Voice of the DBA

Category: Blog

  • SQL Bits XIV

    I’m heading back to London for SQL Bits XIV in March. This is my favorite conference, and I’m excited and honored to be selected to present.

    This year the conference goes to four days, and it’s an amazing set of sessions being offered at a very reasonable price. You can get a full day of expert level training on Wednesday and Thursday if you like. Friday is very low cost, and Saturday is free. Thursday also has a few side sessions if you’d like to attend a variety of different things during the day.

    I’ll be presenting Thur afternoon and Friday afternoon if you’d like to see me, but please feel free to stop my, shake my hand, and say hi at any time. I should be at the venue early Thur and the rest of the conference until Sat late afternoon. My sessions hare:

    • Branding Yourself for a Dream Job – Thur, 4:00pm
    • Get Testing with tSQLt – Friday, 5:00pm.

    That doesn’t leave me a lot of time for Friday night’s preparations, so perhaps I’ll preview my costume early.

    Superheroes

    One of the best parts of SQL Bits is that there is a themed party every Friday night, and everyone’s invited to have fun. I participated in the medieval theme a few years ago, but wasn’t ready for Steampunk last fall.

    However I’m ready for 2015. I’ve ordered a costume, with time to change something if things aren’t fitting properly.

    I’m excited to see what people choose, and it should be great fun in London this March.

    This really is a great event. Lots to learn, lots of fun, and a casual atmosphere that I rarely see elsewhere. I thank the SQL Bits team for their hospitality and I look forward to another first class event.

  • Upgraded SSD

    I was going to call this an upgraded HDD, but that’s not right. Technically it’s a drive update, but really it’s an SSD upgrade.

    My new Portege Z30 came with a 128GB drive. I could have had Toshiba upgrade it, but it was more expensive than the deal I got before Christmas. Instead of Toshiba’s $400 for a 512GB upgrade, I paid $220 for a 512GB mSATA drive, and I also will have the 128GB one that came with the machine as a spare.

    I decided to upgrade the drives this weekend and was surprised how easy this actually was. I probably need to wipe the existing OS and reinstall a cleaner version of Win8.1, but for now I wanted to duplicate things.

    After powering on the machine and getting things setup (Which was easy, having my old settings of my Lenovo T430 pulled from OneDrive during setup), I needed to clone the drive. There are ways of doing this, but I settled on using the Macrium Reflect method from this MaxiumumPC article.

    I downloaded Macrium Reflect and installed it. It’s a simple GUI and connecting my new MSata drive in the external enclosure, I set things duplicating while I went off to watch my daughter’s volleyball tournament.

    The next day, I fell in love with YouTube and the community again. I found this teardown video that shows how easy it is to open up the Toshiba and get at the memory and drive. This is a slightly older model, and I didn’t need to the TORX screwdriver, but it was good to see someone show me without fumbling around or digging through poorly written documentation.

    This morning I started making coffee. I have a BUNN maker that brews a pot in about 5 minutes from start to finish, and it’s hot. I turned that on and then broke out a screwdriver. I didn’t take pictures, but it took me about the same amount of time as the coffeemaker to get done.

    I removed all the screws. I had one false start when the bottom didn’t lift up. I had missed two screws under the rear rubber feet, so I had to pry those off and remove the screws. I also needed a set of pliers to help turn one of the screws holding the drive in. This includes swapping the drives in my external case.

    I screwed things together and booted up the machine and it looked exactly like it had with the 500GB drive as it had with the 128GB one.

    Now to clean the OS and build things the way I want them.

  • Technology Advances – mSATA external case

    I had an SSD die last year. It was one of my traveling SSDs, where I keep spare copies of my VMs and presentations. Fortunately I didn’t need the backup that trip, and when I got home, I switched out to the second drive and carried that along.

    I wasn’t planning on replacing the SSD too quickly, but when I saw a sale from Crucial over Christmas, I ordered a new mSATA drive. I hadn’t really paid attention to the format, thinking this would be similar to my other small SATA drives, but it wasn’t. It’s a card, as in a small SD card sized device.

    I can’t believe how small a 512GB drive has become.

    I also ordered an external case for is, a Sabrent one that was highly rated on Amazon. Here is the collection of the case and drive. For scale, my Bluetooth headset is in the picture.

    Photo Jan 09, 10 20 04 AM

    When I opened the case, it’s essentially a card that slides out. The mSATA card clips in there, much like a memory stick.

    Photo Jan 09, 10 20 20 AM

    Once I clipped it in, I slipped the insert back in the case and used two tiny screws (almost eyeglass size) to lock things together.

    Photo Jan 09, 10 21 02 AM

    The connection to a computer is with a USB3->SATA cable, the same format as my previous drives. That cable might be the bulkiest part of this ensemble as the drive could really be seen as 1/4 the size of my iPhone 6.

    My desktop recognized it right away and things look good. I didn’t do anything with that as I’m planning on sliding it into my new laptop and then using that 128GB drive as my backup on the road for talks and the main VM I need.

    I’m still considering grabbing a small PC like a Gigabyte BRIX as a spare device for me to present from. I’d love a tablet like the Surface Pro 3, but until I find an ultrabook or convertible with 16GB, I’m limited on choices.

  • Just In Time

    I’m glad my new laptop shipped and should be arriving shortly. I saw this on my current Lenovo

    alptop

    I had taken my laptop downstairs and noticed the battery was low. I grabbed the adapter, plugged it in and didn’t think about it. However when I disconnected the power, I got the “low battery” message again. I was surprised as the machine had been plugged in for a few hours. When I hovered over the battery icon, I saw the tip above.

    I’ve tried removing and replacing the battery, and I guess the battery could be dying, but on a previous Lenovo, when I got this it meant a motherboard issue. The internal connectors weren’t working anymore and apparently the repair guy had seen this quite a few times over the years on laptops. As they age, apparently this is one area that fails.

    Replacement of the motherboard for that machine was $1000. It looks like it’s $500-600 for this one, and with all the wear and tear I’ve put on this machine, it’s time to just replace it.

    I suspect with all the presenting and traveling I do, I should be happy with about a 2 year refresh cycle.

    Now I just need to hustle and get my new machine here and set up. I should have two weeks for prep before I travel to Germany for the SQL Konferenz. Fingers are crossed.