Monday, March 29, 2010

Which Analog Hearing Aid Is Right For Me?

When looking for hearing aids most people accept the simple fact that digital hearing aids are better than analog hearing aids. No doubt digital aids are more sophisticated and state-of-the-art, not to mention that they're easier to install and use, but sometimes analog hearing aids are more appropriate for your needs. Digital hearing aids have more options for the user, and so they are more costly than the analog variety, it just depends on whether or not you need these extra features.

Analog Hearing Aids

Modern hearing aids consist of a microphone which receives sound, an amplifier which makes the sound louder and clearer, and a receiver to convey amplified sound to the ear. Analog hearing aids can be divided into two categories: conventional analog hearing aids, and programmable analog hearing aids.

Conventional hearing aids are the least expensive of all and the simplest in terms of technology. They only offer the basic functions that you would associate with a hearing aid. Programmable hearing aids on the other hand have many more features to offer the user. They are actually very similar to digital hearing aids in the fact that they also contain a microchip to program required options and settings suitable for a patient.

Programmable hearing aids can be customized to be used in quiet or noisy environments. They are very easy to use, at a flick of a switch you can completely customize all of the settings. The only difference between digital hearing aids and programmable analog hearing aids is that in digital aids the sound is converted into digital signals which can then be used to perform additional functions, like speech recognition and noise reduction. These state of the art digital hearing aids are normally self-adjusting, however with the analog variety you will have to operate them manually using either a switch, or a remote control.

Programmable analog hearing aids differ from conventional analog hearing aids because they can be programmed to suit the specific patient's requirements. If you are not comfortable with the present settings you can always have them changed to suit you better. An induction coil can be used in programmable aids to pick up sounds that are sometimes hard to hear, for example while using a telephone you sometimes need to strain your ears to hear what the other person is saying. Programmable hearing aids normally come with a switch for induction coil mode so you can easily switch between modes.

Because of these features and others, programmable aids cost more than the conventional ones. The conventional ones can only really be set up, not programmed. The main reason people will chose analog aids is because they are less expensive.

There are times when an analog hearing aid suits the user perfectly, not just because of the cost. Most people buy a hearing aid is to improve their hearing ability, so it doesn't matter how much a hearing aid costs or how modern it is. Very few people would want a speech recognition system, although that would mean I could get rid of my receptionist, oh no that's unfair it would have to make tea too. You can talk to your audiologist to decide which one will be suitable for the type of hearing loss you have.



Hearing Aid Costs

Factors to Consider Prior to Buying a Hearing Aid

Sunday, March 28, 2010

You Can Learn To Read Guitar Sheet Music

When you learn to read guitar sheet music it will be vital in expanding your guitar playing skills. Playing by ear will only get you so far and I am here to help take it to the next step. I will show you some basic tips and tricks to help you learn to read guitar sheet music and hopefully that will make you a better and more versatile guitar player.

I will now give you a list that will show you it is not hard to learn to read guitar sheet music.

Finding the right material

Most guitar books will have some basic sheet music and songs in the front pages that are designed to help you learn to read guitar sheet music quickly. Once you have basic guitar knowledge it is relatively easy to learn to read guitar sheet music. Start in small sections, one chord at a time. Use your guitar and play the chord out loud until you know it sounds correct.

Setting your self up

You will need to be in a small quite room where you will not be distracted by anything when you learn to read guitar sheet music. The only way to know when you get it right is if it sounds right and it can be difficult do that if you have screaming kids in the room with you or loud street noise outside. Concentration is key and this will make it easier to learn how to read guitar sheet music. If you are distracted you may find a whole day can be wasted trying to focus.

Getting started

Remember what I said, be free from distraction! I cannot stress that enough. Now you’re alone and it’s quiet, find a music book with sheet music, try to pick something easy but also try to pick something you are familiar with. It makes it much easier to learn to read guitar sheet music if you are familiar with the tune. Make sure you are confident with one piece before you move on to the next.

Continue practicing

Continue to practice as much as you can, you will find that the better you get the more you will practice. When you enjoy something you will generally apply more time to it. Trying to learn to read guitar sheet music is easy as long as you practice! Once you have mastered reading sheet music then you can attempt to write you own music and that is where the real fun begins! It is essential to make sure you are confident or you will only have to go back and learn to read guitar sheet music all over again.

Left Handed Electric Guitars
Left Hand Electric Guitar

How To Choose An Electric Guitar

For a music aficionado, the electric guitar is the instrument that offers the greatest thrill. Many classes offering courses in guitar playing have sprung up. Hence purchasing the right electric guitar will help you to enjoy your learning experience. Here are some easy to understand tips that will enable you to make a correct decision in purchasing your electric guitar.

Are all the guitars the same?

No. There are many types of electric guitars available in the market. The right guitar depends on the sound that you are interested in. While some guitars can easily switch between jazz, blues and rock without any perceptible difference, the others cater to only one type of sound. Choosing the sound that you want will simplify your purchase decision. Besides, the sound you also need to take into account the location of the neck on the guitar. The two most common types of positions are the "set-neck" and the "bolt-on" necks. The set-neck allows you to keep on playing longer than bolt-on. The meeting point of the neck and guitar is tighter to allow the sound to move freely between the two.

The only disadvantage of set-neck is that it is difficult to repair or replace once it is damaged. The bolt-on style is available with the cheaper versions of guitars. The design is simple, locking the neck in a slot of the guitar body. Musical experts consider that this type of neck style does not give good quality sound and cannot be played longer, but this is more due to type of materials used. If you don’t mind spending money for a superior quality sound but not a durable electric guitar, go for a set-neck.

What are frets?

You can choose the electric guitar based on how wide and long the neck is. 21, 22 and 24 are the number of frets that you can get with the usual guitars. The guitars from Stratocasters have 21 frets. This gives you a shorter neck but opting for large frets will let you play more easily. Jackson guitars have higher frets. The number of frets you should choose will depend on the number of notes you want to play. A higher number lets you play more sounds.

Left Handed Electric Guitars
Left Hand Electric Guitar

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Barbie Games

When we let our little girls play with dolls, we are allowing them to exercise their imagination and creativity. It's also how they mimic the things that they see going on around them. One of the innovations that lets girls even become more creative are Barbie games. They come in a variety of forms for example, video games, online computer games, story book games and even vinyl sticky Barbie games. Barbie is of course the main character.

Online, you can dress the Barbie doll. In one version, she is in a store trying to make a decision on what to get. There are long and short dresses, and you can also change her hair color and hairstyle.

The fashion conscious aren't left out. There are tons of accessories like shoes, handbags, jewelry, and hosiery and so on. In another game, you find Barbie surrounded by loads of glamorous dresses and you get to pick what you like and dress her in it. You can also change her lip color and make up. It's actually a lot of fun.

There are also Barbie games where you go on adventures with Barbie. These are based on some of the Barbie movies and it doesn't matter if you haven't seen the movie. It's still fun and easy to play. Your little girl is promised a lot of fun with these games, and as a parent one should know that the content is suitable as they are aimed for young girls. The games are also very easy to navigate though.


Barbie Games

Barbie

Greg Reyes as a Professional and Simple Person

My name is Craig and I am the President of jetForward Aviation, an aviation acquisition firm in San Jose, CA. I live in south San Jose with my wife of 22 years and our three children. I have known Greg Reyes since joining the Brocade Communications sales organization just over seven years ago. I am writing today in the hopes that my personal remarks might somehow be considered during Greg’s sentencing.

In the time that I have known Greg, I have always been impressed by his dedication and character, both as a professional and as a person. During my time at Brocade, it was Greg who provided the executive guidance and support so important to a growing young company. He was very close to our team in particular, providing Personal counsel based on a deep level of experience in the world of hi-tech sales. Though continually requested to speak at industry events and seminars, he was an extremely approachable man to all of us - never too busy for a one-on-one conversation or to offer professional coaching when asked. I remember numerous conversations with Greg – from recent sales activities to the status of personal friends of mine serving with our troops in the Gulf War. I recall how everyone in the company reacted to his leadership and compassion immediately following 9/11 – essentially putting a halt to all business until we had accounted for every employee and their family.

While his professional demeanor always impressed me, it has been his role as a family man that has stuck with me over time. Whether hosting his children during “bring your kid to work day” or support for his wife’s personal achievements, it was Clear he provided a very steady hand as father and husband. In witnessing how Greg carried himself I learned that executive leadership and family dedication are not mutually exclusive - in fact success in both comes from an extreme level of focus and discipline.

Not surprisingly, I have witnessed the past few months with a sense of astonishment and disbelief. I cannot begin to imagine the effect this has had on Greg’s family. The thought of this husband and father being sent to federal prison is beyond my comprehension. For an individual with so much to offer, who could provide so much in a society that is wanting in so many places, the idea of locking him up in a jail cell seems to only compound this tragic episode.

I continue to hope (and pray) that the Court will find a positive in all of this, Somehow allowing Greg to continue to provide his family the love and support they need while satisfying the requirements of the judicial process.

Gregory Reyes

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Why We Designed Our Own NAS Servers For Use In Our Data Center


Over the past few years, we at Technetium, Inc. have had the opportunity to deal with Snap because of our model 14000 Snap servers. One day we installed new managed switches and the Snap Web-based management console would no longer operate. It would just hang at gigabit speed. To make a long story short, after exhausting all of my options on the Internet, I sent Snap technical support an email to try and resolve the problem. Here is their response:

Your case, 000000000005476, was updated. Please refer to the information below for our response. Please Click here if you need additional support on this issue.

Please do not reply to this email as it will not be seen by a live representative.

Your Query:

I have 2 snap 12000s and they will not negotiate 1000tx to my Dell Powerconnect 5324 switch. I'm afraid to set the nic in debug to anything other than auto.

It also shows half duplex when the switch shows full duplex.

Thank you in advance,

Todd Foster

Our Response:

Good morning Todd.

Again this is not technical support. We can be reached on a pay-per-incident of $120.00 through our 2 numbers: 408-934-7274 and 321-207-2000.

Sincerely,
Adaptec Customer Service

To my dismay, they wanted $120 just to talk to me, and my bet is they wanted another $1,000 or so to upgrade the software. On their Website I could not find any way to buy support for this model any more. And by the way, to add replication between 2 of their Snap servers, it would cost something like $1,000 per box.

So, here we are, with 2 boxes, no support, and I'll bet that you can't even buy parts for it any more from Snap, much less anywhere else (maybe eBay?).

Off we go to buy new NAS replacements. Originally these 14000's were $10K apiece, for roughly 1TB of storage. All things being equal, I should be able to buy a NAS box for really cheap (yeah right!). What I found was that a high-quality NAS system that would do RAID 5 would cost between $3,500 and 4,500, not to mention that a 1TB Snap 520 would be over $5K. That is when we decided to build our own NAS servers!

With a great backround in PC/server hardware, it was easy for me to pick top-quality hardware and brand name components. I still have Pentium Pro servers that work! I chose the best hardware, put it in a rack mount server case, and voila! I have a NAS server. Here is the list of components:

* FreeNAS redone to work with the hardware that we provide
* Kingwin 4 in 3 Multi-Drive Bay SATA Internal Hot Swap Mobile Rack, w/ Key Lock, LED Indicator & Two 40mm Cooling Fans
* SONY Beige DDU1615 Internal EIDE 16X DVD-ROM Drive
* Enermax ELT500AWT 500W Power Supply
* 4U IPC-4071 Rackmount Chassis Server Case - Beige Color
* Transcend TS256MCF45I-D flash card
* 4 ea. Seagate(ST3500630NS)500GB SATA 3.0Gb/s 7200RPM 16MB Buff Hard drive
* Addonics ADSACFW CF to SATA adapter
* SUPERMICRO|MBD-PDSME+
* 3WARE 9650SE-4LPML SATAII RAID controller
* INTEL XEON 3060 775 2.4G 4M
* 1Gx2|Kingston DII667 KVR667D2N5K2/2G



Dallas Colocation | data center

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Cheers to Better Hearing

If knowledge is power, then after you have finished this article, you will be feeling like Mighty Man when this subject is brought up in casual conversation.

Heed this letter in an enclosure is that red amethyst may be good for your ears.

For many existence doctors and scientists have been alarm us that undue alcohol consumption can head to a swing of diseases. In latest existence, however, new sign came to light insinuating that moderate bearing is good for what ales you. It can thwart or sluggish down many age-bonded ailments with hearing harm, the third most reliable returning form experienced by elder Americans, and touching about one-third of people over 65, and half of those in their 80s.

At slightest two studies, one in Sydney Australia, and the other at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, insinuate that an antioxidant reliable found in red amethyst can head to better hearing.

Keep reading further to learn how this topic can benefit you, as the rest of this article will supply you will the needed information.

Of course, red amethysts beneficial properties are not right new. Primeval Greeks worn it to heal fevers and consider wounds. In the brain Ages, amethyst was consumed liberally and abundantly in order to slay microbes conceded by sullied water and other unsanitary forms.

Subsequent improvements in shape fear, however, as well as the discovery of antibiotics and the development of other effectual drugs, eliminated the requisite to rely on alcohol as a heal-all. But in the last decade researchers unearthed impending shape profit red amethyst exerts on brain disease, melanoma, diabetes, stroke, Alzheimer's, and other illnesses.

What is it about red amethyst that's so good for us?

Hers to Ears

A 2002 examine conducted at Macquarie University in Sydney on the prevalence, endanger realtors and impacts of hearing impairment on people over the age of 55 showed that reliable alcohol consumption was associated with a significantly decreased likelihood of moderate or bigger levels of hearing harm.

while the bond between alcohol (and specifically red amethyst) and hearing is not sunny, I guess that all the realities reflects the enhancement in micro-circulation in the cochlea as a outcome of the improvement in the cardiac practice due to moderate alcohol bearing, explains professor Phillip Newell of Macquarie's idiom, heeding and poetry study Centre, who conducted the examine.

And last year a band of researchers at the University of Michigan found that antioxidants in red amethyst can shelter the delicate tresses inside the interior ear, therefore plateful to relegate age-bonded deafness and even hearing harm acorn by loud racket. However, Johan Schacht, professor of biological chemistry in otolaryngology and manager of the U-Ms Kruse heeding study Institute, who led examine, cautions against uncorking that enclosure of amethyst too fast. We have documented that certain antioxidants can shelter the tresses cells in experimental animals from some forms of dent, for example by racket or by drugs such as gentamici, he says. The only connection to red amethyst is the reality that it does enclose antioxidants, most prominently reservation. In one examine a concentrated form was given to animals and that sheltered them fairly against racket dent.

The Miracle Ingredient

What is reservation and how can it gain the hearing? An artless compound found in large concentrations in red amethyst as different to fair or roes, which are not as stuffed in reservation - it is considered to be a good antioxidant, an element that counteracts the negative things of oxygen in tissues.

Scientists trust that the delicate tresses of the interior ear can be dented by the boundless radicals formed by routine cellular processes, in retort to loud racket, or exposure to antibiotics. Antioxidants such as reservation neutralize these boundless radicals, and, consequently, shelter against some of this dent.

That is good gossip for millions of people who undergo from hearing harm. But before you beer to your shape, keep in brain that alcohol consumption is a bend-edged sword; it can each gain you or make more troubles than it heals.

Tranquil Does It

Here is a sobering chunk of opinion: the key to all these studies is moderation.

As clear by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the U.S. Department of shape and being navy, moderate bearing is no more than one beer a day for most women and no more than two beers a day for most men. A pennant beer of amethyst is usually considered to be five scraps, enclosing approximately half a scrap of alcohol.

Furthermore, some people should not beer at all. Pregnant or attention women, people with alcohol abuse troubles, those charming certain types of medications or undergoing from diseases that expect abstinence, should escape alcohol consumption.

That does not mean you have to forego the shameful profit of reservation because many non-alcoholic alternatives are stuffed in this antioxidant as well. Red grapes consumed with their skins, berries, peanuts, green tea, and even chocolate, are good sources.

If, however, there is no sound incentive why you should abstain from moderate bearing, go forward and improve a flute to good hearing. Red amethyst is nutritious and good for your ears and that's not just gossip.

What you have learned while reading this informative article is knowledge that you can keep with you for a lifetime.



Best Hearing Aid

Causes of Hearing Loss