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DIY: Make a vertical laptop stand with a USD 2 napkin holder

DIY: Make a vertical laptop stand with a USD 2 napkin holder

napkinholderSome days ago I received my new 27″ screen to place on my desk together with my MacBook Pro. And I knew that once I had the screen, I would have to make some space on my desk. The main idea is to save space by placing your MacBook laptop in vertical position and not how you would normally use it. As I will only use the 27″ thunderbolt screen when at home, I won’t need the laptop to watch its screen anymore… (more…)

Dell U2713HM full resolution problems on OSX Mavericks

Dell U2713HM full resolution problems on OSX Mavericks

Yesterday I purchased a Dell U2713HM a 27″ display that gives me up to 2560×1440 resolution.

I connected it with an HDMI cable to my Retina MacBook Pro 15″ (late 2013). At first it didn’t work as expected, and I was getting “only” full HD resolution, I knew this was a possibility because I was not using the correct cable. You need a Mini Displayport to Displayport to get the full possible resolution, I purchased the cable but didn’t arrive yet.

Today the cable arrived so I plugged the new screen to my Mac, and surprise! It didn’t work either. 🙁
I was getting a strange resolution, and then I was able to get full HD again, the most, but not the full juice.

I started reading online and found a lot of suggestions, unplug, restart, reset SMC and more. I realized my laptop was almost new, and I could call Apple support. So I did, but unfortunately Daniel, the support representative was as lost as me. While he put me on hold (he was asking somebody else), I found the solution online.

It seems the EDID (Extended Display Identification Data) in Mavericks was not right for my new monitor (I also read this solves the problem for other Dell Models U2711 & U2713H). Fortunately, from this link (I also made a mirror here just in case) I could download a ZIP file  which contains the correct EDID for these Dell monitors.

I just download the file, and uncompress it. Then copy the folder to the following path: /System/Library/Displays/Overrides. Then restarted and the display will work as it should have the first time, full 2560×1440 no problems!

Note: In my case, I got a bad start first, and then the computer started correctly so everything was ok. I’ve noticed it took a couple more seconds than what a normal reboot would take.

Just when OS X was restarting, Daniel (the Apple supporter) came back to me. I explained him what I just did and he was surprised of the solution. I gave him the information and he told me that he will report it so the engineering team can prepare an update for Mavericks.

For the time being, you have the tip here, hope this can solve your problem the same way it did for me. Now, I am enjoying full resolution on my 27″Dell screen :).

This is the model of my Mac, just in case somebody es interested

TeamViewer a tool with hidden costs

TeamViewer a tool with hidden costs

Several years ago, I believe 2009, I purchased a license of TeamViewer 4, we were looking for a tool that would allow us to provide remote support to our customers without the hassle of opening firewall ports. So after testing several tools at that moment, we decided to go for TeamViewer.

The application has always been expensive for our taste as a small company, but all in all, you paid one time fee every year and a half or two and you would get a very good tool with all the updates. We kept on upgrading until version 8 which was working fine for us with exception for one thing.

In version 7 & 8 they introduced the possibility to support remotely Samsung devices. It was fantastic, because we would be able to see exactly what our customer was seeing on their phones on our own screen. This allowed us to connect and help them with their mobile requirements too. So we encouraged all our customers to get Samsung Android devices because they would benefit from us to provide them support. Hey! I even made my father purchase a Samsung Galaxy S3 so I could help him with his device remotely. (more…)

How to insert images from Google Drive into a Google Spreadsheet cell

How to insert images from Google Drive into a Google Spreadsheet cell

I discovered this today and its very useful, so I decided to share it with everybody.

Till now I was able to insert an image in whatever region of a Google Spreadsheet by going to “Insert” > “Image“. But this wasn’t fixing the image to the cell you wanted to place the image to.

As explained on this Google Drive help link, you can enter a URL of an image directly into a cell like this: (more…)

Apple iPhone 5 cases incompatible with docks, again

Apple iPhone 5 cases incompatible with docks, again

iPhone5Dock

Apple is one of the most important technological companies in the world, they invest billions in research and development to bring us super cool, powerful and functional products. I have several of them actually and I really like them, yet, they fail to deliver a simple thing: A dock compatible with their own cases!

This is not the first time they make this mistake, (yes I am assuming its a mistake), in the past I remember having an iPhone 4S and having exactly the same problem, with their own bumper it was almost impossible to find a dock compatible with their device. I ended finding a dock in China that was available with a longer 30 pin connector that would allow me to use my case with it. (more…)

How LinkedIn tricks you to invite people to their network

How LinkedIn tricks you to invite people to their network

I use LinkedIn since several years, it allows you to connect your professional profile to a lot of people in millions of companies around the world. Depending on what you do, being and get connected in LinkedIn with all the people you’ve worked with and know professionally can open you doors in the present and in the future.

One thing LinkedIn does is to suggest you “People you may know” to add them to your own network, and its this spec which I am not so happy with.

Some weeks ago I checked my profile and added some contacts that I know, I was surprised they were on LinkedIn so I add them as suggested by the site. My surprise was when I received an email from them saying they don’t use LinkedIn at all, then I realized, LinkedIn was sending invitations to these contacts so they register in LinkedIn!!!

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