Archive for July, 2009

Unlocking iPhone Tethering

Posted by Ken Thompson in Brain Busters, Journal on July 19, 2009

I was stupidly excited about the release of the iPhone 3.0 firmware, for the primary reason that you would be able to use the iPhone for internet tethering. In layman’s terms, you can use your iPhone as a modem to the 3G phone network. This is the number 1 feature i missed from my Nokia phones.

However, when the firmware came out and I tried to enable tethering I was bitterly disappointed to find the message “Please contact your network provider to enable tethering”. But after a bit of Googling I ended up back at Whirlpool forums where some users have made scripts which you can run on your iPhone to unlock the tethering. Here is the thread I used to get tethering working for Optus:

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm/1219715.html

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Creating Custom iPhone Ringtones – No Jail Break Required

Posted by Ken Thompson in Brain Busters, Journal on July 19, 2009

I spent quite some time looking on the Internet for a tutorial on how to put a custom ringtone on my iPhone. But every tutorial I found always needed you to Jail Break your iPhone. I’m not a fan of Jail Breaking your iPhone, for the sole reason that I don’t want to risk my warranty using customised firmware. It just isn’t worth the risk in my eyes.

So I set out to find a way that I could put custom ringtones on the iPhone in an at least semi-legitimate way. After all, it couldn’t be that hard right? The iPhone is a portable music player after all. After a little bit of research and fiddling around with iTunes and the iPhone I worked it out, as suspected it’s not too hard to make it work.

After downloading some pre-made ringtones from websites, I noticed that they are all .MFR. iTunes native format is .M4A, so I decided to see if it was as simple as renaming a .M4A file to .M4R to create a ringtone from it…it was. So all you need to do is take a file you want, convert it to AAC format, rename to .M4R and sync it to your iPhone. Follow the step by step instructions and screenshots below to setup custom ringtones on your iPhone.

Steps:

  1. Open File in iTunes
  2. Convert to AAC
  3. Open in Windows Explorer
  4. Rename to M4R
  5. Add M4R to Library
  6. Check file is in Ringtones
  7. Ensure Sync Ringtones is Selected and Sync
  8. Select Ringtone on iPhone
View Creating Custom iPhone Ringtones - No Jail Break Required

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New Toy: Samsung LED Series 6 40inch (UA40B6000)

Posted by Ken Thompson in Journal on July 11, 2009

Samsung-LED-6000_1

Just picked up myself on of these bad boys and I have to say I am over the moon with it! I had pretty much decided on getting a Sony Bravia, either a W or Z series, it was just a matter of which one. I hadn’t even considered LEDs as most of them start around the $4k mark. That was until a Retravision catalogue rocked up in my letter box advertising these TVs for under $3k pegging them at the same point as a Z series Bravia. Plus you get a free 22″ LCD TV with them as well…needless to say I was pretty sold.

So on Thursday night I popped into JB Hifi and spend a good 30-45 minutes just standing there looking at the Bravias next to the Samsung. The Samsung definitely had the better picture (in my opinion!), so that was that…decision made. So I headed off home…but dropped my chain at about 45 kmh and have buggered both my knees. So I figured if I am going to be chilling on the couch all weekend, I may as well get the new TV a couple of weeks earlier than intended and had Retravision deliver it late Friday afternoon! Happy days…let’s hope these knees heal themselves up quickly.

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MCSA: Messaging

Posted by Ken Thompson in I.T. Certification, Journal on July 2, 2009

MCSA-Messaging

I sat my 70-291 (Implementing, Managing, and Maintaining a Windows Server 2003 Network Infrastructure) exam on Tuesday. I was very confident of doing well as I’ve been using the skills in this cert for over 6 months now. I wasn’t expecting to score 984/1000 though, but obviously very happy with the result.

The best thing is, I have reached a mini-milestone in my Microsoft certifications now. With the 4 certifications I have thus far, I am now a “Microsoft Certified Systems Administrator : Messaging Specialist”. It feels good to have acquired a milestone and looking forward to studying the rest and obtaining the MCSE in the next half of the year.

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Pixsoul.com.au Complete

Posted by Ken Thompson in Design, Journal on July 2, 2009

Well, I’ve been hard at work on the site this past week. I’ve finished the Design page, created a Photography page, installed some widgets (most obvious is the Twitter feed) and some changes to the layout and design. I’m very happy with the result, even if it is all a bit self-indulgent and wanky…but it’s a self promotional, professional blog; so why not!?

Now that I have finished the site and I have Windows Live Writer working with WordPress again, it’s time to get back to blogging. I’ve got some good posts stacking up about how to customise your iPhone ringtones without hacking it, activating tethering on an iPhone 3.0 without paying your provider or hacking it as well as a bunch of problems and fixes I have come across.

Check out the new pages above in the navigation tabs.

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