Matt’s Desk: Editor’s Blog

In a world awash in external USB hard drives, the NAS – or Network Attached Storage – toils in relative obscurity.  And that’s too bad, because for the networked home they can be an invaluable addition, taking a surprising amount of hassle out of everyday computing tasks.

A NAS is basically a hard drive bundled with a low-power computer that sits on your home network (router or switch), allowing you to access files from every computer on the network, along with tablets, smartphones and media players (PS3, Apple TV, Media Center PCs, etc.).  You can use a NAS to centralize music libraries, documents, installation files, backups, video collections, photos, etc., all without a direct connection to your devices.

Several companies offer inexpensive NAS solutions and most are pretty good.  But I’ve long been a fan of Buffalo Technology’s networking products, and their NAS offerings are no exception. The company’s newest home NAS is the LinkStation Live LS-X, available in 1TB, 2TB and 3TB capacities.   The 2GB version, the LS-X2.0TL, retails for $219, but is available from Amazon.com for just $129 with free shipping – that’s cheaper than many external and internal hard drives with the same storage capacity.

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Our homes are filled with more devices that connect to the internet – and each other – than ever before.  Many, such as laptops, tablets, smartphones and printers, can live by wireless alone; but there are also devices that greatly benefit from (or even require) a direct, wired Ethernet connection: smart TVs, game consoles, streaming video players (Apple TV, Roku, etc.) NAS storage drives, VoIP telephone adapters and home security systems.

Problem is, most wireless routers – the gizmos that share a modem’s internet connection with both wireless and wired devices – usually have only four onboard Ethernet ports (those highlighted in yellow in the image above).  Connect a desktop, game console, TV and VoIP adapter, and you’re slap out of ports.  If this is a problem you’ve run into, you may be asking yourself if it’s time to buy a new router with more ports.

Answer: probably not.  If you’re happy with your router’s wireless performance, all you need for additional ports is an Ethernet Switch.

In this article, I’ll introduce you to Ethernet Switches, show you how to use them to expand a LAN, help you choose the right model for your needs, and give a brief overview of how to best configure your network with a switch.

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The MacBook Air doesn’t have an onboard Ethernet port.  No big deal most of the time, but there are occasions when – if the MacBook is your only computer – you’ll need to connect an Ethernet cable: configuring a router, staying in a hotel with wired but not wireless Internet, etc.  But Apple’s official USB Ethernet Adapter for the Air (Model MC704ZM/A) is a bit pricey at $30, too pricey perhaps for a device you’ll likely almost never need.

But you can use any USB Ethernet adapter with the Air, assuming that there are Mac OS drivers for it.  One cheap option is the I/O Crest SY-ADA24005 USB 2.0 Ethernet Adapter, which sells for just $9  and change at Amazon.  It’s a great, dirt-cheap solution if you only need an emergency Ethernet connector for the MacBook Air.

The only downside is that the SY-ADA24005 comes with a CD with the required Mac drivers, and… um… the Air has no optical drive.  But I’ve found and uploaded the required drivers for the Mac which you can download below.

I/O Crest SYADA24005 Mac Driver (Right-click or two-finger click to download)

Use another cheap USB Ethernet adapter with your MacBook Air?  Let me know in the comments section…

-M

I realize this may not be something the typical user would ever need to do, but if you ever test transfer speeds for personal or professional reasons, you’ll need a test file of a specific size in order to get an accurate measurement.  I often test USB drive, hard drive, smartphone, and even PC to PC file transfer speeds, which I do with a 500MB or 1GB file, depending on the situation.

And you can easily create these test files in Windows using the command line.  Here’s how:

Open the Command Prompt by going to Start > Accessories > Command Prompt, or by typing CMD in the Start Menu search field (Windows Vista and 7).  In Windows Vista and 7, ^{you’ll need to run Command Prompt as an administrator (right-click Command Prompt, then select Run as administrator).} 

^{Once at the Command Prompt, type the following line and press Enter:}

^{fsutil file createnew XXXXXXX YYYYYYY}

^{Where XXXXXXX is the filename and YYYYYYY is the file size in bytes.  So, if you needed a 1GB file named Test1GB, you’d type:}

^{fsutil file createnew Test1GB 1073741824}

^{The test file will be created in the folder shown; for example, if C:\Windows\System 32\ is displayed (as it is above), the file will be created in the System 32 subfolder of the Windows folder on the C drive.  You can then navigate to the folder using Windows Explorer and move the file to the location you wish.}

^{Since the test file size must be defined as bytes, you’ll need to know the number of bytes in the number of megabytes or gigabytes you wish the test file to be.  An easy way to find this information is to use Google.  Just type 1 gigabyte into bytes, for example, into a Google search field and you’ll be given the correct number of bytes in a gigabyte:}

Happy testing!

-M