Denis Lemire's Site

The AirSurfer WISP network I manage for Triton Networking Solutions Ltd. utilizes hundreds of Motorola Canopy Subscriber modules to connect individual broadband clients to our network.

In order to mass manage these devices, Motorola provides CNUT. CNUT is a great tool, but in spite of the fact that it was written in cross platform languages from day one (Currently Java, previously some Perl in the mix for good measure) it is only packaged for Windows and Linux systems.

I’ve been dissatisfied for some time in the exclusion of support for CNUT on my desktop OS of choice. Being in a creative and inspired mood late yesterday evening, I did what any self respecting, Canopy using, red blooded, vigilante coding network geek would do.

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Due to the limited quality of indoor photographs and a deal too good to pass up at London Drugs, I decided it was time to retire my aging Sony Cyber-shot DSC-P32.

At $289 for the Olympus SP-510 UZ including a 1 GB xD memory card the combo was approximately $100 below the typical retail price…

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Why is it that every vendor of Wi-Fi client hardware without exception insists on creating their own wireless configuration utility?

When trying to assist end users with wireless setup over the phone, it is cumbersome enough having to memorize the ever changing Windows Control Panel layout without the added kludge of a distinct wireless configuration utility.

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After writing my previous post on Batch PNG Optimization, I decided to e-mail the author of PNGOUT, Ken Silverman, to see if there was any hope of a future FreeBSD port.

Ken was impressively quick to respond and forward my request to Jonathon Fowler whom previously handled porting PNGOUT to other platforms.

Well lo and behold, as of today PNGOUT binaries for FreeBSD are available!

I decided it was time to upgrade my Mac Mini as it’s always been a little sluggish with the factory installed 512 MB of memory.

Picked up a couple Kingston 1 GB modules (KVR667D2S5/1G) from the local Memory Express ($99.95 each). I was a little hesitant to use the Kingston ValueRAM as opposed to the system specific Kingston kit (KTA-MB667K2/2G) but the cheapskate in me opted for the ValueRAM for approximately $70 less.

As for the tools, I ran to Canadian Tire to pick-up a handy Mastercraft putty knife ($6.29) and some sandpaper ($2.49). Two hours of struggling and $208.68 later, the Mini is now equipped with a whopping 2 GB of RAM.

Special thanks goes out to the wife for having more patience then I did in getting those last two screws in place while reassembling the unit.

So far the machine seems stable and the performance difference in the machine is pretty dramatic. At $239.32 dollars less than WestWorld quoted upgrade price of $448, the whole exercise seems to have been a success.