Showing posts with label Review. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Review. Show all posts

Wednesday, 7 January 2015

How to set up and sync Fitbit Flex Activity Tracker and Review

How to set up and sync Fitbit Flex Activity Tracker? Review at end of this article.




1) Unbox the fitbit package. You should have the below parts in it.


2) Charge the flex chip (the small chip on the left side of the pic above) by inserting into cable that has USB plug at the end (the one in the top of the pic above) and connecting the cable to USB port of your computer. Also, you can connect it to USB charger that plugs into power slots. Once fully charged all the four light indicators on the chip turns on.


Creating fitbit account and the software

3) Now go to http://www.fitbit.com/setup and download the software for the flex model and install the software on your computer. If you have a model other then flex then download the software for that mode. 

4)  Open your Fitbit Connect application. You can set up your device and create a fitbit account by clicking on the Set up a New Fitbit Device link.



5)Click on the New to Fitbit link and then set up your account. You will use this account to login to fitbit.com and see all your activities.



6) After you have set up your account, you need to track your activity with fitbit. Insert the fitbit chip in your fitbit wristband. The device will start tracking your movement in terms of steps taken. Basically every time you move your hand, walk, run etc.


Syncing your fitbit

7) Now to see the activities tracked by your fitbit, you need to sync your fitbit device with your fitbit account. To do this, you insert the fitbit dongle to USB port on your computer.


8)  Start the fit bit connect application and click on the sync button. You need to have your fitbit wristband along with the chip close to the dongle for it to detect and read your activities from the tracker.


9) After sync is complete, click on Go to fitbit.com link or open fitbit.com and login using the account created in one of the steps above. This should take you into account dashboard that will show all the activities tracked in the day by hour.



 10) In your dashboard, you can see the number of steps and calories burnt in the day by hour.


11) That should be it. Sync your activities every now and then. Also, keep your fitbit tracker chip charged once every 2-3 days.

12) If you have android or Iphone, you can install the fitbit app and that app should take care of syncing your activities without having to use the dongle etc.

Review:
a) Easy to set up, sync and check the daily stats. A nice and informative dashboard that gives counts of steps, calories burnt and a graph that plots number of steps by time.
b) LED indicators to indicate the amount of battery power left.
c) A bit hard to wear because of the clip that is used to lock the strip. We have to press it hard for it lock. I would have liked if it was more like a normal watch band. May be it is designed this way so that it hugs the wrist tightly.
d) Comes with two wristbands of different sizes. 
e) Very light weight. Looks stylish.
f) Dongle helps to sync using normal PC. Apps available for Android and Iphone.

Friday, 26 December 2014

Big Data - Good Books for Hadoop, Hive, Pig, Impala, Hbase.




Big Data - Good Books for Hadoop, Hive, Pig, Impala, Hbase.



1) Hadoop: The Definitive Guide


 

Hadoop: The Definitive Guide: Ready to unlock the power of your data? With this comprehensive guide, you’ll learn how to build and maintain reliable, scalable, distributed systems with Apache Hadoop. This book is ideal for programmers looking to analyze datasets of any size, and for administrators who want to set up and run Hadoop clusters.
You’ll find illuminating case studies that demonstrate how Hadoop is used to solve specific problems. This third edition covers recent changes to Hadoop, including material on the new MapReduce API, as well as MapReduce 2 and its more flexible execution model (YARN).
  • Store large datasets with the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS)
  • Run distributed computations with MapReduce
  • Use Hadoop’s data and I/O building blocks for compression, data integrity, serialization (including Avro), and persistence
  • Discover common pitfalls and advanced features for writing real-world MapReduce programs
  • Design, build, and administer a dedicated Hadoop cluster—or run Hadoop in the cloud
  • Load data from relational databases into HDFS, using Sqoop
  • Perform large-scale data processing with the Pig query language
  • Analyze datasets with Hive, Hadoop’s data warehousing system
  • Take advantage of HBase for structured and semi-structured data, and ZooKeeper for building distributed systems

2)  Programming Hive



Programming Hive: Need to move a relational database application to Hadoop? This comprehensive guide introduces you to Apache Hive, Hadoop’s data warehouse infrastructure. You’ll quickly learn how to use Hive’s SQL dialect—HiveQL—to summarize, query, and analyze large datasets stored in Hadoop’s distributed filesystem.
This example-driven guide shows you how to set up and configure Hive in your environment, provides a detailed overview of Hadoop and MapReduce, and demonstrates how Hive works within the Hadoop ecosystem. You’ll also find real-world case studies that describe how companies have used Hive to solve unique problems involving petabytes of data.
  • Use Hive to create, alter, and drop databases, tables, views, functions, and indexes
  • Customize data formats and storage options, from files to external databases
  • Load and extract data from tables—and use queries, grouping, filtering, joining, and other conventional query methods
  • Gain best practices for creating user defined functions (UDFs)
  • Learn Hive patterns you should use and anti-patterns you should avoid
  • Integrate Hive with other data processing programs
  • Use storage handlers for NoSQL databases and other datastores
  • Learn the pros and cons of running Hive on Amazon’s Elastic MapReduce

  3) Programming Pig




Programming Pig: This guide is an ideal learning tool and reference for Apache Pig, the open source engine for executing parallel data flows on Hadoop. With Pig, you can batch-process data without having to create a full-fledged application—making it easy for you to experiment with new datasets.

Programming Pig introduces new users to Pig, and provides experienced users with comprehensive coverage on key features such as the Pig Latin scripting language, the Grunt shell, and User Defined Functions (UDFs) for extending Pig. If you need to analyze terabytes of data, this book shows you how to do it efficiently with Pig.
  • Delve into Pig’s data model, including scalar and complex data types
  • Write Pig Latin scripts to sort, group, join, project, and filter your data
  • Use Grunt to work with the Hadoop Distributed File System (HDFS)
  • Build complex data processing pipelines with Pig’s macros and modularity features
  • Embed Pig Latin in Python for iterative processing and other advanced tasks
  • Create your own load and store functions to handle data formats and storage mechanisms
  • Get performance tips for running scripts on Hadoop clusters in less time

4) HBase: The Definitive Guide 
 


HBase: The Definitive Guide: If you're looking for a scalable storage solution to accommodate a virtually endless amount of data, this book shows you how Apache HBase can fulfill your needs. As the open source implementation of Google's BigTable architecture, HBase scales to billions of rows and millions of columns, while ensuring that write and read performance remain constant. Many IT executives are asking pointed questions about HBase. This book provides meaningful answers, whether you’re evaluating this non-relational database or planning to put it into practice right away.
  • Discover how tight integration with Hadoop makes scalability with HBase easier
  • Distribute large datasets across an inexpensive cluster of commodity servers
  • Access HBase with native Java clients, or with gateway servers providing REST, Avro, or Thrift APIs
  • Get details on HBase’s architecture, including the storage format, write-ahead log, background processes, and more
  • Integrate HBase with Hadoop's MapReduce framework for massively parallelized data processing jobs
  • Learn how to tune clusters, design schemas, copy tables, import bulk data, decommission nodes, and many other tasks

5) Getting Started with Impala: Interactive SQL for Apache Hadoop
 

Getting Started with Impala: Interactive SQL for Apache Hadoop:Learn how to write, tune, and port SQL queries and other statements for a Big Data environment, using Impala—the massively parallel processing SQL query engine for Apache Hadoop. The best practices in this practical guide help you design database schemas that not only interoperate with other Hadoop components, and are convenient for administers to manage and monitor, but also accommodate future expansion in data size and evolution of software capabilities.
Ideal for database developers and business analysts, Getting Started with Impala includes advice from Cloudera’s development team, as well as insights from its consulting engagements with customers.
  • Learn how Impala integrates with a wide range of Hadoop components
  • Attain high performance and scalability for huge data sets on production clusters
  • Explore common developer tasks, such as porting code to Impala and optimizing performance
  • Use tutorials for working with billion-row tables, date- and time-based values, and other techniques
  • Learn how to transition from rigid schemas to a flexible model that evolves as needs change
  • Take a deep dive into joins and the roles of statistics




Thursday, 25 December 2014

2014- Best of Boxing Day Deals for Electronic Items in Toronto - TV -Laptop-Tablet-Speaker-Camera

  2014- Best of Boxing Day Deals for Electronic Items in Toronto - TV -Laptop-Tablet-Speaker-Camera

 Stores you can do your boxing day shopping:

     
  • Bestbuy, Futureshop, Walmart, Staples, Target, Sears- are good for buying electronics such as  TV, Laptop, speakers,etc.
  • Walmart, ToyrUs- are good for shopping baby stuff.
  • Leons, Brick, Badboy, Walmart, Sears- are good for furniture items.
  • All the malls are good for shopping cloths etc. My favourites are scarborough town center, eaton center, yorkdale mall, vaughan mills, etc.
  • Homedepot, lowes- are good for home hardware, appliances, gardening or snow removal equipments.

Some of the best electronic item boxing day deals that I found from the websites are below:

Location: FutureShop, Walmart

There is this 58 inch for $699 and a 60 inch from sony for $999


Samsung 58" 1080p 60Hz LED Smart TV (UN58H5202AFXZC) - Black
Cost: 699.99
Save $300



LG 50" 1080p 120Hz LED TV - Silver (50LB5900)
Cost: $499.99
Save: $100
Sale Ends: December 28, 2014



Location: BestBuy/FutureShop


ASUS X Series 15.6" Laptop - Black (Intel Dual-Core Celeron N2830/500GB HDD/4GB RAM/Windows 8.1)
Cost: $279.99
Save: $100
Sale Ends: December 28, 2014



Location: Bestbuy/ FutureShop

Cost: $279.99
Save $100
Sale ends: January 1, 2015
Samsung Galaxy Tab 4 10.1" 16GB Android 4.4 Tablet With 1.2 GHz Quad-Core Processor - White



Location: BestBuy


Canon Rebel T5 18MP DSLR Camera With EF-S 18-55mm IS, EF 75-300mm Lenses & DSLR Bag
$499.99
Save: $310
Sale Ends: December 25, 2014








Location: Walmart


Sony- 5.1-Ch. 3D Smart Blu-ray Home Theater System (BDVE2100)
3D Blu-ray Home Theater with Wi-Fi

Cost: $168

Thursday, 27 November 2014

My Top 5 cheap android tablets for less than 150$ in Canada

My Top 5 cheap android tablets for less than 150$ in Canada.


1) Samsung 7" 8GB Galaxy Tab3 Lite Tablet - White


Pros:
Samsung is a better brand
Samsung apps and better quality LCD display
1GB of RAM and a 1.2GHz dual core Marvell PXA986 processor
Front and back facing camera


Cons:
8GB Ram.


   
  





2) Asus 7" 16GB MeMO Pad Tablet With Wi-Fi - Black



Pros:
7 inch WSVGA touchscreen LCD display
1.2GHz Intel Clover Trail Plus Z2520 Dual Core processor with 1GB of RAM offers great multitasking capabilities
16GB EMMC storage offers plenty of room for files, photos, videos, and more
Front and Rear facing camera
Jelly bean 4.3







3) Google Nexus 7 by ASUS 32GB 7" Tablet with Wi-Fi (1B32-CB)


Pros:
Cheaper than the first two tablets in this list.
32 GB storage
NVIDIA Tegra 3
Processor Speed 1.3 GHz and NVIDIA Tegra 3 type


Cons:
Only front facing camera
IPS Capacitive LED





4) Le Pan II 9.7" 8GB Tablet with Wi-Fi - English

 
Pros:
9.7'' inch LCD display. Bigger than all the tablets in this list.
Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) operating system with Adobe Flash support
Qualcomm APQ8060 1.2 GHz processor


Cons:
No Rear Camera
8gb storage



 

5) Acer Iconia B1-710 7" 8GB Android 4.1 Tablet With MTK Dual Core Processor - White


Pros:
Better brand than the lesser known brands.
MTK dual core processor and 16GB of flash storage


Cons:
Only Front facing camera


 






Also check out
the below link for other cheap tablets for less than 150$:



a) Kobo Arc 7HD 7" 32GB Android 4.2.2 Tablet With NVIDIA Tegra 3 Processor - Black



b) Le Pan TC082A 8" 8GB Android 4.2.2 Tablet With Cortex-A7




I own this Le Pan TC082A from a year now and it is pretty good. Check out my reviews using the below link:

http://dwbitechguru.blogspot.ca/2014/10/review-le-pan-tc082a-8-8gb-android-422.html 

Saturday, 8 November 2014

Spector T230- Bluetooth Wireless Speaker - Review

 Spector T230- Bluetooth Wireless Speaker - Review


If you wondering what is the best gift you can give for christmas or as a corporate gift and you love music, then this product might be a great choice. I got this as a gift from my company and I totally love it. What is that is so special about this speaker? It does great stuff for a small palm size speaker. I'm sure few years ago to get the volume and clarity that this bluetooth speaker provides, we would have to go with an expensive speaker and which is few times bigger in size.





The few things that I like about this bluetooth speaker:
a) Very small in size and can be carried even in a pocket.
b) Looks very cute and stylish.
c) It surprises every one with the volume and clarity of sound. The clarity and volumes is great even few meters away from the speakers. You can hide the speaker in your pocket and make people wonder where is the sound coming from :). Which makes it ideal for taking it to picnic spots or wherever you want in your house without connecting wires to the source of music or to power slots.
d) Connects with both my android and blackberry phone through Bluetooth. Turn the switch in the speaker to Bluetooth mode and then find the speaker on your phone through Bluetooth and connect. As  simple as that. The phone does not have to be very close.
e) It runs for a long time and does not need charging every hour. I runs it many times before taking it for charging. It has USB charging.

Lastly, do not take it to any relative or friends house who might like it so much and ask you to give it to them. I have some people like that in my family, so I don't take it along with me when I visit them lol :)

The manual for spector T230 can be found here:
http://www.spectorandco.ca/en/products/files/manuals/T230%20-%20T245%20User%20Manual.pdf

More details about the product spector T230 can be found here:
http://www.spectorandco.ca/sp/product.php?item_num=T230