Techie Haven

Archive for the ‘Hardware’ Category

A quick post about a few inexpensive things you can do to avoid long wait times when transferring files.

If you find yourself backing up a lot of files to a portable drive or transferring a lot of files between your computers at home take a look at the following items…

Click the switch above and it will take you directly to the CompUSA page for the item. This is a Gig switch and will allow for faster transfer of your data across your home network. To make sure it will actually speed up your traffic you need to confirm the following…

• Your computers support gigabit Ethernet – Check your model at the companies website and check under the network specs. All computers should be set at auto negotiate which means it will use the faster speed automatically.
• You are not connected using wireless – For example this will not speed up traffic to and from your wireless laptop or wireless devices.
• Your wiring – If your home is wired for CAT5 you need to be careful of wall jacks that have both a PC connection and a phone connection. There is a good chance the builder or installer cut corners and used a single cable for both connections which would not let you use gigabit, it would fall back to 100. To confirm just remove the wall plate and make sure 2 separate cables were used.

This will not speed up your internet, just transferring files to and from the computers within your home. So if you copy movies, music, or pictures to other computers in your network and all the devices are connected back to a central point (router, hub, or switch) this will make that process go MUCH faster.

To install you would connect the switch to your modem or router with a CAT5 cable and then connect all your home devices into the new switch.

Click the card above and it will take you directly to the CompUSA page for the item. This is a SuperSpeed USB 3.0 PCI Express x1 Expansion Card. This will give your PC the ability to use USB 3.0 to an external drive. You can use this if your PC is currently limited to USB 2.0 speeds (again, check your PC manufacture website for product details but chances are if your PC is over 1 year old it does not have USB 3.0).

Make sure your PC also has a free (open) PCIe slot. If the PC is only a few years old it should, but check on the manufactures website for your model to make sure.

For this to be worth while you will need either a USB flash drive or portable drive. Keep in mind that if you put files on a 3.0 device but later connect them to USB 2.0 at the office only your transfering at home will go faster (unless of course you add this card to your work PC or your work PC has USB 3.0 already.)

Here are the devices you could get for USB 3.0…

 

Again, you can click the images to go directly to where they are sold.

That is all for today.