Category Archives: Cool Tools

Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Networking, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Advanced IP Scanner Worth Using

September 30, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

For years now, I’ve been a huge fan of Nir Sofer’s software tools. Along the way, I’ve often used his NetBIOS Scanner (NetBScanner). It shows me which IP addresses Windows PCs occupy. Two weeks ago, I noticed PatchMyPC supports a tool named Advanced IP Scanner. I’ve now tried it out. I can say I totally find Advanced IP Scanner worth using. It appears as this story’s lead graphic, in fact.

This NetBScanner output shows only Windows and other devices with NetBIOS names; Advanced IP Scanner (top) shows EVERYTHING IP.

If Advanced IP Scanner Worth Using, What About NetBScanner?

Once I started using the former, I immediately saw the limitations of the latter. Simply put, NetBScanner shows only 8 entries; Advanced IP scanner shows 18. It even includes devices that lack NetBIOS names but participate in the LAN (e.g. my ASUS WAP, my thermostats, and my TV). Better still, it shows the IP addresses that some of my PCs (laptops, mostly) use for Wi-Fi and GbE, along with which one is live at present and which one is unused (e.g. X380).

There’s more: as I was troubleshooting my PING and RDP issues earlier this week, I learned to make use of the right-click tools it offers for devices whose IP addresses it shows. You can access its maker’s own Radmin utility to jump directly into its version of remote administration of anything showing.

To me, though, the right-click Tools menu is both interesting and helpful. Shown above this paragraph, it lets you run a variety of commands in a cmd.exe window against the highlighted item. I used it to run PING tests point-to-point on my LAN and eventually got everything working. It also turns out to be a handy way to launch RDP as well.

Remember: Cools Tools Rule

I’ve come to like this free, informative and easy-to-use utility enough to add it to my top tier Windows tools collection. I call these “Cool Tools.” For me, they are essential items in my administration and troubleshooting toolbox. If you try Advanced IP Scanner out, I predict you’ll want to add it to your lineup, too.

Cool Tools, Insider stuff, USB devices, WED Blog, Windows 11

WD Black SN850 SSD Heatshield Bites Me

September 29, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

It’s sometimes said: “It’s the little things that get you.” Boy, was that true for my latest SSD purchase. Alas, as shown in the lead-in photo, I accidentally ordered a version with heatshield. It’s pretty impressive. Formed of solid aluminum, it’s least 5mm tall. It upped the cost by US$30, too. Even so, the WD Black SN850 SSD heatshield bites me — or my deployment plans — right in the hindquarters.

How WD Black SN850 SSD Heatshield Bites Me

Why is this a problem? Well, I’d planned on emplacing the SSD in an NVMe enclosure. Such enclosures, however, only accommodate circuit boards, not massive (and thick) heatshields.

What I needed, in fact, was the barebones version (image above). Costs US$99.50, and fits an NVMe enclosure just fine. I guess that’s what I get for giving into techno-lust. Amazon’s one-click ordering gave no time for thought. Sigh. I blame the government…

We Don’t Need No Stinkin’ Heatshield…

A little poking around online showed me that I was not the only buyer so surprised. Another party confirmed the heatshield would come off (but only destructively). Caution was my watchword.

Armed with a pair of needle-nose pliers, I carefully bent the heatshield away from the PCB. Next stop: Disk Management, for new drive setup. Worked! Happily, here are the results in File Explorer from my cheapo new NVMe enclosure.

Live and learn, I hope. Going forward, I’ll read my product details more carefully. Gosh, perhaps I can avoid the same mistake in future. We’ll see!

Cool Tools, Hardware Reviews, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

Docking Discrete GPU Laptops Trick

September 27, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

Inquiring minds want to understand how to get the best graphics performance when using a multi-purpose, high-bandwidth connection. Yes, I’m talking about a Thunderbolt 4 dock (like the CalDigit TS4 or the Belkin Pro Thunderbolt 4). Turns out there’s BIOS tweak involved: it’s my “docking discrete GPU laptops trick.”

OK, What Is the Docking Discrete GPU Laptops Trick?

By default, most dual-GPU laptops run in dual or hybrid graphics mode. That is, they use the built-in GPU unless a specific application requires or prioritizes the discrete GPU. When running on battery, in fact, they only use the built-in GPU unless forced to use the discrete GPU instead, to extend runtime.

My trick comes in at the BIOS level. Thus, for example, the Lenovo P16 Mobile Workstation, has a BIOS setting under Config → Graphics Device. It takes possible values of Hybrid Graphics (the default) or Discrete Graphics (the alternate). If you switch from the default to the alternate, the laptop always uses the discrete GPU to drive display outputs.

When using a dock, one is perforce plugged in for power (either separately, or through the dock itself, which has its own heavy-duty external power supply/brick). That means it’s safe to use the more power-hungry (but also, more capable) discrete GPU to drive two or more displays.

For Thunderbolt 4, docks are limited to a single 8K display or dual 4K displays (usually via DisplayPort, aka DP, and/or USB-C). So far, I have found this connection to work indistinguishably from my production desktop. It’s got an Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti with dual DP Dell UltraSharp 2717 2K monitors attached. The docks drive the same outputs equally well.

Uh-Oh: Must I Raise My Display Ante?

Right now, I can’t really drive the graphics end of things to the level where it would stress Thunderbolt 4. I’m wondering if that means I need to buy up, and replace my 2017 vintage monitors with something like the Dell UltraSharp U2723QE. At US$600 and up, two of those would sting the bank account a bit (its stunning display serves as the lead-in graphic for this story). But it may be time for a display refresh here at Chez Tittel, so to speak.

Let me check with “The Boss” (wife, Dina) and get back to you on that…

Cool Tools, Insider stuff, USB devices, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Flash Drive Goes Incredibly Slowly

September 26, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

Here’ s an interesting item. Last week, when trying to troubleshoot the graphics driver on the Lenovo P360 Ultra SFF PC, I ran into an interesting follow-on issue. I decided to copy the “old driver” file to a flash drive to take it upstairs where the unit lives (networking issues temporarily kept me from using RDP, as is my more typical practice). And gosh, I couldn’t help but notice my Mushkin Atom flash drive goes incredibly slowly when copying that 649K file. The deets, courtesy of File Explorer, provide the lead-in graphic for this story.

If Flash Drive Goes Incredibly Slowly, Then What?

Just for grins, I plugged in an older USB3 mSATA device and copied the target file again. Despite its antique vintage (2014 or thereabouts) it beat the snot out of the flash drive. As you can see in the next screencap, it achieved a data rate of 236 MB/sec. That’s a whale of a lot faster than the paltry 12.5 MB/sec shown in the lead-in graphic.

The SSD-based USB device is more than 18 times faster than the flash-based device. Wow!

What does this say? It says that older mSATA SSDs are worth keeping as a much speedier alternative to flash drives. Back when I bought the Sabrent enclosures in which my 3 mSATA drives are housed — I have one each 256, 512 and 1,024 MB devices — I paid US$60 or thereabouts to buy them. Now, you can pick them up at Amazon for US$14.

For US$14, you can move files around a whole lot faster!

To me, that’s money incredibly well spent, given the half-dozen or so mSATA drives I still have kicking around here. If you’ve got one or more sitting idle, this would be a smart buy for you, too.

Note Added 2 Hrs Later: Cheaper Than Flash!

You can buy a 256GB mSATA SSD for under US$30 right now. That makes the total price around US$45 for enclosure and drive. That’s about 3X what you’ll pay for a 128 GB flash drive, and less than some “faster” 256 GB flash drives cost. To me, this argues even more strongly that this is a good way to boost your USB storage arsenal without breaking the bank.

Benchmarking, Cool Tools, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, Uncategorized, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Thinking About Windows 10/11 SSDs

September 20, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

I’m still busy benchmarking away on the two Thunderbolt4/USB4 PCs that Lenovo has recently sent my way. But as I’ve been doing so, I’ve been thinking about Windows 10/11 SSDs in general. On that path, I’ve realized certain principles that I’d like to share with you, dear readers.

I’m spurred in part to these statements from a sponsored (and pretty contrived) story from MSPowerUser entitled “Is NVMe a Good Choice for Gamers?” My instant response, without reading the story — which actually focuses on storage media beyond the boot/system drive — was “Yes, as much as you can afford.” Spoiler alert: that’s what the story says, too.

Where Thinking About Windows 10/11 SSDs Leads….

Here are some storage media principles that flow from making the most of a new PC investment.

The more you spend on a PC, the more worthwhile it is to also spend more on NVMe storage.
Right now, PCIe Gen4 drives run about 2X the speed of PCIe Gen3 drives. They don’t cost quite twice as much. Simple economics says: buy the fastest NVMe technology your PC will support.
Buy as much NVMe storage as you can afford (or force yourself to spend). For pre-built PCs and laptops, you may want to buy NVMe on the aftermarket, rather than get the drives pre-installed. Markup on NVMe drives can be painful. Hint: I use Tom’s Hardware to keep up with price/performance info on NVMe SSDs and other PC components (it’s also the source for the lead-in graphic for this story, which still prominently displays the now-passe Intel Optane as an SSD option. Caveat emptor!).
Corollary to the preceding point: fill every M.2 slot you can in your build. For both my recent Lenovo loaners — the P360 Ultra and the P16 Mobile Workstation — that means populating both slots with up to 4TB each. Right now, the Kingston KC3000 looks like a 4TB best buy of sorts.

Thinking Further (and Outside the Box)

More thoughts in this vein, with an eye toward external drives and multi-tiered storage (archives and extra backups):

If you’re going to put an NVMe SSD in an external enclosure, you will be OK for the time being in a USB 3.2 rather than a USB 4 enclosure. Right now, the newer enclosures cost more than twice as much but don’t deliver anywhere near 2x the speed (except on synthetic benchmarks — I used C: imaging times as a more reliable indicator). Over time this will no doubt change, and I’ll keep an eye on that, too.
I don’t consider spinners (conventional mechanical hard disk drives, or HDDs) any more, except for archival and inactive storage. If I need something for work or play, it goes on an SSD. If I might need something, someday (or to restore same) then it’s ok on an HDD.

I used to restrain spending on NVMe SSDs because of its high price differential. I’m now inclined to believe that restraint is a false economy and forces less productivity as a result. That’s why I’m rethinking my philosophy. I haven’t quite yet gotten to Les Blanc’s famous dictum (“Spend It All”) but I am coming around to “Spend As Much as You Can”…

Remember This Fundamental Assumption, Tho…

My reasoning aims at high-end PCs where users run data-, graphics-, and/or compute-intensive workloads. It does not apply, therefore, to home, hobbyist, and low-end office users. For them typical productivity apps (e.g. MS Office or equivalent), email, web browsing and so forth predominate. They wouldn’t need, nor benefit much from, buying lots of fast NVMe storage. That said, a 1 TB fast-as-possible NVMe for the boot/system drive is the baseline. Other storage options will balance themselves against budget to dictate other choices and PC builds for such users.

In different terms, if you’re not maxing out your PC running data analytics, 3D models and other high-end graphics rendering, or AI or machine learning stuff, this advice is most likely overkill. Too, too costly. But for this user community, more spent on NVMe (and GPUs and memory as well) will repay itself with increased productivity. ‘Nuff said.

Cool Tools, Hardware Reviews, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog, Windows 11

Lenovo P16 Gen1 Gets Unboxed

September 19, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

Just over a month ago, I reached out to my contacts at Lenovo. I’d been wanting to lay hands on some newer PCs so I could dig into Thunderbolt 4 and USB 4 to understand its workings. A couple of weeks ago, I received a P360 Ultra SFF PC equipped with 2 each TB4/USB4 ports. Last Friday, unannounced and unexpected, another so-endowed laptop arrived at my door. Here, I’ll report on my initial findings as this Lenovo P16 Gen1 gets unboxed and set up. It’s a doozy!

Details: Lenovo P16 Gen1 Gets Unboxed

I’ll provide a recitation of facts and figures for this powerful portable workstation PC. In fact, it’s the most expensive personal computer I’ve ever worked on. Indeed, its website price, as configured, is a staggering US$9,719! It’s a big heavy sucker, too: 30.23mm x 364mm x 266mm / 1.2″ x 14.3″ x 10.5″, and 6.6 lbs/3.0 kg.

Here’s a selective list of what’s inside this beast of a Widows 11 Pro laptop. (Find all details on its product page under “Tech Specs”):

CPU: i9-12950HX (16 cores, 24 threads)
RAM: 128 GB (4 x 32GB 4800 MHz DDR5)
GPU (built-in): Intel UHD 770
GPU (discrete): Nvidia RTX A5500 (16 GB VRAM)
Display: 16.0″ WQUXGA (3840×2400) OLED touchscreen
SSD: 2 TB Kioxia KXG7APNV2T04 (PCIe 4.0 Gen4 NVMe)
Biometrics: Fingerprint reader and Hello IR Camera

As cool and impressive as all this stuff is — and it is all that for sure — the real reason I’m using this monster appears in the next image, enumerating the unit’s various ports:

My real reason for using this laptop is item 10, boxed in red.
[Click image for full-sized view.]

I’m jazzed, of course, by the panoply of features and stuff on this giant luggable PC. But I’m most interested in working with its two rear USB-C ports, both of which support Thunderbolt4 and USB4. And indeed, I’ve confirmed that both work as claimed. That’s not always the easiest or most obvious thing, as I’ll explain next.

Getting to TB4/USB4

As I’m learning, it takes some diligence to get either or both of these fast bus technologies to work. The PC port has to support these technologies, as does the target device, and the cable between the two. This is not always the easiest thing in the word to ensure or arrange. But as the following screenshot shows, I’ve gotten both working on the ThinkPad P16 Gen1 Mobile Workstation:

Intel TB Control Center: Above, the CalDigit TS4 dock; Below: an NVMe drive inside the Konyead USB4 enclosure.
[Click image for full-sized view.]

Both TB4 and USB4 remain cutting edge connection types. Everything about them is expensive right now. The CalDigit TS4 dock goes for over US$350 when you can find one for sale. The Konyead M.2 USB4 enclosure costs US$130, which is about what I paid for the Sabrent 1TB Rocket 4 Plus I put inside.

And then, one MUST use TB4/USB4 cables which aren’t cheap either (I got mine with the CalDigit) but they routinely go for US$20-40 for 1 M. Cables are not always well-labeled. It’s a good idea to go for those explicitly specced out for 40Gpbs data and marked as such. I’ve had lots of interesting issues from using lower-spec cables. Mostly, USB4/TB4 simply doesn’t work as promised and the device drops to UASP/USB 3.1/2 levels of performance.

Tomorrow, I’ll follow up and explain what all that means… Stay tuned!

Benchmarking, Cool Tools, Hardware Reviews, Insider stuff, Recent Activity, WED Blog

Backblaze Data Confirms SSD Trumps HDD Reliability

September 14, 2022 Ed Tittel 2 Comments

It’s always made sense on an intuitive basis. Hard Disk Drives (HDDs) include spinning platters, moving arms with read/write heads, motors to power things, and gears to control action. SDDs are made entirely of circuitry: no moving parts. Thus, it’s compelling to assert that SDDs should be more reliable, and less prone to failure than HDDS. And indeed, the latest 2022 Drive State report from online backup and storage provider Backblaze weighs in on this topic. As I read it, that Backblaze data confirms SSD trumps HDD reliability.

The lead-in graphic shows 4 years’ worth of SSD data vs. 8 years for HDDs for boot drivers in their thousands of datacenter based servers. Whereas there’s a dramatic upward knee in the curve for HDDS between years 4 and 5 (from 1.83% to 3.55%), failures actually dipped for SDDs during that interval (from 1.05% to 0.95%). Interesting!

How Backblaze Data Confirms SSD Trumps HDD Reliability

The afore-linked report explains that boot drives function in multiple roles on the company’s plethora of storage servers. They store log and temprorary files; they maintain storage holdings based on each day’s storage activities and volume. The disparity in the number of years for which data is available comes from later adoption of SDDs as boot drives at BackBlaze. That practice started in Q4 2018. Today, all new servers boot from SSDs; older servers whose HDD boot drives fail get SSD replacements.

The numbers of SSDs keep going up, too. The end-of-year 2021 SSD report encompassed 2,200 SSDs. By June 30, 2022, that count grew to 2,558. Failure rates for such devices show much lower numbers than for HDD (see the tables labeled Backblaze SSD Quarterly Failure Rates in the latest report for more detail). Models included come from the following vendors: Crucial, Dell, Micron, Seagate and WDC.

Note: the report itself says:

For any given drive model in this cohort of SSDs, we like to see at least 100 drives and 10,000 drive-days in a given quarter as a minimum before we begin to consider the calculated AFR to be “reasonable”.

The real news, of course, is that quarterly, annualized and lifetime failure rates for SSDs are significantly lower than for HDDs, based on Backblaze’s own long-running data collection. Thus their conclusion comes with the weight of evidence “…we can reasonably claim that SSDs are more reliable than HDDs, at least when used as boot drives in our environment.”

Good stuff! As for me, I like SSDs not just because they’re less prone to failure. They’re also FAST, if more expensive per storage unit than spinners.

Backup/Restore, Cool Tools, Insider stuff, USB devices, WED Blog, Windows 10, Windows 11

Exploring TB4/USB4 Backup Speeds

September 13, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

OK, then. I’m starting to dig into the capabilities of my new loaner SFF Lenovo P360 Ultra PC. It’s a beast, especially for such a small package (3.4 x 8.7 x 7.9″, 87 x 223 x 202 mm, weight 4.4lb/2.0 kg). Right now I’m giving the front USB-C ports a workout, and exploring TB4/USB4 backup speeds. They’re amazing.

About the preceding graphic. It shows a front and rear view of the P360 chassis. Here’s what those numbered items convey:

1. Power switch (on/off)
2. Audio/headphone jack
3. USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type A port
4. 2 x Thunderbolt4/USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C ports
5. Wi-Fi antenna mount
6. 2.5 GbE wired network (RJ-45)
7. 1.0 GbE wired network (RJ-45)
8. 4 x miniDP GPU (connects to Nvidia GPU)
9. Chassis latch release
10. 3 x full-size DP GPU (connects to on-chip Intel GPU)
11. 4 x USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type A ports
12. Optional PCIe card slot/port
13. Power in from 300W power brick

What Exploring TB4/USB4 Backup Speeds Says

First things first: I ran comparatives using CrystalDiskMark on a set of different NVMe enclosures with their own drives, as follows:

Enclosure                NVMe SSD              Price (Date)
======================   ==================    ==============
Sabrent NVMe PCIe x1.3   ADATA XPG 256GB       US$ 60  (2019)
Puhui USB 3.1 USB-C      Samsung OEM 512GB     US$ 30  (2022)
Konyead M.2 TB4/USB4     Rocket 4 Plus 1TB     US$162  (2022)

I didn’t get a lot of useful data out of that comparison, though the numbers for all three devices increase their readings down the preceding list. The final item shows most readings between 2x and 3x those for the first item. However, I decided to compare backup results for all three setups, working through a brand-new Belkin Pro Thunderbolt 4 Dock.

The results turn out to be a bit of a good new/bad news scenario. New TB4/USB4 NVMe enclosures are still punishingly expensive. Performance results from backup show them not yet worth the $132 differential vis-a-vis a cheap0 USB 3 3.1 Gen2 version. About the only thing they can do right now, as far as I can tell, is bring up the “USB 4.0 SSD” label in the Thunderbolt Control Center, as shown in the lead-in graphic.

Big Price Diffs Don’t Translate to Performance

Here’s a table of backup times from Macrium Reflect Free to the three drives, listed by Enclosure name (consult previous table for more info on innards):

Enclosure                Backup (times)
======================   ==============
Sabrent NVMe PCIe x1.3     162 (2:42)
Puhui USB 3.1 USB-C        131 (2:11)
Konyead M.2 TB4/USB4       132 (2:12)

While there’s a 31/32 second difference (about 20%) between the older Sabrent enclosure and the two newer ones, there’s so little difference (1 second) between the other two that I’m sure that falls in the margin of measurement error one would expect.

What’s interesting here is that these backup speeds — even on the slowest/oldest device — are about twice as fast as on my other, similarly loaded test machines (which top out at USB 3.1 Gen 2). That tells me for those who do a lot of backing up, video editing, or other data intensive stuff there’s some real benefit to be gained from investing in TB4/USB4 ports and devices.

Lessons Learned

What lessons do I draw from this experiment? Glad you asked! Here’s a list:

It’s definitely worth adding an interface to older desktops to support TB4/USB4 for the speed bump it provides.
This new technology provides a “speed reason” to consider buying in on a newer laptop or PC.
Newer, more expensive TB4/USB4 NVMe enclosures may not be worth the added cost as compared to USB 3.1 Gen 2/TB3 counterparts.
From what I’m reading, it’s a good idea to use as short a USB4/TB4 rated cable as possible.
It’s also best to hook the NVMe enclosure directly to the PC if you can (going through the dock reduced performance by about 5% overall)

A terrific experiment, and a great learning lesson, too. Thanks to the nice folks at Belkin and Lenovo who made their gear available to me.

Cool Tools, Insider stuff, PC/phone travel gear, Recent Activity, USB devices, WED Blog

CarPlay Cable Connections Are Key

September 9, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

Here’s another recent lesson learned from our just-completed trip to New England. On our reconnaissance mission in late July, we quickly figured out that a Lightning cable between iPhone and in-car USB makes connecting simple and fast. This time around, we learned that the cable itself also matters. Though I packed 3 such cables in our cable bag, only one of them worked well to support CarPlay. Hence my title: CarPlay cable connections are key. Let me explain…

Why CarPlay Cable Connections Are Key

One of the cables was probably shorted: the charge indicator kept turning on and off when it was in use in the car. That simply won’t do.

The second cable was an old — iPhone 6 vintage, at least — Apple-provided charging cable. Clearly, it couldn’t handle the bandwidth requirements needed to ferry comm traffic between the iPhone and the car’s built-in display. It simply didn’t work reliably or well.

The third cable proved to be the charm. It was a 10-foot Amazon Basics USB A for iPhone and iPad cable purchased in 2019. This item is no longer in stock, but something like this iPhone 11 model (US$16.99) would undoubtedly work. I gave one to my son when he went off to school, so I’m ordering 2 more right now.

Underlying USB Support in CarPlay

As I understand it, Lightning cables support USB 2.0 more or less uniformly (here’s an interesting discussion from Volvo, and an informative Reddit thread). My guess is that both of my old cables were sufficiently “used” that they simply couldn’t provide full USB 2.0 capability/bandwidth. The newer cable — despite its 10ft (~3M) length — worked just fine.

Hint/tip: before you take off on a road trip, it’s probably a good idea to test your chosen Lightning cables (listening to music is a fair method) to make sure they can carry the load. I’d also recommend taking a spare — I always do — just in case you lose or damage one while traveling.

Cloud PC, Cool Tools, Recent Activity, WED Blog

Appreciating Apple CarPlay

September 7, 2022 Ed Tittel Leave a comment

Hello there! We’re just back from a combination trip to the Northeast. On August 25, we flew to Boston with son Gregory to move him into Emerson College. On August 31, we took an Uber to the Boston Logan rental car pickup to head north to Maine. This latter half of the trip has me appreciating Apple CarPlay greatly and enthusiastically.

Why I Am Appreciating Apple CarPlay

I’ve owned and used various in-car GPS systems for years, including those available in Mercedes, Volvo, and Toyota models. Each one is a little different. Each one has its decided UI quirks and foibles. That leads me to my number one source of CarPlay gratitude: a single, consistent and pretty intuitive UI for navigation via Google Maps. It’s great!

Item number two may be just as important. I can remember paying $300 to $500 to access GPS capability in several cars. CarPlay comes as a standard (no added cost) feature on many cars these days. That’s a nice savings, in addition to the benefits of a familiar and standard UI.

My third source of gratitude is a YMMV thing, or it may be a matter of personal preference. I find the voice instructions in Google Maps to be easier to understand and follow than those in the Mercedes GPS (that’s the built-in one I know best thanks to using it in 3 cars over the last 10 years or so).

When driving in unfamiliar places, that’s a benefit that’s hard to overstate. I’ve learned to turn around or re-route to rectify my mistakes while driving. But gosh! I’d rather not have to rectify mistakes that result from misunderstanding voice instructions. Google Maps works better for me in that regard.

All My Future Vehicles Will Have CarPlay

Because we’re an iPhone family (wife, son and myself all have 13 models right now), it makes sense to integrate phone and vehicle. There are lots of other benefits, too — including music, phone calls and SMS messages, the Waze app, and more. Frankly, I just can’t see paying extra for a feature from a carmaker that doesn’t work as well for me as the iPhone running Google maps (or some other equivalent). One more thing: here’s an interesting MakeUseOf story that explains the best of the CarPlay apps, and what new stuff lies ahead in this category. Check it out!

‘Nuff said!