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Alan H.

Alan H.

Joined on 04/06/05

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Product Reviews
product reviews
  • 21
Most Favorable Review

RAVPower RP-PB07U

RAVPower RP-PB07U Super High Capacity Power Bank (12000mAh Capacity / 1A & 2.1A Dual USB Output) for iPod, iPhone, Smartphones, Digital Cameras, Tablets and E-Books
RAVPower RP-PB07U Super High Capacity Power Bank (12000mAh Capacity / 1A & 2.1A Dual USB Output) for iPod, iPhone, Smartphones, Digital Cameras, Tablets and E-Books

Pros: Love it. Dependably holds nearly full charge for a couple months. Like the lights that indicate battery's status.. Like the on/off switch. Came in a nice case with two cords and a set of interchangeable adapters for multiple styles of USB connectors. Will run an IPhone playing music at least on 4 Coast to Coast flight (both directions.) If my S4 Samsung or IPhone runs out of battery, it runs the phone and charges it at the same time charging either phone to about 60% of full battery in less than an hour. It seems to be around 1% charge / minute. It will charge two phones at once just as quickly. It's saved my my b-tt many times.

Cons: interchangeable adapters little flimsy and I've broken one and don't know how to replace it. Little bit heavy and big like all very high capacity portable lithium batteries.

Overall Review: Liked it so much I bought its bigger brother 14,000MAh, which included a bonus led flashlight. All the above applies to this too but it lasts even longer.

Most Critical Review

AData didn't work for me

XPG SX300 128GB Mini-SATA (mSATA) MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) ASX300S3-128GM-C
XPG SX300 128GB Mini-SATA (mSATA) MLC Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) ASX300S3-128GM-C

Pros: None in my system but it might work in other systems. My motherboard is a MSI ITX Z77IA-E53 which is an Intel I5 1155 socket cpu with 2x8GB G.Skill Ram & a 2GB RNY video card.

Cons: Could not be seen in bios or post. Had no other motherboard so I went out and bought an Intel 525 series 180GB m-sata. Installed perfectly and is working fine. I also bought a SYBA SY-ADA40050 Mini-SATA to 2.5" SATA Adapter. After I finished installing Win7 Ultimate, I tried the AData in the adapter. Right away I could see the drive in Drive Mgr, but I couldn't do squat with it, i.e.I couldn't initialize it. So I tried rebooting. On the third try I got to it, but it still wouldn't allow me to initialize it. Ok reboot 2 more times. Finally I could get to the little puppy and was able to initialize it. But it wouldn't let me format it. Ok, reboot time. Six was the magic number. Finally I was able to format it but it still won't work in the m-sata slot. No way am I going to keep this drive! It should have worked like the Intel drive. I AData Tech Support was of no help. All they could tell me was that their drive should have worked. Because it didn't they offered to take it back and test it. Big deal spend another 15 bucks on shipping and lose the drive for two weeks. AData - do you know about cross shipping?????? I think the drive is fine. I think it isn't compatible with something on the MB, whether its the UFEI BIOS or the m-sata slot. But this has really turned me off AData products because I don't trust them to be compatible and I don't think they are motivate to really help their customers. I got a minimal response when I needed a response that exceeded my expectations.

This is not the a Touro External HD & Warranty

HGST Deskstar NAS 3.5" 4TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s High-Performance Hard Drive for Desktop NAS Systems Retail Packaging
HGST Deskstar NAS 3.5" 4TB 7200 RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s High-Performance Hard Drive for Desktop NAS Systems Retail Packaging

Pros: to John E. This is a 7200 RPM drive with a 5 star rating. The Turo is a 5400 rpm drive with a 3 star rating. Just because the capacity is the same doesn't mean the drive is the same. Warranty is always by date of sale assuming you can prove that with a receipt. If you lose you receipt it will warranty reverts to date of manufacture

Cons: none

10/22/2014

My review of SV431DVIUAHR 4 port DVI kvm

StarTech.com SV431DVIUAHR 4 Port High Resolution USB DVI Dual Link KVM Switch with Audio
StarTech.com SV431DVIUAHR 4 Port High Resolution USB DVI Dual Link KVM Switch with Audio

Pros: seems well made.

Cons: Didn't work. There was no video. That got solved when I called tech support. But it still kept freezing that and you wound up with no mouse or keyboard and the kvm wouldn't switch either. This would require a reboot of one or more computers and a reset of the kvm. . 100% of the time freezing would happen if left overnight say you were doing an overnight night backup. Freezing would also happen randomly. Input #2 would also get noisey. Tech support said I might have had a bad unit. But they did teach me basic trouble shooting steps and tell me how to go about hooking the unit up 1. make sure the KVM, monitors and the computers are turned off before attaching any cables. 2. Attach the usb cables and the mouse & keyboard. They acknowledge that some wireless mice won't work in the console USB mouse port. If it doesn't use the USB hub connection. If there is connectivity, the left half of the light will go green even if the connected computer isn't powered up. The selected computer will cause the right half of the light to turn red. If this is not the case try turning the computer on. If there is still no connectivity, turn everything off and reset the KVM. Turn it off and then wait 1 minute. Turn it back on and then check again. If still no connectivity try swapping USB cables. 3. Make sure the computer and monitor are off. Plug in the console monitor and the cable btw the monitor output on computer #1 to the monitor #1 on the KVM 4. turn on those monitors and the computer. Confirm video mouse and keyboard on computer #1. If there is no video or turn everything off and remove the power to the kvm for 1 minute.Turn it back on and then turn on the monitors and computer #1. If the monitor still isn't showing video, make sure you have the right type of DVI cable. The device will not work with a DVI-A cable. It will work with either a single or dual link DVI-I or DVI-D cable. I was able to get it to work on one input with a Displayport connection on one end and a dual link DVI-D connector on the other. 5. Repeat with the other inputs. One at a time. Test each one before going on to the next. Always try resetting the kvm by turning everything off and then removing the power connector from the kvm for a minute in order be sure it has reset. The tech was very patient and very good. But he couldn't overcome a broken unit. He did turn me on to a promotion that Startech had for a dual monitor 4 port DVI KVM that was only $50 more. Because of the quality of the tech, I returned this one and bought the dual port version. So far so good.

Overall Review: Very high quality tech. Knew his product very well and was very patient. That's why I gave it two stars.

BIOS settings can impact recognition of KB & Mse

StarTech.com SV231DDVDUA 2 Port DVI VGA Dual Monitor KVM Switch USB with Audio & USB 2.0 Hub
StarTech.com SV231DDVDUA 2 Port DVI VGA Dual Monitor KVM Switch USB with Audio & USB 2.0 Hub

Pros: If a computer is plugged into a KVM and it doesn't recognize the mouse and/or kb, changing some BIOS settings might solve it. I had this problem with the single monitor 4 port version of this KVM. I went into both of my computer's BIOS' and found them both set to a default setting that made the computer halt on all errors. Initially I switched that around so that it would never halt halt on any error. That solved the problem. So clearly it was a problem with a BIOS setting. But then I wanted to know which setting(s) was/were causing grief. So I started turning the settings back to their original state one by one with cold boots btw each test. It's a tedious process that can take the better part of an hour, but that wasn't a big deal to me. I'm not saying that this will work every time on every computer. I don't think there's much about computers that does work every time. let alone on every computer. But it could work for you. And I would say that once I figured this out the KVM seems to be quite nice

Cons: Might require BIOS settings to be changed,

Trendnet TK-423K 4 port

TRENDnet TK-423K 4-Port USB PS/2 Audio KVM Switch Kit
TRENDnet TK-423K 4-Port USB PS/2 Audio KVM Switch Kit

Pros: came with (way too short) cables. Also came with (way too short) audio stereo cables. Too short = 6'. Way too short = 4'. The unit seems well made with good action on the buttons.

Cons: Didn't work. No video, no KB and no Mouse switching. Weird cable setup: 1 USB + 1 PS2 with a warning on it NOT to use it if you use the USB connector. Video is done by old style 15 pin connector which is useless with a DVI or Displayport connector. A DVI (with the 4 analog) pins by the blade to a 15 pin adapter didn't get video. I stated with USB for KB & Mouse and got nada. The same thing happened when I unplugged the USB connector and used the PS/2 connector. Manual, if you can call it that consists of a shortcut guide. No troubleshooting tips,no phone number for support. It would be very nice if there was a wired or even better a wireless remote. Overall a useless and a total waste of time for me. Will RMA.

Overall Review: It's about time that KVM makers began to make reasonably priced KVMs that worked with DVI and Displayport connections and not 20+ year old VGA connectors. TImes have changed!