kbps. The only time I saw it higher was early one Sunday morning, when I got speeds of 1.5Mb. This proved that higher speeds were possible, and so it was either bad contention at the exchange, or some other unknown Orange problem.

As the service was pretty much unusable for most of the time, I phoned them up to see what they would do about sorting the connection out. This is where the fun and games started.

Their Technical Support is located in India, and they clearly read from a script (which seems to include the phrase 'I apologize for the inconvenience' every other sentence), which indicates that they have no real expertise. After explaining the problem, the guy I spoke to finally ran out of options from his script and said he was going to arrange a line test. Call back in 24 hours for the results of the test, he said. I duly called back, navigated the convoluted menu system, explained the problem again and asked for the test results - this time I was told that the line test department don't work at the weekend, please call back after 24 hours (which would be a Monday). Annoyed, I agreed to call back.

When Monday came, I called back. This time I was told that the line test results were not back and I should call back in 24 hours. This was starting to piss me off. I asked them to call me back when they had the results, as it was costing me a fortune to keep calling their premium rate number. They couldn't do this, they explained, as it would be a breach of account security to access an account unless the account holder was on the line. In that case, I asked, how were they going to update my account with the line test results if I wasn't on the line? 'I apologize for the inconvenience' was the reply.

Annoyed at this, I started looking around at other Broadband suppliers, as I was hard pressed to see Orange coming up with any solution. Then I came across a website called OrangeProblems, and I realised that what I was experiencing, both in terms of poor connection and support, seemed to be the norm for Orange. Countless posters on the forums had the same abysmal speeds that I was getting, and were getting the same run around as me from Technical Support.

So rather than waste any more of my time phoning India and getting the run around, I decided to move on. I phoned Orange to ask for my MAC code, and after being transferred to the 'convince them to stay' department, the guy tried to convince me that my connection problems were due to me using a dedicated Ethernet router, rather than the bog standard cheap USB Modem Orange supplies. Plug it back in and all my problems would be solved. I really couldn't be bothered to argue with him, so just insisted on him giving me my MAC code.

I have signed up with another provider, who informed within an hour when the connection would be active.

If you are thinking of signing up with Orange Broadband, don't bother. They make using the Internet a total pain in the arse.

Bye Bye Windows

I have made a big decision - I am going to move my main desktop PC over to Ubuntu from Windows XP. Why am I going to do this?

Quite frankly, I have had enough of Windows. An organisation the size of Microsoft ought to be able to through enough resources at an OS to make it extremely robust and stable. Instead, I find things that just stop working, have to spend too long applying various anti virus and firewall patches, and constantly patch Windows itself.

I recently finished re-installing a friends XP machine that had been crippled with a virus that had wrecked the networking side of things, including internet connectivity. They had a Packard Bell computer, but lo and behold they had lost the XP CD that came with the machine. We tried different XP discs that we were able to get hold of, but none worked with their serial number printed on the label on the PC. Fortunately, another friend had a spare license from their Microsoft Action Pack subscription, so we were able to use that to rebuild their machine. This took more evenings than I care to count, trying all the different discs and serial numbers.

Now I find that my PC is going to need re-installing. The sound has stopped working, and no matter what codecs or drivers I install, nothing works. I have tried re-extracting the required Windows dlls but no luck. So the only thing I can see left to try is a re-install. But, lo and behold, I seem to have lost my XP CD as well! Despite being able to find every worthless bloody driver CD I have ever had, the time I need the important one, I can't find it.

So, I'm not going to bother. I have no intention of ever going to Vista - the prices Microsoft charge in the UK are way over the top for a system that seems focused on stopping you doing more things than it allows you to do. I recently installed Ubuntu on my music server to run Slimserver, and I like the look of that, so I have decided to kiss goodbye to Microsoft and their unreliable, insecure software, and say hello to Ubuntu Feisty Fawn. Who knows, perhaps it will be no more reliable than XP, but at least I will no longer have the worry about losing license keys or discs or worrying about how many times I can install it without breaching the license.

Ebay Account hacked

This week I received an e-mail from Ebay, informing me that my account password had been compromised and that they had therefore reset the password and locked down my account. The e-mail went on to say that this must have been as a result of me falling for a phishing scam, and giving my password to some third party.

Sorry guys, but I HAVE NOT given out my password. I have a bit more sense than to fall for some phishing scam, and have seen plenty of examples in my time. Indeed, I was highly suspicious of the Ebay e-mail, until I realised it contained no links. It was only after trying to log in to my account and finding it was locked that I realised it was genuine.

It seems a cynical ploy by Ebay to try and blame account holders for the problem, obviuosly to try and cover up their well known security problems. My password being compromised can only be as a result of Ebay being hacked, and after seeing this article on The Register, perhaps I shouldn't be surprised. While they may get away with passing off this old baloney about phishing scams to the average user, it is clear they have an ongoing security problem.

The alarming thing is that it appears to have been ongoing for some time, with Ebay either unwilling or unable to do anything about it.

EMI remove DRM

Following yesterdays announcement from EMI that they are to remove DRM from their entire digital download catalogue, and initially make the DRM free versions available on iTunes (at a higher bit rate, and at a higher price), a few questions remain.

1. Apple will continue to sell the DRM, low quality versions as they do now. What is the logic in implementing DRM on low bitrate files? Numerous sites offer unprotected sound samples in lower bit rates, the whole point being that the sound quality isn't good enough to bother copying it.

2. I hope that the following statement means some sites will soon start offering officially sanctioned lossless downloads:

EMI expects that consumers will be able to purchase higher quality DRM-free downloads from a variety of digital music stores within the coming weeks, with each retailer choosing whether to sell downloads in AAC, WMA, MP3 or other unprotected formats of their choice.

3. Why won't Apple make the files available in MP3 format? While it is not the best format around, it is the widest used - there are plenty of players out there that do not support AAC. I guess we will have to wait and see who else will carry the DRM free files.

4. Can we now expect Apple to remove the DRM on the Independent music they carry, that is available elsewhere without DRM?

While this is a good first move, we will need to see how things pan out over the next few months, and what other record labels, if any, follow EMI's lead. Personally, I feel the price rise is a bit much, even though I accept that bandwidth costs will increase with the bigger file sizes of the higher bit rate downloads - in the UK, the existing iTunes offering is overpriced for what it offers.

How to get a Wii

Nearly 3 months after release, it is still difficult to find anywhere that has the Wii in stock.

You could pay over the odds at E-Bay, or spend all day trawling round the online suppliers hoping to get lucky.

I used a website that does the hard work for you, WiiPreOrder. They track all the online suppliers and pop up notifications when the Wii is in stock. You have to be quick, as even now some of the retailers sell out in 5 minutes, but it worked for me. I don't have any association to that site, but they provide a useful service.

Nintendo Wii review

Released on Dec 8th in the UK, and sold out out straight away, it has taken me until the middle of Feburary to get hold of a Wii. In fact, it is nearly 3 months since it was released, and all retailers still sell out as soon as they get their hands on a few units.

Bundled with Wii Sports, a 5 sport game, it retails at £179, which is a bargain as far as I'm concerned. Nintendo decided to go for mass market rather than high end graphics, and it looks like that has paid off for them. Sales figures for January show that the Wii sold 436,000 in the US, compared to 294,000 XBox 360's and 244,000 PS3's. In Japan, the Wii outsold the PS3 by 3 to 1 in January. No fgures are avilable for the UK.

Everything about the Wii package smacks of Nintendo. The Mii Channel, where you create mini lookalikes is great fun, and classic Nintendo. My kids think this is the best thing about it, and like going to the Mii parade to watch everyone mill about (we created Mii's for everyone in the family). The warnings to take a break during Wii Sports are a bit annoying, but again, that is a very nintendo thing to do.

The fact that Wii Sports uses the Mii's you have created in the games is the icing on the cake. Although to me the Mii's don't look like any of us, the kids seem to think they do and think it is hilarious watching 'themselves' swing a golf club or tennis racquet on the TV!

Wii Sports itself is fairly simplistic, and is a good demo of what fun can be had with the motion sensing controller. None of the games have any great depth, but they are all good fun (OK, except for Baseball, but that's Baseball I suppose). There is no great depth in the graphics, indeed some of the design strikes you as being a bit odd - none of the spectators in Tennis have any arms or legs, in fact the players don't appear to have any arms either, with a the racquet swinging around in mid air! Similarly in Boxing, the boxers don't have any arms, just a set of gloves swinging around in mid air as well. While this seems odd at first, it seems to suit the 'caricature' nature of the gaming, with your Mii being used as the player.

The Golf is quite difficult, as it seems to be quite hard to get any repeatability in the swinging action, but you do eventually get there. You need to underhit rather than go for power. There is a fair bit of aliasing in the trees and rough in the golf, but you get the feeling that the whole lack of detail in Wii Sports is more down to the rush to get it out there to show people what it can do, rather than the hardware's capabilities. It will take a while before we truly see how far the console can be pushed graphics wise.

All in all the Wii is great fun, and Nintendo have been successful in making the thing appeal to a wide audience, far beyond what a normal console generally has. Even the Wife has got up and had a go with Wii Sports, and believe me, that is some feat.

New Linux Server results

After recently completing the installation of my new server to run SlimServer, I thought I would post some results.

My requirements were for a quiet, low-power consumption machine that would be easy to manage. I opted to build my own machine, based around a Jetway J7F2 mini-ITX motherboard. This uses the low power VIA C7 1.2 Ghz processor. The board is a fanless design, satisfying my requirement for low noise. As I will be using the server to house my music files, I opted for a large 320Gb Western Digital 3.5" drive. These are very quiet in operation. The system was built into a Noah mini-ITX case. I installed the maximum 1GB memory that the board supports.

The case has a fan, which is fairly quiet, and is the only source of mechanical noise in the system (apart from when the hard drive is reading/writing). I may yet remove the fan, but I need to see how hot the hard drive runs without it.

The ideal situation would have been to have a drive for the OS, and a separate drive for the music files, but the Noah case doesn't have room for this. An external drive wasn't really an option, with three kids running around the house leaving a trail of destruction in their wake ;->

For the OS, I decided to go for the Ubuntu variation of Linux. This was mainly because it was free, and a number of people on the Slim Devices forums were successfully running SlimServer on Ubuntu.

I was a bit apprehensive as I had no experience of Linux, but the install went smoothly. The install of SlimServer was equally straightforward, using the Slim deb package.

As I intend to run the machine headless (without a monitor/keyboard), I needed some way to control the machine from my main Windows XP desktop. This was easy, as Ubuntu has a VNC based remote desktop facility built in, so it was a simple case of installing the free edition of RealVNC on the Windows machine, and setting the preferences in Ubuntu.

Sharing the music files on the Linux machine with the Windows machine was a bit more involved, but I found some instructions on how to do this here, using Samba.

Now it is all up & running, the performance of the machine is very good. Considering it is a low speed processor by todays standards, it has no problems running SlimServer. When it is streaming music to the Squeezebox, the CPU runs at 15-30%. The system is using about 190MB of memory, out of the 1GB installed. I'm not sure why, but the interface on the Squeezebox is a lot quicker than when it was running from my much higher spec Windows machine. I think MYSQL runs a lot better out of the box on Linux compared to Windows, but I don't have any figures to back that up.

There are still one or two things to fine tune in the setup. The board supports ACPI power management (which means you can set the machine to do a safe shut down when pressing the power button, for example), but I need to fine tune this as at the moment Ubuntu pops up the standard shutdown dialogue, rather than just shutting down.

In the end, there was no need to worry about using Ubuntu, it all installed very well. The machine is a lot quieter than my noisy Windows desktop machine (an Acer), so I'm very happy with the results.

Why Linn do not use DRM

Thanks to 'The Smokester' on the Slim Devices forums for pointing this out on Linn Records web site. Linn, to their credit, do not use DRM on their digital downloads If ever there was a reason needed for music companies to avoid using DRM, this is surely it:

"...We have been testing the only known commercially available system (Microsoft WMA-DRM) and come to the conclusion that it is neither robust nor "developed". The faults and problems we have encountered are:

The "system" is a two part handshake license agreement that requires Linn and the customer to meet certain technical requirements. These requirements include for Linn:
Check the computer that is downloading the music is "compliant". This means that we must check that the computer that is downloading the music has not been hacked (Microsoft DRM has been hacked quite recently and not for the first time) to remove all DRM information and capability.
We need to interrogate the downloading computer via our web connection and to do this the contact has to be via Internet Explorer (only) which needs to have both ActiveX and cookies turned on. (If customers don't have these system requirements they won't be able to receive the licence to play the music they have bought).
By doing this, Microsoft will then be able to update the customer's computer to remove the hacked files.
There are versions of Windows Media Player in use and only the most recent ones can be checked. If a customer doesn't have this, they will need to download an up to date version of WMP before being able to play their music.
There are many operating systems in use and only some are supported in the test code. Once all three variables (the browser, Media Player and Operating system) are considered it is easy to imagine that we will only be able to download music to a very small subset of contacting customers.
Once we implemented the new system we tested it and it fails to deliver files with the correct "rights". The files we tested did not operate as intended.
Microsoft has dropped support of WMA (the only audio file format that can have the DRM applied) on the Mac platform. (7% of our customers are Mac users). Plug-ins are available but they require considerable user knowledge and skill. These Plug-ins only work on recent Mac operating systems and are third party support rather than Apple or Microsoft.
Microsoft DRM does not wok on a Mac meaning that any music downloaded to a Mac will not play in iTunes even when the Plug-in is used.
WMADRM'd files downloaded to a PC cannot be imported to iTunes for PC meaning that customers cannot add their legitimately purchased music to their iPod. The files only work when imported into Windows Media Player.
There is no other platform independent DRM systems that are commercially available.
As you can see from the above it is our opinion that the Microsoft DRM system does not work and that until such time that something does work our best endeavours to protect our artists' music will be to include the usage rights as above and ask our customers to agree to these rights when making a purchase..."

New server for SlimServer

Up till now I have run Slimserver from my main desktop Windows PC. While it has run OK, I have always been a bit uncomfortable with having to have the PC running and consuming anything up to 190W of electricity just to play some music. I thought about a NAS solution, but wasn't happy with the current NAS solutions. Instead, I decided to build a mini-ITX based system. These have the advantage of low power consumption (around 25W flat out), plus the board I chose (a Jetway J7F2) has no onboard fan, so it would also be quiet.

Initially I was going to stick Windows on the new machine, but in the end decided to go for Ubuntu, a flavour of Linux. I was a bit apprehensive, as I had no prior experience of using Linux (or building my own PC for that matter), but it all went rather well.

Initial impressions are that the interface on the Squeezebox is a lot snappier than when run from my higher spec Windows machine. But I will spend some time trying more things out before I come to any firm conclusions.

There were one or two Linux related pitfalls along the way, which I will document later, but it was a good learning expereince, which now has me tempted to run Ubuntu on my main machine...

Who is Steve Jobs trying to kid?

In a recent open letter, the Apple CEO Steve Jobs called for the Music Industry to relax their stance on DRM. While the record companies may have insisted that DRM be in place before they would license their catalogue to Apple, it was Apple themselves who have placed the greatest restriction on the music bought on iTunes - that you can't play it on any non-Apple devices.

Jobs then went on to claim it would be a bad idea to license their 'Fairplay' technology so the files could be played on other devices, saying:

"The most serious problem is that licensing a DRM involves disclosing some of its secrets to many people in many companies, and history tells us that inevitably these secrets will leak. The Internet has made such leaks far more damaging, since a single leak can be spread worldwide in less than a minute. Such leaks can rapidly result in software programs available as free downloads on the Internet which will disable the DRM protection so that formerly protected songs can be played on unauthorized players. "

Sorry mate, but in case you hadn't noticed, your 'Fairplay' DRM system has already been cracked numerous times, check out http://hymn-project.org/ for starters.

It seems Apple would rather the record labels change their stance on DRM in general, rather than Apple have to license their technology to others. This currently seems unlikely, with the RIAA urging Apple to license their DRM technology to others.

One Billion Bulbs

One thing every one can do to help fight Climate Change is replace standard light bulbs with low energy replacements (either Compact Flourescent or LED).

If you go round your house and add up the total wattage used by all your bulbs, you'll probably be amazed, especially with the current fashion for Halogen spots. I recently replaced a number of standard bulbs with CFLs, and calculated the total wattage used would be reduced from something like 370 Watts to 60 Watts. If you want to know what that equates to in energy saving/money saving terms, check out the stats on OneBillionBulbs, where you can create an account and track your C02 and cash savings.

Also, if you have your own computer, why not check out LocalCooling, who have an application you can install on your PC to optimise it's power use. The application provides a few extra options than the standard Windows Power Saving settings, and again, it will also keep track of your energy savings.

Why I won't buy DRM music

After I first got my Rio Karma a couple of years ago, I'd thought I'd buy some music downloads to supplement my CD collection that I had ripped. Big Mistake.

I bought 4 or 5 tracks. At the time, I was thinking of buying a Slim Devices Squeezebox (which I subsequently did), and was unsure of whether to get the more expensive wireless version. As a test of my wireless network, I set up my laptop over by the Hi-Fi and tried playing some of the music files from my main PC. Lo & Behold, when I tried to play one of the files I had 'bought' and downloaded, up pops the box informing me that the licence of the music file would be updated before it would be played (even though the file was still located on the main PC, the fact I was trying to play it from the laptop seemed to count as 1 instance of copying the file to another computer). I then sat and waited for at least 10 minutes, until I gave up watching the 'Updating Licence' message. One of the other files I downloaded had a licence restriction that prevented me copying it to the Rio.

That was the first and last time I bought any DRM 'protected' music files. My whole feeling towards DRM is that it is implemented solely for the benefit of hardware manufacturers - the fact that files bought from iTunes or Zune will only work on the iPod & Zune players respectively shows that the manufacturers main concern is that you are locked in to their product line. Wanna buy a new player? Too bad your music library won't play on it - but, hey, you can always go and buy it all over again from a competing store! Then we have the innocent sounding names for the DRM scheme - Fairplay (Apple) or PlaysForSure (Microsoft). What is fair about stopping you playing a legally bought file on a player made by someone else? It surely won't PlayForSure if you try and load a file from the MSN Music shop on an iPod!

So, what do I do? I buy the CD and rip it myself. It generally only costs £1 more, but I can rip it to high quality OGG or FLAC format, not the low quality 128Kbs you find on most music stores. And I can play the CD in the car. I would rather not have to buy the CD, as it just means more stuff cluttering up the house, but for me, there is no alternative.

For downloads I use Magnatune, who have a great selection of new music by unknown artists, all of a very high standard. All of their albums are DRM free and available as high quality downloads. I occasionally use eMusic, who are also DRM free, although I don't like their subscription based model.

The fact that these two stores exist and have not gone bankrupt shows the absurdity of the RIAA and their DRM lobby. If piracy were so bad, these stores simply wouldn't survive.

Someone needs to point out to the architects of these DRM schemes that Copyright law allows for fair use. The way DRM is currently implemented does not allow for any fair use as far as I'm concerned. What is the modern day equivalent of going round a mates house with a new CD? Put some downloaded files onto a memory stick, get round your mates house and oh, sorry, there is no internet connection there, so the licence can't be verified and you can't listen to the music. Too bad.

So, no DRM for me.