Problem with phone (voip) over new modem setup
I just noticed that the phone quality with my new setup as mentioned in the last posts is bad. The ringing sound is almost echoing and when someone on the other end speaks it is like I am on a bad modem dial-up connection. Arghhhh!!! Do I need to blame my new D-Link modem or did I forget an important setting in both of my DSL-modems? I am receiving a call from my best friend from Germany tonight and am ready to pull the new modem apart and go back to my old setup. I cannot even ask anyone for ideas, because my setup is pretty rare, I guess…maybe I do need to put my German modem first and the Australian modem second? But then I wonder how to receive the high speed internet, if my German modem is not receiving it, plus I also want to use the wireless of the German modem… Would be easier to draw a picture to explain what I mean. Okay, here is my setup:
Looks easy, but took me a while to setup the software of both modems to actually work with each other. However, the phone seems to not get the decent amount of bytes through the line as the sound is just shabby. Also, as I said yesterday, our internet speed is still very much the same as before the new modem came into play. I guess, that the D-Link modem is not transfering the whole speed to the Fritzbox modem. But, where to check and what to set where and why??? HELP!
UPDATE
Just found out that I can call out, but the person on the other end can’t hear me. 
Call me computer network geek with boobies
Today at 2.30 pm you might have heard a loud YEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!
That was me, because I could finally get my personal smart DSL friggling modem2modem setup to work.
So far I was using my wireless German DSL modem (Fritzbox 7050), which I hacked from Annex B to Annex A to receive the Australian DSL signal, plus I changed the firmware and installed another hack.
Unfortunately I didn’t receive the full ADSL2+ speed with my hacked German Fritzbox modem. My internet provider is iinet, and they advertise with up to 24000 kb/s as download speed, which one can only reach when your next exchange is right next to your house probably. Our exchange point is 3,2 km away, therefore we can only reach between 4000 and 6000 kb/s.
Because I wanted to highest speed possible (who wouldn’t) I bought the D-Link 502T Generation II DSL modem (on eBay.com.au).
Since last night, I was trying to connect both modems, because I wanted the full speed of my internet line, which I reach with the Australian DSL modem, but I didn’t want to miss my Fritzbox wireless internet and the VOIP (voice over IP), because I have two phone numbers set up in my Fritzbox, a German number, so that people from home can call me cheap or for free (with a flatrate to german fixed phone numbers, pretty common these days).
I know, it sounds quite confusing for someone who is not in it.
I am totally in it, a bit exhausted but HAPPY! Learning by doing, as usual the best training! 
And my man is proud of me, again. 
I’m his computer chick, he accepted and lives with it. What would he do without, anyway? Saved him and us a lot of money for an Australian wireless DSL modem with VOIP integrated, which also needs to have all the features that my Fritzbox has. Ok, and I love my Fritzbox. 
Mission accomplished! 
I have wireless Internet again, can use my phone with the two numbers, use the advantages of my Fritzbox settings (like the the night setting where phone is automatically turned off, the nice online traffic counter, modem reports via email, setting of two alarm clocks and let the phone ring me up in the morning, the awesome software display design (D-Link looks like 1995!) etc.), but still I am surfing over the Aussie D-Link modem with the higher speed.
The only thing, I don’t know if the speed I am reaching now, is correct…I measured it with speedtest.net and it said 0.27 Mb/s download… My Aussie modem is receiving 6853 kb/s, which would be over 6Mb/s, or am I wrong?
Mar 27, 2009 • A-life & English •••• 0 comments »
Connecting new Aussie ADSL2 modem with wireless German DSL modem
Finally I have time to install the new DSL (ADSL2+) modem that I’ve ordered on eBay a few weeks ago. It is brand new, cost me only $30 (plus shipping extra $15), and is supposed to be a good DSL modem, as far I could search in diverse forums for user opinions. For geeks, it is the D-Link DSL-502T, Generation II, ADSL2+ modem router.
My plan is to connect it to my German wireless DSL modem. With only my German modem, which I changed from Annex B to Annex A (Australian Standard), the DSL speed seems to be, ehm, very slow. We reach not more than 900 kb/sec as download speed, around 500 kb/sec upload. Our internet provider gives us up to 24000 kb/s download speed and we can’t use it so far, but we pay our $60 per month. Therefore, I listened to Sven from the other side of this country (Sydney), who said, he had the same slow internet connections with his German DSL modem, therefore he bought a simple Australian DSL modem to put it as transmitter in between phone line and German DSL modem.
If you don’t see me for a while it can mean that I’m having trouble with getting the internet running. Wish me luck!
Upgrade to WP 2.7.1 successful
I just came home from work and before going to bed I quickly (well, about 30 minutes) upgraded my WordPress Blog version to the newest 2.7.1 (from 2.6.3), successfully by hand (this automatic upgrade plugin out there does not work for me). I must say, it looks very neat in the Admin dashboard now. I like it. All my plugins seem to work and my beloved wp-cats plugin that would not work with the new WordPress is not needed any longer, because the new WP has a quick edit function for the posts/categories, which almost works as nice as wp-cats. So , I am happy. I deactivated the intensecommentdebate plugin for now, to test if the spam came through that. And I know that most of you don’t care, if I have this hot comment tool running or not. :P
The country tracker is also a test run. I deactivated statcounter, because I am not really looking into it very often lately and thought, I can save some script-loading to improve my blog’s speed. I’m more interested from where in the world you are coming from. Unfortunately it only saves the last 10 countries.
Oh, was that a snoring sound? My better half seems to have fallen asleep while playing Tetris on his mobile. Wait, I’m coming…..! Good night my dear new fast blog(software).
Mar 21, 2009 • A-life & Blog & English •••• 1 comment »My new TöffTöff Brmmm Brmmm
D Seit letzem Freitag, dem 13. März(!) 
, bin ich stolze Besitzerin von diesem hier:
E Since last Friday, the 13th(!) , I am the proud owner of this:
D Gleich ausgetestet, ob es denn auch camping tauglich ist. Jepp, Matratze passt rein und Nathan und ich auch.
E Testing for camping…yepp, mattress fits inside, so do we. Approved!
D Jetzt habe ich mein eigenes Gefährt und Nathan kann eins seiner beiden Autos (wahrscheinlich den Volvo) verkaufen.
E Now I have my own car (quoting Nathan: ‘you made an investment’) and Nathan can sell one of his other two cars (probably the Volvo).
D Ich liebe mein neues Auto! Es ist von 1992, hat 295.000km runter, Servolenkung, Air-conditioning(die momentan aber nicht funktioniert, aber das bekommt mein Männe hoffentlich gefixt), sehr bequeme Sitze, neue Reifen (brauchen nur ne Ausbalancierung). Alle sechs Monate wurde das Auto zur Wartung in die Werkstatt gegeben (die Vorbesitzerin ist Deutsche, in Kenia geboren, in England aufgewachsen, als junges Mädel nach Australien gekommen). Es wurde vorm Verkauf noch mal in die Wekstatt gebracht und die letzte Inspektion gemacht (Ölwechsel, neuer Ölschalter (wofür is das?), generelles tuning). Das Beste: das Auto ist bis July registriert, das heisst, ich spare mir erstmal die um die 250 Dollar für die Anmeldung bis July. Man zahlt es hier entweder alle 6 Monate oder 1 Jahr im voraus. Bei alten Autos empfiehlt sich aber die 6 Monats-Variante.
Es fährt sich echt toll und so leise, ausser dass die Stossdämpfer super weich sind und die Federung recht alut quietscht. Nunja, ist halt ein altes Auto. Ich muss “ihm” noch nen Namen verpassen…
E I love my new car. It is from 1992, has 295.000km, power-steering, air-con(not working at the moment, but mr.Natey can hopefully fix it), very comfortable seats, new tyres (they only need an alignment). It got serviced every 6 months the last 11 years and got the last service a week ago (oil change, new oil switch (for whatever that is good for), engine tuning). The best: it is registered until July this year, so I don’t have pay for that in the next months (around $250 for 6 months). It drives very nice and quiet, only the suspension is a bit soft and makes squeaky noises. Well, it is an old mate. I still need to give him a name…
Mar 18, 2009 • Australia & Deutsch & English & Visuelles •••• 7 comments »14666 x spam instead of ham in my Gallery2
D Ich weiss schon warum die Zahl 666 in Verbindung mit dem Teufel steht. Soeben habe ich festgestellt, das meine externe (bisher nicht so öffentliche) Fotogalerie 14,666 Spamkommentare inne hat. Ja, gehts noch? Ich habe mich schon länger nicht mehr mit meiner Gallery2 beschäftigt und überlege eh seit einiger Zeit vielleicht doch auf die zahlreichen kostenlosen Fotohoster (Picasa, flickr, Ipernity, ZenPhoto, etc.) auszuweichen. Nun weiss ich ja, wie man seine eigene Bildergalerie installiert, hosted, anpasst und hegt und pflegt und könnte mich schön zurücklehnen und das hosten jemand anderes überlassen, z.B. flickr/yahoo oder Picasa/g00gle. Ich bin schon seit einiger Zeit bei flickr und seit Kurzem teste ich auch Picasa und muss sagen, beide haben was für sich. Flickr würde ich allerdings wenn, dann nur in der Pro Version nutzen, was hiesse, dass es $2 pro Monat kostet, dann aber unendlich Speicherplatz bietet. Picasa bietet 1GB for free, was schon ausreichen könnte, aber wenn man Bilder in Originalgrösse hochlädt, ist das auch schnell ausgeschöpft. Ich finde das flickr Design nicht so intuitiv zu bedienen, wie Picasa, wenn man an die Familie denkt, die gerade erst mit den ersten Schritten im web anfängt. Für flickr gibt es allerdings mehr plugins für Blogs, um die Fotos einzubinden. Flickr ist weiter verbreitet; gibts ja auch schon länger.
Ist an sich ne feine Sache, mit ner eigens gehosteten Galerie (wie der Gallery2) alles unter Kontrolle zu haben. Aber so langsam sehe ich nicht mehr ein, jeden Monat 5 Euro zu zahlen, um (unter anderem) meine Bilder im Netz zu haben oder meinen Blog zu schreiben. Und da ich eh bald mehr Speicherplatz brauche, und ich es jetzt schon nervig finde, jedes Bild so klein im Speicherbedarf wie möglich zu machen, nur damit ich mehr Platz auf meinen Webseiten habe, werde ich wohl eine der bequemen Möglichkeiten wählen. Erstmal die AGB’s beider vergleichen…hehe! Wer kommt besser weg? Ich weiss ja, wie sehr alle auf G00gle schimpfen, aber ist Yahoo da so viel besser?
Zurück zu meiner Fotogalerie. Ich kann die Kommentarfunktion der Gallery2 natürlich abschalten, aber mag es, wenn jemand ein Bild kommentiert. Aber nur wenn der jemand ein Mensch und kein Spam-Roboter mit Linkschleuderfunktionalitäten ist! Und ich wundere mich, warum mein Hosting Speicher fast ausgeschöpft ist… löschen löschen löschen…von den 14,666 Kommentaren waren ganze 3 kein Spam. 
Hat vom Speicherplatz zwar nur um die 45MB freigeschauffelt, aber immerhin. So, und nun wohin mit den Bildern?
E I know why the number 666 is in connection with the devil. Just now I found out that I have 14,666 spam comments in my external (yet not so public) photo gallery. Just insane! I haven’t logged into my Gallery2 for quite a while. Also, lately I was thinking of switching to one of the free photo hosting websites (picasa, flickr, ipernity, zenphoto, etc.). Now that I know how to install, host, adjust and care and maintain my own photo gallery, I could lay back, relax and let other companies host my photos….for free (I know the hooks with photo licensing, which is the reason I didn’t use them yet).
I am paying $10(AU) a month at the moment, to host my blog and my photos, with having 1GB of space (now less than 200MB left). I will run out of space soon, if I don’t upgrade. The upgrade is another $4(AU) a month. Too much!
For unlimited photo hosting I could pay $2 a month if I use flickr (I already have a free account, which would not be enough for me), for example. Although I don’t like their gallery design and wonder how my family and the older generation would be able to navigate through?
Here I think Picasa is a bit better. Giving me 1GB for free and having a more intuitive gallery design (that even my new-to-the-internet-dad knows how to navigate through). So, I am already trying out Picasa (G00gle) and think 1GB could be enough for me at the moment. I really like their desktop photo management tool and how easy it is to upload the photos. That’s what I am looking for. Something where I can quick edit photos, making them smaller for web, giving titles or tags and online it all goes. I probably stick with Picasa for the more private photos and flickr for the special photos? I wonder how it works for both if you want to hide albums from the public…which service is handling it better?
Back to my own hosted gallery. I could switch commenting in my Gallery2 off, but I do like the comment functionality and I know that especially family and close friends like to comment on them. Damn spam problem though. I was wondering why my hosting memory is almost at the limit…delete delete delete…from all 14,666 comments only 3 haven’t been spams. Deleting them all freed up about 45MB memory, at least something. Still I only have less than 200MB on my webspace and need to think of either shrinking stuff, deleting or moving to free hosting sites (as mentioned above).
D #Hinzufügung:
Es gibt anscheinend Leute, die ihr gesamtes Leben via kompletter Fotosammlung auf flickr verewigen (und alles öffentlich, uiuiui)…scheint also keine Begrenzungen in der Anzahl der Fotoalben bzw. im Speicherplatz bei Flickr zu geben, oder? Bei den Picasa-thumbnails finde ich die regelbare Skalierung der Grösse allerdings ein nettes Feature. Bei flickr ist alles nur so zusammegeklatscht und alle thumbnails haben die gleiche Grösse. Dafür gibt es diese nette Alben in Alben Struktur, was Picasa wiederum nicht kann.
A quick telegram of recent happenings
Englisch paragraphs start with a bold E,
Deutsche Absätze beginnen mit einem fettgedruckten D.
D Ein bisschen Gartenarbeit…und man kann doch gleich sehen, was für Schuhe ich getragen habe. Sieht eher so aus, als wäre ich unter die Schornsteinfeger gekommen. Man merkt doch einfach, dass der Grundboden hier sehr sandig ist (wahrscheinlich wäre hier sogar Strandsand, wenn die Briten nicht…ihre Rasenkultur mitgebracht hätten) und die Grasbüschel sind auch nicht so dicht und tief verwurzelt wie in Deutschland. Man geht ein wenig und es staubt. Man mäht Rasen und befindet sich in einer totalen Staubwolke. Rasenmähen auf australisch.
E A bit of gardening…and one can see what kind of shoes I was wearing. Looks more like I was in a chimney. The difference to lawns in Germany is that the earth is very sandy (maybe we would have sand all around us, if the Brits didn’t import their green lawn culture). The grass is not as deep with roots in the ground as in Germany either. You walk and leave a dust cloud. You mow the lawn and one cannot see you because you’re hidden in a sandy dust cloud. Lawn mowing in Australian.
D Nathan hat sich mal wieder selbst übertroffen und ein fantastisches neues Gericht entworfen…wir nennen es Spicy Thai Sunset Chicken Noodle Soup. Hauptkomponenten: Vermicelli, Süsskartoffel, Kürbis, rote frische Chilischote, Röstzwiebeln (fast ist mir das Wort nicht eingefallen), Erdnüsse, Minzblätter, und mehr. Sooo lecker.
E Nathan could show again his talents as the super chef and developed a new meal, which we called “Spicy Thai Sunset Chicken Noodle Soup”. Main ingredients: vermicelli, sweet potatos, squash, fresh red chili, fried onions, peanuts, mint, and more. Sooo delicious.
D Hier mal wieder ein Glücksfundstück von Nathan…seit ein paar Tagen/Wochen ist hier in der Gegend Sperrmüll und da wir in einer eher reicheren Gegend wohnen, wird hier weggeschmissen, was andere Leute (wir) noch als neuwertig sehen und wahrscheinlich gebraucht weiter verkaufen würden, statt an die Strasse zu stellen.
Seit Langem suchen wir schon via Anzeigenzeitung und Internet nach zwei passenden Barhockern für unseren Küchentresen. Das Problem war immer, dass der Durchschnittsbarhocker 75cm hoch ist; wir aber nur maximal 65cm gebrauchen können, weil unser Tresen niedriger ist.
Hier sind unsere neuen Höckerchen…sogar schlicht im Design (sieht aus wie ehemals Ikea vom Holz). Leider sind sie zu hoch (~75cm), aber Nathan will die unten abschleifen. Dann wird das schon passen.
E Again an item of the Nathan’s lucky eye during side road trash season. Ha ha!
We were looking for quite a while now to find two fitting bar stools for our kitchen bar table. Mostly the bar stools were too high in size (normally they are around 75cm), and our counter top is lower than the average height. Last week Nathan came home with these two, almost brand new, bar stools, which remind me of the Ikea design. They look like they haven’t been used long at all. The only thing is, they are too high for our counter, but because the legs are massive wood it will be easy to shorten them.
D Neben den Barstühlen hat Nathan noch einen 4-Takter Rasenmäher der Marke Rover “gefunden” (soll sehr gute Qualität sein und nicht aus China laut australischem Vorbesitzer). Ich habe einen kleinen Glastisch und einen grösseren Plastiktisch für den Garten “gefunden”. Nathan hat dann wiederum eine Dachantenne (für eines seiner Kunstprojekte) “gefunden”, dann ebenso eine Gasflasche für unseren Grill, einen grossen grünen Sonnenschirm (bei dem nur ne Schraube locker war), dazu einen massiven schweren Fuss aus etwas verrostetem Eisen (wat solls, hält!), ein Mountainbike (nun können wir zusammen auf die Piste gehen)…und all diese Dinge haben Null Nada Nix Dollar gekostet.
E Besides the bar stools, Nathan also “found” a 4 stroke lawn mower from Rover (supposed to be a good/expensive brand). I found one small glass outdoor table and one large outdoor garden table in plastic (well, but at least something to start with until we will “find” something else), Nathan found a terrestrial antenna (for his art), a gas bottle (for our BBQ), a large green garden umbrella with a heavy steel base, a mountain bike (now we can go on the dirt trails together, yay)…and everything for zero Dollar.
D Und dann gibts da noch zu erwähnen: unser Rasen, der ja so unter der australischen Sonne leidet und kurz nach unserem Einzug fast tot war, scheint wieder lebendig zu sein und zeigt das mit neuen dunkelgrün spriessenden Gräsern. Juchhu! Und wenn man ganz genau hinguckt, dann sieht man ein kleines fliegendes Objekt….wer kann es sehen und was ist es? QUIZ
E At last I need to mention our lawn in the backyard that was almost dead through the harsh Australian summer sun, shortly after we moved into our house. But now, it looks like it wants to live. It is showing dark green grass patches that are freshly grown. Yeah! And if one is looking closely enough there is a small flying object in the photo…who can see it and what is it? QUIZ
Come to Australia!
[via Facebook]
Mar 10, 2009 • Australia & Funny •••• 1 comment »Hello?
Wenn ich wirklich 101 Blogabonennten via rss feed habe, wie mein Feed Statistik tool mir anzeigt, warum habe ich dann so ein einsames Gefühl? Hallo, ist da wer?
Mal ne ernsthafte Frage. Seid ihr genauso verwirrt oder gar genervt von meinen mal deutschen, mal englischen Einträgen? Ich nehm’s euch nicht übel, denn ich bin ja selbst so hin-und hergerissen…man will es ja immer nur allesn recht machen.
Ich bin am Überlegen, ob ich nicht ein separates Blog anlegen soll. Das wäre dann auf Deutsch.
Bin sogar am Überlegen, ob ich nicht auf eine der kostenlosen Bloggerplattformen wechseln soll. Sparen ist angesagt. Immerhin zahle ich monatlich fünf Euro für meinen Webspace, plus die Jahresgebühr der Domain von 15 Euro. Sind also zusammen 75 Euro. Das sind immerhin gute 150 australische Dollar. Isch musch ma schau’n. Irgendwie bin ich grad so richtig grummelig und es könnte passieren, dass mit einem Wisch alle meine Spuren im Internetz verschwunden sind. Da ist er wieder, er gemeine Zwilling. Bäh.
~~~
If it is true, and I really have 101 feed subscriber to my blog, as my feed statistic tool is showing me, why do I have such a feeling of loneliness? Hello, anyone out there?
A serious question. Are you confused or annoyed by my German and then English entries the same as I am?
I am thinking about getting a separate blog, which would be in German language.
I also think about “going back” to one of the free blog platforms, instead of paying my monthly fee of five Euro ($10 AUS) plus additionally the fee for the domain of 15 Euro ($30 AUS). In a year I am paying around $150 (AUS). In these days it is good to save every cent and hey, there are so many free services out there, why not use them? Now, that I know how to build and host my own blog I could just relax and invest the saved Dollars in more chocolate, for example.
• A-life & Deutsch & English •••• 9 comments »Long time no see Mr Spam but now get out!
It has been a while, months, maybe even a year, oh no, even since June 2007, that I have received a Spam comment in my blog or better, in my comment moderation loop.
Unfortunately, it seems as if something must have happened or changed lately, because I now get a few spam comments a day. This is not too bad, I know that bloggers usually get up to Hundreds of Spams a day, but after having a blog for quite a while with NO spam at all, it is just annoying that it starts over again…And at the moment I have more spam than real comments, haha! It must have something to do with one of the last WordPress plugins that I installed. I am trying out quite a few new plugins recently, so I don’t have a clue, which one it might be.
Lately, I installed “GetWeather“, “Easy Picasa“, “(c)feed“, “feed stats“, “Feed Statistics“, “IntensiveDebate” (had spam before this was installed), and since today “WP Stats“. My feeling is that it started after I installed the feed plugins, but I am not sure.
I don’t really want to install the math-question (“what is the sum of one and five?”) into my comment textarea again, which is a great tool, but still it is annyoing for the reader to type in any extra stuff before a comment can be made. I thought “Akismet” and the “Simple Trackback Validator” plugin were doing a great job so far. I wonder if it really has to do with one of my recently installed plugins…
Mar 9, 2009 • Blog & English •••• 0 comments »