Neil's Spiel

I have a lot of wireless devices. Our Tivo, Apple TV, PS3, Wii and XBOX all connected wirelessly. This is in addition to my wife's laptop, our phones and the kid's PC. All told, there is a lot of wireless traffic flying around the Hetzel residence. I had been using an Apple Time Capsule which has a Wireless N router included in it, but I don't think that Apple designed it to have that many devices connected at once. As a result, all wireless traffic was very, very slow. Poor Trudy was pulling her hair out every time she was online (which is all the time). If you see a bald lady muttering about 17 more days know that the balding is partially my fault for not fixing the speed problem sooner :)

 Because the Time Capsule was soooo slooooow, I decided to pick up a Linksys WRT601N. In addition to the Gigabit switch, it has two, simultaneous N radio bands and was essentially billed as exactly what I wanted. I'm happy to report that this router absolutely SCREAMS in terms of speed. I'm very happy with it. I can now watch HD streaming video on my phone while my wife works, my son plays WoW and my daughter plays the Wii. Everything moves at a much increased clip. Even Apple TV is much, much faster.

However, getting to this state of wireless bliss was a rough road.

When I was at Best Buy yesterday, I saw that they had marked down the model I wanted from $200 to $169. There was also an open box item they were selling for $149. I decided to take a chance on the open box item assuming (as the representative assured me) that the return was simply due to the previous owner not knowing how to set it up. Well, I've set up plenty of routers so I figured it worth the shot. I got home, cracked open the box and followed the "LELA" instructions to the letter. Once the configuration was complete, the software informed me that the router could not detect an internet connection (this despite the face that I could see the cable modem and router lights blinking in unison when they were connected.)

I tried looping the Internet port to one of the input ports and checking to see if the router was picking up an IP. It was (127.0.0.1). I tried configuring it many different ways and it simply would not talk to the cable modem and pick up the IP address from COX. Frustrated, I decided it must be a hardware issue and returned to Best Buy. There I haggled with the employees and explained that I should not have to pay the extra $20 (the cost for a new router vs. the open box one I bought) for the privilege of doing their testing job for them. Eventually they relented and let me grab a new version of the same model for the mark down price.

I rushed back home, plugged it all in again and got the same result. Ugh. Now the troubleshooting began in earnest. I searched and found this linkwhich told me that I had to use MAC cloning in order to use the router. The instructions said that I had to use the MAC address of my PC, but that made no sense since it's the MAC address of the cable modem that should be cloned. I followed the instructions using the MAC of the cable modem and still no joy. I even tried the MAC of my machine just for fun and of course it didn't work. Frustrated, I engaged Linksys support. They were friendly and helpful, but they too seemed to be taking stabs in the dark. I tried each of their suggestions to no avail and while waiting for their responses, I searched the internet and found that a lot of people were suffering the same issues as me and not getting anywhere...even with Linksys support.

Hence the purpose of this post.

I decided I would try one more stab in the dark before giving up and returning the router to Best Buy. I stole the MAC address of my previous router, and entered it in the configuration screen for MAC Cloning on the WRT610N's web config interface. Suddenly everything worked peachy. Don't ask me how using a MAC address of a device that isn't even on the network counts as "cloning", but it did and now we're good. Of course I still have some hurdles to overcome. I want to hook the Time Capsule up to the existing network so I can at least use it as a disk for Time Machine. But for now (and since I use JungleDisk), I'm quite pleased with speed boost. The speed is worth the money, but Linksys really needs to work on the configuration of the router...it's buggy as heck.

This is a shout out to Staci Snider in Parkersburg, West "by God" Virginia.  Faithful reader of NeilHetzel.com...even when there was nothing to read.  Thanks!

So I decided to write something.  Sue me.

Our family picked up tickets to the Phoenix Symphony's Family Series which they bill as "...features six Saturday afternoons of fun, learning and music! Each Family concert is specially themed for kids, with pre-concert activities including our popular instrument petting zoo. "  To be honest, that doesn't really sell how cool the series is.  I learned about this series from my participation in the 501st.  Several years ago the Phoenix Symphony contacted us because one of their family concerts was "The Music of John Willliams" and they asked us to show up for the Star Wars portion.  They do a wonderful job gearing this for kids.  The music is interesting and the concerts are short.  Our two kids were pretty upset at having to spend a Saturday afternoon away from the TV and the Wii.  They were pretty sure they were going to hate the symphony.  About half way through they were clapping and smiling and completely into it.

This particular concert was called "Celtic Fiddlin'" and despite the somewhat goofy name was fantastic.  Obviously the music centered around the music of Scotland along with Nova Scotia and other traditions that are spin offs from the Scottish culture.  I was surprised at how much I got out of it  While they certainly gear the length of concerts and the pace of the music toward keeping kids interested, it's still a a great experience for Trudy and I as well.  We got to see Natalie MacMaster perform along with the Symphony. Truthfully I had never heard of her before, but I was in love with the music before the concert was over.  When we got home, I immediately looked her up on iTunes and purchased Natalie MacMaster The Collection, a 2-disc set which seems to contain most of her work.  Currently I'm enjoying "Get Me Through December" (Sung by Allison Kraus) which is about as beautiful and mournful a song as I've ever heard.  "If Ever You Were Mine" is also a piece I can listen to over and over again.  Go check out the samples on iTunes and if you like it get it.  It's a great album.

When the symphony let out, we had had so much fun together as a family that we didn't really feel like going home.  I decided to take Luke to a comic store and buy him some comics but while there we discovered we were right next to Haus Murphy's, a German restaurant/pub that feels as though you really have gone back to Europe when you walk through the door.  They've won Best of Phoenix several times.  What a great choice for dinner!  We had ever imaginable type of German food (a sampler platter recommended by our awesome waiter) and our kids who normally hate anything new tried it all.  We talked about traveling back to Europe and having adventures there.  We talked about the Alps and foods from around the continent.  We laughed and Trudy and the kids enjoyed sharing my bread pudding desert.  For those that don't know, bread pudding is served hot so it was hilarious to watch Luke (who normally won't put anything above room temperature in his mouth) stuff heaping gobs of steaming hot bread pudding in his mouth and then squint his eyes and tremble against the heat.  In the battle between the pain of a burnt tongue and the sugar hit of bread pudding, the later wins in Luke's case.  Right before we left two older gentleman appeared, one with a tuba and the other with an accordion.  They commenced playing German folk songs to us as we sat at our table.  It was awesome!  When finished, the tuba player asked Molly if she'd like to see where the music comes from.  He lowered the bell of the tuba into her face and of course she looked into the dark hole.  He then produced a resounding low end "blat" that made Molly squeal and the rest of the restaurant laugh.  Soon thereafter every little boy in the place was asking to "see where the music comes from".  Although scared for life from embarrassment, princess Molly is resting comfortably as we speak as is expected to recover soon :)

When we got home we decided that we hadn't had enough imaginary travel for one day so we moved from Nova Scotia and Scotland to Germany and from Germany to Austria as we popped in The Sound of Music.  I'm ashamed to say that I had never seen the movie from start to finish and I'm happy that I finally have.  The kids loved it.  And for the first time in a long time they told voluntarily thanked us for how much fun they had that day.  That was a very new experience and most welcome change.  It's nice to know our kids aren't teenagers yet and thus actually enjoy time with us.

That was the end to one of the most rated G and completely memorable and fun days I've had in a long time.  It was great.

And to think I was obsessing over Metallica's new Death Magnetic album (which is f*$%ing brilliant I might add) for the last two weeks.

P.S. I'm too tired to figure out why I can no longer add hyperlinks to text.  Here are two links you need to click on:
1) Natalie MacMaster:
http://www.amazon.com/Collection-Natalie-MacMaster/dp/B000LP4O2O/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1221981436&sr=8-2

2) Best of New Times for Haus Murphy's
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/bestof/2007/award/best-german-restaurant-26492/

I decided to give MarsEdit2 from red-sweater a test drive. It purports to make your posting life easier and to be honest I am actually lazy enough that using .Text's interface is enough to keep me from posting. Perhaps this will increase my desire to post? If you look up and see the next post with a post date one year from this one you'll know it didn't work ;)