Category Archives: Reviews

The HP Customer Service Experience

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As I wrote about in a previous post, I decided that I should purchase a HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus because, after looking at the HP website and making a few inquiries on a few social medial tech pages, that HP had a good reputation for printers and, for my needs, and inkjet would work just fine.

So, I shelled out the bucks and got the all-in-one delivered.

That’s when the HP Customer Service Experience began.

  1. The website is virtually useless. No way to contact support and some user forums that require registration and may or may not be able to answer a question in any sort of timely fashion.
  2. The User Manual – downloadable in .pdf format is also just about worthless.
  3. The black ink cartridge that came with the all-in-one that should have lasted me for my first 1000 pages or so didn’t work. The printer told me it didn’t work and it would accept it.
  4. Trying to set it up with the included software and drivers was not at all intuitive and the adhesive graphic covering the touch panel was deceptive. In short, there was a sequence to follow but neither the start up guide, the User Manual or anywhere else helped with the right sequence.
  5. I wanted to try and print legal size paper and realized it couldn’t be done. At least, not any way I could figure out. Envelopes required taking all the paper out of the tray, inserting the envelopes and resizing the paper guides, printing the envelope (or more than one) and then re-inserting the letter size paper.  Talk about a pain in the ass.
  6. Finally, there was Twitter.  Many times large corporations pay attention to Twitter. They have a presence and they usually respond on Twitter faster than any other method. After about a day, @HPSupport tweeted that I should follow them and DM with them to resolve the issue.

Of course, I did DM back to them – twice – but have never received a response. Never. Just to simple question –

It makes you stop and think. Do these guys even care?

Evidently not.

 

Finally….The HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus Installed

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In my last post, I wrote about trying to install my brand spankin’ new HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus.

Well, I finally did it. Best of of all, I think it actually works.

A couple of things I learned about the process some good, some not so good:

  • With tenacity and perseverance I can usually figure out what needs to be done to get the job done.
  • HP support really bites.  I even tried getting through to them on Twitter @HPSupport but they weren’t answering.  Maybe they had a Christmas party today or something.
  • Not everything that comes in the box is in good working order. In my case the black ink cartridge didn’t work for what ever reason and I had to run to the store to get one for an additional $37. While I was at it, I got the color ink multi-pack (just in case) for another $57.
  • While I was trying to get things working I thought I would try the direct, hardwired (USB) method vs the wireless method and ended up needing to buy a new USB cable (which didn’t come in the box) for another $28.  AS it turned out, once I got the new black ink cartridge in, I didn’t need the cable.  In fact, I had to disconnect it to go wireless.
  • Doing the AirPrint or HP ePrint thing was tricky and not at all intuitive.

Here’s the bottom line. Unlike technology from the old days when you had a huge manual that would tell you how to do everything and/or a customer support line with a live person at the end, technology of today presupposes that you know enough about how to put things together and make things work.

The other challenge, of course, is that this stuff is all made in China…including the manuals and “Getting Started” posters.  I don’t know how they put things together in China but I think it’s a bit different from the way you put things together in the US.  Especially instructions on how to put things together.

I think the real deal, here, is that unless you really have a lot of patience or a geeky 16 year old nearby installing even something that should be relatively simple…is not.

Installing A New HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus

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I don’t usually like to complain about new technology. Well, OK, maybe just a little.

I just bought a brand spankin’ new all-in-one (copy, fax, print, scan) – the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus.  It’s supposed to do everything but tie your shoes.

However, the “setup” is less than intuitive and seems to be taking forever.  In fact, it has been going on for 15 minutes before I started this blog post.  Right now I’m looking at the touch screen on the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus while it says “preparing printer” and occasionally making a sound like the rollers moving.

I pulled the paper tray in and out thinking maybe it wasn’t grabbing the paper.  I went to the HP website to see if there was something there that would tell me something like, “the printer takes a long time to setup”.  I’m trying to set it up through my wireless router so I can print to it from my iPad.

Alas, maybe that’s the issue.  According to the software that came with the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus my network connections can’t be located.  Maybe that’s because the hardware is busy making noises and “preparing printer”  There seems to be a flashing light but I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean.

So I figure I’ll go to the HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus support page and try to find out there or maybe even get a phone number I can sit on hold with while my HP Officejet Pro 8600 Plus is doing it’s thing, whatever that is.

But, nooooooo.

There are bunches of support “forums”, blogs, user manuals, etc. but not a single way to get through to a real, live person either in the US or India or China (where the thing is made, incidentally).  So I’m stuck.  I don’t know what to do or how to do it.

I even tried turning the thing off thinking maybe it just needed to “reboot” or something but then it flashes a message at me saying “maintenance cannot be interrupted”. Weird.  Can’t turn it off. Can’t proceed.

The “New” Facebook or Google+

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Facebook rolled out a new look today.  It looks like a combination of, well, Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

The same old news feed is there but it has all this new fangled ordering scheme. It has a new way to view your Facebook friends in lists that include things like “Close Friends” and “[Your geographic area] Friends”.  It also has a scrolling feed on the right side that looks a lot like Twitter except it’s people in your friend list commenting on other people’s status updates.

I guess Facebook is trying to become the one stop shop of social media.

Too bad.

I was just getting used to the way Facebook was and was able to navigate around with something resembling familiarity. No more.

The Cluttered Look

Do you remember when Yahoo! was the big boy in the room? The 800 pound gorilla? The elephant?  Then Yahoo! started cluttering up their home page.  It became a “portal” to lots of other stuff. The only problem is that the Average Joe or Josephine couldn’t figure out how to get around.

Enter Google.  Lots of clean, unadorned white space with a search bar in the middle of the illustration of an extremely cluttered roompage.  You type in what you’re looking for and it takes you to a page with the most likely solutions for your search.  The “ads” were still relevant to your search.  You didn’t see results for pantyhose when you were looking for hotels in Atlanta.

The search results page was orderly.  By contrast, Yahoo! was a freakin’ mess.  So, what happened?  Yahoo! fell my the wayside and Google took the helm.

I see the same thing happening with Facebook.  The ads are like the ads on TV or radio or other parts of the Web.  They’re just something that someone thinks I might be interested in because of my perceived demographic group.  It’s not really what I would want.

Now with all the status update feeds (faux Twitter) and the “Close Friends” etc. (faux Google+), and bizarre news feed ordering and blue corner relevance markers (faux Google searh), Facebook has turned into a Frankenstein monster.

That’s why I like Google+.  At least for right now.  It’s clean.  It’s easy to express your thoughts and share.  You can format a lot like your would normally type. The Circles are easy to understand, easy to customize, easy to navigate.

Sure.  Google + has some downside.  A lot of people like to share graphics including animated .gifs which drive me crazy but I can”mute” a post without necessarily “blocking” the person.  If someone really annoys me I can pull him out of my Circle toot suite.

Someone called Google+ the Facebook for Grownups.  I think I like that description.

But It’s Free

Yeah, Facebook is free.

Commercial TV is free. Top 40 radio is free. They also suck.

And, it’s really not free.  We get the ads thrown at us all the time and Facebook makes gazillions from those ads.  Just because we don’t pay a yearly or monthly fee or something doesn’t mean it’s really, truly free.

Speaking with Conviction

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As aI fool around, waste time really, on the web, I sometimes come across some pretty interesting stuff. Maybe I should say interesting, to me. Awhile back I came across a short video called Typography. At first I thought it would be a viewing of different types of fonts or, perhaps a history of typography or the importance of typography in communication.

It was none of that. Well, it did exhibit a lot of different fonts that were configured in many different ways. Art. It was combined with a poem that really doesn’t sound like a poem. Doesn’t read like a poem. Maybe it was because of the way it was read. Maybe it was because of the visuals in the background.

All I know is that what started off as a lark, just something to do while I was bouncing around turned out to touch me. The video is by Ronnie Bruce. The poem was written and spoken by the author, Taylor Mali.

It’s 2 minutes and 45 seconds and worth every bit of it.

Typography from Ronnie Bruce on Vimeo.

Self Delusion

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I’m really interested in how people think and how they make the decisions they do.  Heck, I’m interested in how I think and how I come to the decisions I make.

That’s why I was captivated by a recent book trailer I found while cruising around Google+. It’s amazing to me that books need visual trailers just like movies but I guess that’s a sign of the times.  It works for me.

It also let me to a blog my the same name of the book – You Are Not So Smart: Why You Have Too Many Friends on Facebook, Why Your Memory Is Mostly Fiction, and 46 Other Ways You’re Deluding Yourself – that is interesting in and of it self.

So, I pre-ordered it.  What the heck.  The blog posts are well written and entertaining as well as informative.  Definitely worth a look.

The (Non) Joys of WordPress Coding

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computer code on a piece of paper with a penOK. I admit it.  I’m not a coder. I’m not a geek.

I like “plug and play” or “set it and forget it” type stuff. I  like to noodle around on WordPress and blog a little.  I also like to see some Analytics.

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not one to dig deep down into the analysis.  I don’t necessarily care if people who are reading the blog are from the US, the UK or the former USSR.  I really just care to see if it’s one person or one hundred or one thousand.

Well, when I swithched themes from the old Woo Theme (Papercut) I was using to the Twenty Eleven theme that comes in the box, so to speak, with WordPress the old Google Analytics tracking code seemed to vanish. So, I tried to figure out how to put new tracking code into the new theme to get it to track.

Man, I really have  a new respect for people who live, eat and breath this stuff.

First, I had to find the freakin’ tracking code which was no small feat. Then, I needed to figure out how to install it. I couldn’t quite figure that out. Then I registered for and logged into WordPress support. In there I got a lot of suggestions for various plug-ins.

So, which plug-in to use.  The “star system”, of course.  How the hell am I suppose to know which one works better than the other.  I installed one that had four stars and lots of interesting features. The little promo video that came with it made it look easy. Click, click, click. You’re done.

Only when installed the plug-in and activated it and went to adjust the setting so it would track, I kept getting an error that I hadn’t set up the profile for the website to accept this this particular plug-in or some such thing (it actually said something different but this was the gist of it).

Of course, I have no idea who to contact for some help.  It’s probably an easy fix.  It’s probably just a couple of mouse clicks in the right place.  My problem is that I have no idea where to look or what to do.  The other issue is I have no intention of paying some coder $100 to click his mouse four times.

The worst case scenario is that I’ll never be able to track visitors to the blog. Oh well.

Reasons I Like Google+ | Confessions of an Average Schmoe

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I’m not a geek.  I’ve never been a geek.  I’m not studying to become a geek.

So, I was pretty excited to be invited into the next big, new, shiny social media/network powered by Google called Google Plus 1.  Shortened to Google Plus. Shortened to Google+ or G+.

I’ve been on Facebook and Twitter and LinkedIn (see the icons in the sidebar) for awhile.  I was used to them.  I had lots of “friends” and “followers”.

So why Google+?

1. So Far The Format Is Pretty Clean

It just doesn’t seem as cluttered up as Facebook and the multiple columns of Twitter lists I keep on Tweetdeck.  I know the ads are coming but, for right now, there seems to be a lot of white space which means I can concentrate on the stream that goes down the middle of the page.

2. It’s New

This is almost the best part.  It gives me a chance to “start over” and be a little more selective about who I have in my “Circles” (the G+ equivalent to “Lists”).  I don’t have to accept everyone who requests a follow and I can actually seek out people outside of my field (real estate) to engage in some new and different and interesting conversations.

3. The Format For Posting Is Fantabulous

OMG!

You have more than 140 characters.  You can create separate paragraphs by hitting the Enter key. You can bold, italic and strike through.

You can Edit!  This is huge for me.  I can’t count the times I typed in something and hit the Enter key only to realize that I had misspelled a couple of words or made a couple of typos or my grammar sucked because my fingers weren’t keeping up with my brain. But once I hit that Enter key, I had two choices: let it be or delete it and start over.  On Google+ i can notice a mistake after the fact and change it…or add to it…or whatever else.

4. Navigating Among Circles is Easy

There  is a menu on the left side with all my Circles.  I can choose the entire stream or just one Circle or just a couple to see what’s going on there.  It’s helps filter out all the extraneous stuff. It works really well without having to navigate out of the Stream or off the page.

5. The Google Bar at the Top

This allows me to navigate easily to my Gmail and other Google apps. It shows the notifications, too – when someone has added you to one of their Circles, or posted a comment to one of the posts you commented on or your post and any number of other things.  To be sure, the Notification feature can be a bit much once you get some people you’re engaging with but it’s also easy to tell G+ what you want t be notified about – all, some, none of the events that you’re attached to.

My First Pass

That’s kind of my first pass at Google +.  So far, I’m likin’ it.  It’ll be interesting to see if it catches on, especially after it’s opened to anyone and everyone.  I’m sure it’s still evolving and there are probably lots and lots of people who want to use it to make some serious bucks (people besides Google, that is).  We’ll see.

THE Scale

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Well, THE scale came in today. Yippee!  This is supposed to be the scale that is super accurate and doesn’t have a lot of other mumbo jumbo that you have to remember.  No “memory” about what your weight was yesterday or what your bone density is or what have you.  Just straight up pooundage.

It’s is little smaller than I expected it to be.  Maybe because it’s designed go into small-ish places.

It also does not slide.

This is a drawback. The scale I have now slides pretty easily across the laminate floor in my kitchen. I can nudge it under a counter over hang when it’s not in use and pull it out easily when I want to weigh myself.

Not so with this scale.  The feet have some kind of non-skid substance which makes it very hard to slide or move. That in and of itself would not be so bad except that you need to recalibrate it every time you move it. Step on, get the weight reading. Step off. Step back on to get the real weight reading.  Pain in the ass.

Of course, it needs to be on a “flat, hard surface”. No carpet or anything like that. Which makes it a problem in our house.  My wife’s bathroom has ceramic tile but it’s pretty small and she has it pretty well junked up with her stuff.  Not much room.  My bathroom has two parts – the sink and mirror part which has carpet and the toilet and bathtub part which has tile but is really too small to add the scale.

Bummer.  I may have just thrown $30 down the tubes.

I’m going to try and see if it works for me, though, and also see how different the reading is from the fancy schmancy scale.  Maybe I’m just whistling in the sark or pass the graveyard or whatever that saying is.

After all, the scale will read lower and lower numbers if I just stop eating crap and exercise more.

Day 13 of the 30 day challenge to myself

 

The Rhubarb Festival

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I’m going to try a couple of things here.

One is to try and add a blog post every day for the next 30 days.  It may or may not be about my weight loss journey but, most likely, it will be.  I’ll try not to get to depressing but a lot of my life seems to be a little bit of a struggle and food tends to be the comfort factor.  Of course, there are parts of my life are pretty upbeat, too.  I just need to remember them.

The other thing is that I really need to get into the habit of posting/writing, again.  I used to do it all the time either here or on my real estate blog and I’ve really slacked off on both.

It has been said that even if you write a couple of hundred words a day, it’ll kick in the creativity.  We’ll see.

Rhubarb

OK.  So I was tired of sitting around and not doing a whole lot that was anywhere close to fun or different.

Running around taking care of the things my business needed and doing the volunteer stuff for my local Realtor Association and the volunteer stuff for my Rotary Club.  I even took a class on how to make Outlook a great and wonderful resource. It all just got a little bit old.

I got this e-mail from a place called Kitchen Kettle Village in (are you ready?) Intercourse, PA.  It’s about 15 miles east of  Lancaster, PA in the heart of Pennsylvania Dutch Country.  Think lots of Amish. Think quilts. Think rhubarb.

Rhubarb is in season so this little oasis of a shopping village has a Rhubarb Festival every year.  The place is really very nice.  They also have lots of nice shops that you just don’t run into in the Metro DC area.

Well, this was the 28th Annual Rhubarb Festival complete with a baking contest (are you with me?) that included pies, cakes, cheesckaes, cupcakes, jams and all kinds of other rhubarb delights.  Of course there was raw, out-of-the-ground rhubarb which, if you’ve never tasted it, is kind of bitter/sour. It’s when you put it together with tons of sugar and other goodies that it tastes good.

Rhubarb is full of great nutrients.  More potassium than a banana. Folic acid. Vitamins A and C.  All kinds of good stuff.  And, if you can pull it off, you can eat it like celery.  Only the taste is not that wonderful.  Bake it in a pie or cake or whatever and….you get the point.

Aside from the great rhubarb baking contest there was the ice cream vendor (straight from the local Lancaster County cows!), the coffee place that was selling rhubarb/strawberry smoothies, there was a fudge place (thankfully, we were able to pass up the fudge. no small feat.). Of course, there we quite a few other non-food shops.

Pretzels

Pretzels are also big business in Lancaster County, PA.

We stopped at Hammond’s to pick up some of the regular handmade pretzels as well as some chocolate covered pretzels (in dark chocolate and milk chocolate, of course).  The regular pretzels are 70 calories a pop.  I have no clue about the chocolate covered ones except that they’re….more.

I have to say, they make the best pretzels in the world.

But, still….