Computery

Headset recommendation: Logitech h800

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I've worked from home for ten years. During this time I've needed a reliable headset for doing calls and listening to music that fit some rudimentary needs:

  1. It needed to be wireless, so I didn't pull my laptop onto the ground.
  2. It needed to be stereo.
  3. It needed to have a built-in mic.
  4. It needed to work reliably.
  5. Not too expensive.
  6. 8+ hours of use on a single charge.

This didn't seem like such a big deal, but it turned out to be more difficult than I thought it would be.

Let me work through the headsets I've tried and the problems I ran into.

The first wireless headset I tried was the Logitech h600. It was wireless, had a reasonable quality mic, was stereo, didn't cost too much, and seemed to work fairly well. However, there were some glaring problems, primarily that it was a little small for my head so it had to be pulled down tight to fit right, and because here was no padding on the top band its hard plastic would push down on my head and hurt after a while. Another minor problem was that it needed a USB adapter, it couldn't use the Bluetooth system built into the laptop. The pain wearing it proved to be too much to deal with, given that I was wearing it extensively, so I had to ditch it.

New requirements list:

  1. It needed to be wireless, so I didn't pull my laptop onto the ground.
  2. It needed to be stereo.
  3. It needed to have a built-in mic.
  4. It needed to work reliably.
  5. Not too expensive.
  6. 8+ hours of use on a single charge.
  7. It needed to fit my slightly larger-than-average mellon.
  8. It needed to be comfortable to wear for hours at a time.
  9. Not need any extra attachments to my computer, e.g. a USB adapter or something.

I then tried its older sibling, the Logitech h800. This was larger and had some padding on the band, so it didn't hurt to wear. It also used the laptop's Bluetooth system so didn't need any adapters to connect - just pair it to the laptop once, and then just turn it on when I wanted to use it. Hey presto!

For the most part the h800 has worked well - it's comfortable for wear for hours at a time, even a full day. However one problem I noticed was that the mic quality, i.e. the sound of my voice, is really poor compared to, well, everyone else I was having calls with. Everyone else was using different headsets, I thought my problem was with my headset, so after several years of use it started falling apart and I decided to replace it with something that might be better.

New requirements:

  1. It needed to be wireless, so I didn't pull my laptop onto the ground.
  2. It needed to be stereo.
  3. It needed to have a built-in mic.
  4. It needed to work reliably.
  5. Not too expensive.
  6. 8+ hours of use on a single charge.
  7. It needed to fit my slightly larger-than-average mellon.
  8. It needed to be comfortable to wear for hours at a time.
  9. Not need any extra attachments to my computer, e.g. a USB adapter or something.
  10. It needed to have a reasonable quality mic.

The first alternative I tried was the Jabra Evolve 65 UC. This is a slightly upper scale headset that is purported to have really good quality, and was recommended by some folks at work. I tried looking for one at a brick 'n mortar store so I could try it on, but they couldn't find their on-hand stock so I ended up ordering it online. When it arrived the first thing I did was checked to see how it fit, and unfortunately it was just too tight on my head, and had a hard plastic band with no padding so it just hurt to wear. It also had poor quality audio from the mic, the same as the h800. Clearly wasn't going to work, so I returned it.

After that failure I went back to looking.

The biggest problem with the h800 was with the mic quality. Doing research there seemed to be a known problem with the Bluetooth architecture itself. It seems that there are two "profiles" for how headsets work - a high quality mode for listening to audio, and a lower quality mode for transmitting & receiving simultaneously. Given that I want to have two-way conversations, this turns out to be a major limiting factor in the Bluetooth concept. So.. maybe Bluetooth wasn't what I needed..

There's also a newer generation of Bluetooth that might have helped. My laptop supports Bluetooth 4, but there's a 4.1 that adds a low-power mode, and a new 5.0 that improves things further. I did some searching on 4 versus 5 for audio headsets, but couldn't find anything at the time. So maybe Bluetooth 5 might help, but I'd have to either find a USB adapter or replace the laptop, and that wasn't in the budget.

A coworker mentioned the Plantronics Voyager Focus UC, a set that looks like it might be what I needed - on-ear headphones, includes a USB dongle to use instead of Bluetooth (to avoid mic problems), and it had a comfortable head band. The coworker mentioned that the mic quality was really good when using the dongle, but just using Bluetooth it was terrible, which confirmed my suspicion about needing to go with something that used a USB device! Unfortunately it was no longer available from most suppliers as it was an older model. Given I couldn't try it out, I hesitated getting it.

The first headset I tried was the Logitech G533, which I grabbed from a local store. It covered most of the requirements, and used a USB dongle so the audio should work nicely. I tried it for two days but in the end it proved to be too much - I really didn't like the over-ear form factor and the noise cancelling aspect distorted how I heard my voice when I was speaking, which was too weird for me on calls. Also, it felt a little flimsy, so I was worried about it lasting a few months, never mind a few years. So back to the store it went.

New requirements:

  1. It needed to be wireless, so I didn't pull my laptop onto the ground.
  2. It needed to be stereo.
  3. It needed to have a built-in mic.
  4. It needed to work reliably.
  5. Not too expensive.
  6. 8+ hours of use on a single charge.
  7. It needed to fit my slightly larger-than-average mellon.
  8. It needed to be comfortable to wear for hours at a time.
  9. Not need any extra attachments to my computer, e.g. a USB adapter or something.
  10. It needed to have a reasonable quality mic.
  11. No noise cancelation, or at least a way of turning it off.

The next set I tried was the Beats Solo Pro. This is a premium piece of hardware at roughly $300, and was using my hardware expense account from work so I could splurge on something I used constantly. The headset had a head band, fairly comfortable ear covers, didn't have a boom mic but supposedly had some nifty stuff to make it work well, long batter life, etc, and several coworkers loved their prior model (Solo 3). I grabbed it on sale at a local store (order-ahead for easy pickup, thank you COVID-19), brought it home, took it out of the box (nice packaging job, Beats!), connected it to my laptop and then... realized it was just too small for my noggin. I tried out the mic anyway, just in case, and it was no better than what I'd used before. Drat! Back to the store it'll go.

I did some research into headsets that fit larger mellons. While there are several articles out there, most of them focus on over-the-ear headsets with noise cancellation, and I didn't want that. They also focused primarily on Bluetooth headsets and didn't take mic quality into account, so they weren't going to work for me.

I also did a little more research on Bluetooth 4 vs 5, and it turns out that the improvements don't change anything about the usage "profiles" - it still cuts the audio quality when you're speaking, so that was going to be a non-starter.

I again looked at the Plantronics headset, but it was getting even harder to find, and some comments on Amazon suggested folks were selling cheap knockoffs, I figured I'd hold off again.

Given they were available locally I figured I'd double check what items Logitech had again, and look through their details. While doing this I happened across a little tidbit about the h800 I've been using for several years - while it's sold primarily as a Bluetooth device, it does come with a small USB dongle to connect it if your computer doesn't support Bluetooth. I'd made the assumption that it was a Bluetooth adapter, but I noticed that the manual didn't actually say this, instead indicating it was a proprietary system. So, it might just work!

This morning I dug around to find the headset's adapter, which wasn't in the handy-dandy holder in the left ear cover, plugged the adapter into my laptop, made a test call with Zoom and saved it, then compared the recording to one made with the device connected via Bluetooth - the difference was night and day!

Final requirements:

  1. It needed to be wireless, so I didn't pull my laptop onto the ground.
  2. It needed to be stereo.
  3. It needed to have a built-in mic.
  4. It needed to work reliably.
  5. Not too expensive.
  6. 8+ hours of use on a single charge.
  7. It needed to fit my slightly larger-than-average mellon.
  8. It needed to be comfortable to wear for hours at a time.
  9. Not need any extra attachments to my computer, e.g. a USB adapter or something.
  10. It needed to have a reasonable quality mic.
  11. No noise cancelation, or at least a way of turning it off.

So, after all my searching for a replacement headset to my held-together-with-tape-and-good-wishes Logitech h800, my new headset will be a Logitech h800! In the end needing to have a clearer mic trumped my hope to avoid using a USB adapter. Go figure.

All IE8 security settings

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There are occasions when you have problems with Internet Explorer (IE) having problems with Javascript or plugins that at least partially stem from the browser's security level, for example it can cause Drupal's Ubercart e-commerce module to not let IE users to checkout (a bad thing). For those occasions, here are all of the IE8 security settings listed out in a single table in all their gory detail.

To see them go to the Tools browser menu, click on the Internet Options menu item and then the Security tab, then click Custom Level to see how each setting is adjusted based on the specific security level.

IE Security Settings
Setting Medium (default) Medium-High High
.NET Framework
Loose XAML: enable enable disable
XAML browser applications: enable enable disable
XPS documents: enable enable disable
ActiveX controls and plugins
Allow previously unused ActiveX controls to run without prompt: enable disable disable
Allow scriptlets: disable disable disable
Automatic prompting for ActiveX controls: disable disable disable
Binary and script behaviors: enable enable disable
Display video and animation on a webpage that does not use external media player: disable disable disable
Download signed ActiveX controls: prompt (recommended) prompt (recommended) disable
Download unsigned ActiveX controls: disable (recommended) disable (recommended) disable (recommended)
Initialize and script ActiveX controls not marked as safe for scripting: disable (recommended) disable (recommended) disable (recommended)
Only allow approved domains to use ActiveX without prompt disable enable enable
Run ActiveX controls and plug-ins: enable enable disable
Script ActiveX controls marked safe for scripting: enable enable disable
Downloads
Automatic prompting for file downloads: disable disable disable
File download: enable enable disable
Font download: enable enable disable
Enable .NET framework setup
: enable enable disable
Miscellaneous
Access data sources across domains: disable disable disable
Allow META REFRESH: enable enable disable
Allow scripting of Microsoft web browser control: enable disable disable
Allow script-initiated windows without size or position contraints: disable disable disable
Allow webpages to use restricted protocols for active content: prompt prompt disable
Allow websites to open windows without address or status bars: enable disable disable
Display mixed content: prompt prompt prompt
Don't prompt for client certificate selection with no certificates or only one certificate exists: disable disable disable
Drag and drop or copy and paste files: enable enable prompt
Include local directory path when uploading files to a server: enable disable disable
Installation of desktop items: prompt (recommended) prompt (recommended) disable
Launching applications and unsafe files: prompt (recommended) prompt (recommended) disable
Launching programs and files in an IFRAME: prompt (recommended) prompt (recommended) disable
Navigate windows and frames across different domains: disable disable disable
Open files based on content, not file extension: enable enable disable
Submit non-encrypted for data: enable enable prompt
Use Pop-up Blocker: enable enable enable
Use SmartScreen Filter: enable enable enable
Userdata persistence: enable enable disable
Websites in less privileged web content zones can navigate into this zone: enable enable disable
Scripting
Active scripting: enable enable disable
Allow Programmatic clipboard access: prompt prompt disable
Allow status bar updates via script: enable disable disable
Allow websites to prompt for information using scripted windows: enable disable disable
Enable XSS filter: enable enable enable
Scripting of Java applets: enable enable disable
User Authentication
Login: Automatic logon only in Intranet zone Automatic logon only in Intranet zone Prompt for user name and password

FYI these were obtained from a Windows XP SP3 virtual machine and may behave differently on different versions of Windows.

Synology NAS updates work better in Firefox than Safari

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A small thing I noticed this morning is that Safari wasn't able to complete the DSM 3.0 update - after selecting the file and hitting the upload button it didn't proceed any further. Firefox 3.6, on the other hand, had no problem with the task and was only too happy to process the update. Oh, and the DSM 3.0 OS is gorgeous!

Recovering the Safari address field

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Apple's Safari is my browser of choice on OSX - it's fast, it has a great RSS reader, and it's generally very stable. Occasionally I run into glitches with it, though.

A perfect example is what happened to me tonight. The machine had been running a bit slow having been unused all day, and when I tried to start interact with apps it was taking them a few moments to get caught up. I should note that I also am having problems with my MacBook's armrest that has started clicking the mouse button if I press on the wrong area. Anyway, while the apps were warming up I accidentally dragged the address field / address bar out of the toolbar then watched in horror as it went poof and disappeared.

201002181927.jpg  

Not to much of a problem, I thought, and I went to change the toolbar settings to restore it, only the Customize Toolbar window wouldn't open. Further, the "Open Location" menu item was disabled.

201002181927.jpg

ARGH!

I tried searching online on ways to recover it but all of the suggestions boiled down to "reset it through the Customize Toolbar window", which obviously wasn't going to work.

Thankfully I was aware that Apple uses XML-like property-list, or "plist", files to store settings for most of its applications. I also knew that there were preferences files in the "Preferences" directory of the "Library" in my home directory, one for most of the applications I had installed, including one named "com.apple.Safari.plist".

Opening this file brings it up in OSX's Property List Editor tool which provides a tree-like interface into the various properties that have been assigned. Just what was needed.

201002181929.jpg

Unfortunately the Property List Editor tool doesn't include a search so you have to just trawl through all of the settings until you find what you want, or something related, or something that might just look like fun. The problem I was having was related to the Toolbar and there was a large number of items that could be added to the toolbar, so I started looking for something with the word "Toolbar" in the name that contained sub-items, i.e. an array.

After a bit of searching I found the "dictionary" object "NSToolbar Configuration SafariToolbarIdentifier" which had the sub-property "TB Item Identifiers".

201002181934.jpg

Guess what this contained - yep, you guessed it, an array of strings named "BackForwardToolbarIdentifier", "StopOrReloadToolbarIdentifier", "HomeToolbarIdentifier", "PrintToolbarIdentifier", "AddBookmarkToolbarIdentifier", "OPToolbar1Passwd", "WebSnapper" and, lastly, "InputFieldsToolbarIdentifier". My Safari toolbar only had five items, not the eight in this list, but at least it had relevant-sounding names.

201002181937.jpg

A moment later I noticed that right beside this dictionary was another one named "NSToolbar Configuration BrowserWindowToolbarIdentifier", which also had an array named "TB Item Identifiers". This list was shorter.. only five items, and each of them seemed to be the items that were showing in my toolbar.. Was this what I was looking for?

201002181938.jpg

Before I dug further I closed Safari so it wouldn't try to overwrite the file I was trying to manually modify. I then went to the "TB Item Identifiers" array and clicked the "Add Item" button, which added an "Item 6" entry to the array; making a guess I copied the "InputFieldsToolbarIdentifier" item from the other array and pasted it in as the value for the new "Item 6".

201002181939.jpg

I then saved the file and opened Safari...

201002181925.jpg

Yay! :-D Problem resolved, back to life as normal.

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