0 Steelseries Sensei RAW

Hello! My old faithful Logitech G9X broke as of yesterday, so I decided to set sail for a new mouse. I ended up buying a Steelseries Sensei RAW since I'm a big fan of Steelseries products. I have to say, I really loved the G9X, and I always thought I would buy a new one if the one I had broke, but I just felt like I should go for a change this time.

First things first, I must say I'm really impressed with the product. It comes in a nice small box with its manual, a Steelseries sticker, and the mouse itself. It works as soon as you plug it in with no problems at all. I suggest you download Steelseries Engine from the website to fine tune your mouse. The mouse cable is braided like many other good mice, so that you don't rip the cable apart at some point.

There are two versions of Steelseries Sensei RAW, glossy and rubber. I picked the glossy one up since I don't really like the rubber feeling, but it's different for everyone I suppose. The mouse has 7 buttons, (LMB/RMB/MMB/M5/M6/M7/M8) where M5/M6 is placed at the left side, and M7/M8 is placed at the right side. The buttons are easily reachable without any problem even though the right side buttons look uncomfortable at first glance. There's also a button right under MMB, which allows you to toggle between 2 DPI modes. (you can set them in Steelseries Engine) You can also configure every button as you like, to execute some macros, or launch applications. I use my M7/M8 for Next/Previous song in Winamp.

The mouse has a nice LED Steelseries logo, which is also fully configurable via Steelseries Engine. You can change the intensity of the illumination, and make it blink if you want. I personally keep it illuminated all the time, since it looks quite good.

Technically speaking, the mouse is 5700 DPI, which is a lot more than enough. There are mice with over 10000 DPI now, and I just don't get why anyone would something like that. I think even 5700 DPI is a lot, and I doubt many people use it that fast.

I thought it would be hard to get used to this mouse after using the G9X for so long, but once I set the DPI to the value it was on my old mouse, I got used to it with no problem at all. I can even say that I like the glossy surface more than the surface of the G9X.

The mouse is quite lightweight, (lighter than G9X with no weights attached) which I like. As someone who plays games a lot during the day, a light mouse makes my arm feel like heavens. I would categorize it as a medium-large size mouse. If you have a small hand, you might not be so comfortable with it.

All in all, I recommend this mouse with my whole heart. I'm glad that I went for a change instead of buying another G9X. I'm not saying this mouse is better than G9X by any means, (I can't betray the old faithful this fast!) but I can say it's as good. If you're looking to buy a new mouse, and if it fits your budget (60$ in Amazon), make sure you give Steelseries Sensei RAW a chance!

0 Virtual Private Servers (VPS)

Hello everyone! After a week, we are together with a new post again. Today's topic is Virtual Private Servers. First things first, as always, let's start with learning what a Virtual Private Server (VPS) is. A VPS is a Virtual Machine, hosted on the internet. It's like having your own computer which you can access remotely via the internet.

You can use a VPS for many things, such as hosting a (IRC, games, VoIP, web, email, etc.) server, using it to test software out without modifying your own computer, downloading & uploading, (if your internet is slow, you can download stuff on your VPS and use it instead) or just playing around on it.

A big advantage of using a VPS is that they're really cheap, and you can have plenty of them running different operating systems for full flexibility. That way, you'll be able to do everything you need without even touching your main computer. Virtual Private Server also come with disadvantages like anything else. They usually have really low resources since many Virtual Private Servers are being ran on one computer to reduce expenses. If you are looking for something with high resources, then I suggest you buy a dedicated server instead of a VPS. Although, buying a dedicated server will cost you a lot more than a VPS.

There's also a confusion between VPN and VPS which I would like to clear out. First of all, they aren't the same thing. A Virtual Private Server is a virtual machine, hosted on the internet like we've talked about before. A Virtual Private Network (VPN) is a tunnel. Basically, it's an IP address which you can use to connect to the internet instead of using your own. This way, you can use country-specific services which you can't use in your country by using a VPN.

That would be all about Virtual Private Servers, at least for now.

See you later in a different post!

0 Managed Server

Hello there! Haven't been able to write lately because of New Year's Eve and all that stuff. Happy (late!) New Year to everyone to start with, I hope you had fun! Today's topic is Managed Server, also known as Managed Dedicated Server.

I want to share information about what a managed server is, since I talked too much about data recovery for long time, and it feels like it's a good time to change that.

A managed server is a server, as you might appreciate, where the hardware and the software is already included. They also have system administrators which are working on the servers all the time, and they are obligated with maintaining the server. In this case, of course, they are more expensive than unmanaged servers, for obvious reasons.

Although they are more expensive, I believe it's always better to choose managed over unmanaged, since you might have problems that you can't overcome on your own with an unmanaged server, and spend hours on it to solve the issue. In the other hand, the administrators in managed servers are always there in order to fix your problems.

Security is also a concern in unmanaged servers since there isn't anyone on the spot who can access the servers, and all you got is remote access. When you consider all of these things, it's a smarter move to choose a managed server over an unmanaged one.

This way, you won't have to worry about things like software & OS updates, firewall & antivirus services, backups, database management and server monitoring.

So, if you're looking to buy a server, make sure that you buy a managed one. Even the most experienced users & developers sometimes stumble upon problems which they can't solve on their own.

I will have to keep today's post short since I am really busy with other stuff at the moment. I will write more about this subject later on in a different post.

Until the next time, see you!

0 RAID Recovery for Windows

Hello hello! We are together with yet another data recovery related post, since I noticed that I skipped something after all. I've been talking about how RAID arrays work and all the technical information, but I just noticed that I never mentioned anything about how you can recover your data from your RAID array in a real life scenario.

Hence, today's topic will be RAID Recovery for Windows, also the name of the software we will be using.

First things first, you're supposed to remove all the disks from your RAID array, and connect them to your computer as individual disks. This might require some time since you will end up having to open your computer up in order to connect the disks.

After you're done connecting the disks to your computer one by one, it's now time to download the software we are going to use. For this, we are going to use a software called RAID Recovery for Windows, which works on every Windows platform. One downside is the fact that the software costs 99$, which is pretty expensive (in my opinion). You can find more information about RAID Recovery for Windows here.

After you obtain RAID Recovery for Windows, you're simply to choose the RAID array type you're using, (only RAID 0 and RAID 5 are supported) check the disks, and let the program do your magic. As we've talked before, there's a fault tolerance of one disk in RAID 5, so you can connect one disk less and still recover all of the data. In RAID 0, even though there's no fault tolerance, the software will try to save as much data as possible provided that your computer detects the disk.

After that's done, you will be able to access your files in an explorer window where you can copy them into another disk. You can also use disk images instead of the disks itself, if you're making images regularly. That will save you from the trouble of reconnecting the disks to your computer, and you can rebuild your RAID data quickly and put your array back online with a new set of disks in the case of failure.

I personally haven't gave RAID Recovery for Windows a try myself yet, since I haven't experienced problems with my RAID array in a long time, but I've been recommended by my colleagues to use it, as they said they had success with it. Maybe in the future, if I get into a position to need to use it, (hope not!) I wrill write a more extensive review about the software itself.

That would be all, I guess. It's a pretty straight forward process that every user can follow easily in order to recover their data. The same company also offers software for NAS data recovery if you're interested, since these these things pretty much go hand in hand.

Thanks for reading folks, I hope this makes your life easier!

0 QNAP RAID Recovery & NAS

Hello everyone! I've talked about RAID 5 data recovery in one of my earlier posts. I've mentioned that if more than one drive fails in a RAID 5 array, it won't be possible to recover data, and that's the way it works. But lately, I've come accross something while I'm browsing the web. It's a service called by a company called QNAP, and they allow you to recover your RAID (works with RAID 0,1 and 6 as well) even though more than the allowed number of disks are crashed.

The reason why I give credit to this company in my post is because before looking on their website, I didn't know such a thing existed. It always makes me happy to learn new stuff that I haven't known about before. I don't know if other companies offer services like QNAP RAID recovery, but it's definitely worth taking a look. I will keep you updated if I find anything else about other companies. (maybe a comparison post)

From what I've understood, this system works with a NAS. (Network-attached storage) For those who don't know, a NAS is a data storage which is connected to a network. Although, unlike hard drives, a NAS isn't just a file server, as it has its simply a computer by itself. It has its own parts and its own Operating System, and the RAID array drives are attached in it.

Using a NAS for your RAID array has many advantages such as being able to change the hard drives in your RAID array without too much hassle, better and easier volume management, better back up options (such as a cloud back up or a NAS replica), and a higher performance than a DAS on a network.

Finally, the main reason for me to write this article, the recovery of RAID arrays. Thanks to the QNAP RAID recovery software in the NAS, you can recover your RAID array even more than the expected amount of disks crash. Note that this isn't guaranteed, but I've heard good things about QNAP RAID recovery after reading about it on the internet. I haven't tried it myself, but I've heard many people had success with it.

They offer a variety of NAS drives which you can see on their website. It would be unfair to an extent for me to recommend QNAP & QNAP raid recovery right off the bat, as I haven't done much research about other companies and see if they offer services like this & their success rates, but I can only say that I've heard good things about it. So if you're looking for a NAS drive, make sure that you check their website out. Personally, back ups are really important in my view, (I'm sure it's the same for everyone) and this can save your life one day.

I usually write about the things I know about, but today was different for me as well. I hope you enjoy the post and find something which suits your needs!

You can learn more about QNAP RAID recovery in this page.

0 VLC Media Player

Nowadays, we all watch movies and listen to music on our computers, instead of watching them or listening to them in our stereo or DVD players. That being said, everyone knows that they need to use a program in order to do this. There are many alternatives to do this such as Windows Media player and Winamp. My recommendation though, if you haven't heard about it yet, is VLC media player.

The main reason I prefer VLC player over anything else is because it supports all the media formats that I've come across so far. With another players, there would be usually the trouble of finding codecs and everything in order to play media. VLC producers must've been aware of the issue before creating VLC, hence you can play anything you want with no codecs or anything on it.

The next important thing (for me) is that you can sync audio/subtitles easily in the settings. There are many cases where I can't find synced subtitles for the movie I'm watching. Luckily, it only takes a minute to sync the subtitles in VLC by simply going to Tools -> Track Synchronization.

There are many other fancy options in the software which I'm not using, but some people might find use for such as recording a part of the video you're playing, slowing & speeding up, taking snapshots, a fully customizable video effects panel where you can change the graphical attributes of the media you're watching and many more. (cropping, rotating, color filters etc.) You can also download plugins for VLC media player which makes it fully customizable compared to other media players. (although there are media players which support plugins, they're usually very limited)

All in all, if you like playing media on your computer and you're looking for a software which you can use, then VLC media player is the right way to go. Even if you're not going to use its fancy options in any way, it's still the best media player out there just because of its extensive support of different file types.

If you are interested and want to try VLC media player out (it runs on all platforms too!), you can download it here.

0 Hard Drive Repair Software

Hello there everyone! Today, our subject is something which has really troubled me in the past, repairing my damaged hard drive. It was the days didn't know so much about this stuff so it took me a while to figure out, and there wasn't so much information in the internet about it. That's the reason I felt like sharing this with you guys today.

There are many different hard drive repair software, also known as hard drive diagnostic software which can help you recover your hard drive. These software vary depending on the brand of your hard drive, so it's important that you choose the right one. Above is a list for the repair utilities of the brands I can think of right now.

Seagate SeaTools for Seagate & Maxtor hard drives (Available for Windows & DOS)

Hutil for Samsung hard drives (Available for DOS)

Western Digital Diagnostic Tools (Available for DOS)

Note : For the tools which are available for DOS only, you're required to burn them to a CD, since they will only work on boot. It's also recommended that you use this method rather than the Windows one as it is more effective.

I remember the time when I couldn't format my Seagate hard drive anymore, and I just happened to find a SeaTools disc which I've gotten out of a magazine by luck. It was the last thing I tried before I threw my hard drive away, and was quite shocked to see that it actually fixed my hard drive. I believe it was a MBR issue now when I think about it. (which I had no clue about at the time, so format not working scared me a lot)

Keep in mind that these software are capable of erasing/writing data on your hard drive as well as reading, so it's not recommended that you use these if you have any data which you can't afford losing at the time. You should back your data up before using any of these.

The working principle of these software is quite simple. It attempts to read all of your hard drive to start with to see if there are any bad sectors which interrupt data flow. The master boot record is also checked as there are master boot record viruses which can't be removed by ordinary format. (Low-level formatting is required for those who are interested) If the software detects anything unusual, it will report back to you so you can decide what to do. Nowadays, all the hard drive repair software are implemented with low-level formatting tools, so you can solve your problems right on the spot. Bad sectors however, are physical errors on your hard drives and there isn't much you can do about them.

All in all, make sure you run hard drive repair software on your hard drives to see what's wrong with them before throwing them away right off the bat. There's always a chance that these tools will save your life!