'Friendly Fire' game on Android

OK, so this is the addictive Android game I mentioned last time I 'talked' about my new Android phone... Naturally it's a free game (otherwise why would I be playing it?) although they do try to get you to pay to upgrade, obviously that didn't work on me, but I suspect others have been cajoled into paying out to get quicker results from the game...

It's a military base-building game with a twist - the twist is that it adapts the actual location of your home as the location for your base - it uses google maps for it's basic layout and then overlays the playing 'board' where the action takes place - so you end up defending your own street which is a very neat twist... Difficult to explain it further without trying it for yourself..
The gameplay is familiar, you build up your defences, and some attacking forces then attack other bases - you can choose to attack people in your own locality, your own country or attack others all over the world. I started this game with a few friends at work and you can attack each others' bases when they are in the same locality which again is another nice twist. I was told it would be addictive, and it lives up to it's billing...
You will be attacked from time to time, but a successful attack means you are immune from further attacks for 12 hours (or until you decide to attack someone else), and although your base is instantly rebuilt, you may lose 'resources' and 'rank' as a result.
As you progress through the levels, you build better defences and better weapons - it's a simple enough concept and much-used, but this has some nice touches which makes it a real addictive pleasure.

Latest Gadgets

I am still playing with my new NAS that I bought from eBay, and so far have found that it works pretty much as I hoped. Access speeds are hardly blistering, but I only really want to use it for back-ups anyway...
I have installed to hard drives (400GB each) and set them up to be seen as a single disk. I am currently moving my current back-up files from my USB drives onto this new 800GB drive. Once these are safely done, I can wipe to old USB drives and then add them onto the NAS as extra storage space available to the network. My next task will be to configure my backup software to carry on backing up the various files that I need - I am also considering moving all my pictures onto the NAS so that they are available across my network and maybe backing them up onto one of the USB drives - I have already moved my music files (which I will also need to back up).

So as it stands, I have found two distinct uses for the NAS, firstly to back up files that I want to keep, and secondly to make certain files available across my network - where this has been done, another back-up will be required for which I will use the USB drives that the NAS has replaced. I have found the free back up software 'SyncBack' from '2brightsparks' to be perfectly adequate for my needs, so I will control most of the back-ups using this software, although I do have the option of the software that came with my Packard Bell external drive - this software is a lot quicker to set up, so I may try to see if it will work across the network.

The final task that I want the NAS to do for me is to provide a folder for other to access remotely with a password, this should be possible using the FTP server, but I haven't tried his yet and am not sure how it will work out.

Latest Purchases

My quest for improving my PC set-up never ceases...which ends up costing me a bit, at least I rarely have to use my 'own' money as my internet earnings cover most of my purchases...
It's not like I have the latest CPUs and Motherboards, but I do like to build new systems from scratch using old components, then add big hard-drives and plenty of RAM... currently I have two socket 939 board systems, one with a 2.2GHz single core, and one with a 2.0GHz dual core. I have a USB back-up hard-drive on each machine, but they are both pretty much full now. There is a 250GB backup drive on one, and a 150GB backup drive on the other.
I spotted a NAS (network attached storage drive) system some time ago, and have been interested ever since. The NAS works as extra storage just like a USB drive, except that it is connected via the network router and is therefore available to the whole network. Not only that, but some of them have USB ports so that USB drives can be added, plus many of them offer options for remote access. I tracked some on eBay and ended up with the IcyBox (pictured) this one takes two SATA drives (I also got 2 x 400GB drives from eBay), plus it has two USB ports to accomodate my existing USB drives which will give ne a total storage solution of 1.2TB. You can set up the IcyBox to RAID settings so that one drive is backed up by the other, but my intention is only to use the system to back up my PC's, so I don't really need to back up my back up!
I intend to use the system as a server for some files that I want to share over the network, so it will be interesting to see if that will work as I want it to. I am also quite excited about the internet access features, particularly if I can use it to host files that I use for websites - in theory, I could place all my blog pictures on there which would mean that I no longer needed to upload pictures...
I will post about how this new 'solution' works out in practice, so far I can only report that the 'refurbished' model that I bought looks cosmetically pretty much perfect, and the English version of the manual is not the best translation I have ever seen - hopefully the product itself and it's associated software will be fairly intuitive and I won't need to refer to the manual much..

Ups and downs

I have had one of those 'good news..bad news' weeks this week:

Good News.. I reached payout from Google Adsense for the third time this year and am already three-quarters of the way towards my next payout.
Bad News.. I lifted something far too heavy at work and have suffered chronic pack pain all week.

Good News.. I successfully fitted a 'previously enjoyed' Motherboard and CPU to an old PC, upgrading (just a little project really) from a 300mHz P2 to a 533Mhz Celeron to use as my 'spare'.
Bad News.. I managed to 'blow' the Motherboard on my main PC when fiddling with the RAM. So now I am using my spare as my main PC while it is getting fixed by someone who knows what they are doing!!

Not such a bad week when considering that I will have had a welcome cash injection (even if I have to pay it all out on a new MOBO..), and my back is getting better. Overall Adsense performance seems good at the moment with one of my blogs in particular getting some good PPC results (Hey you CAN make Adsense on a blog!!).
I am also happy that the PC upgrading project went OK, I have not exactly brought my old PC into the 21st Century, but I have brought it through from 1995 to about 1998, and the MOBO only cost me £10 ($20) on eBay including postage... Maybe I will attempt a dual core next time!

Making your blog more interesting

Right now Google gadgets is my favourite source for stuff to make your blog look interesting. They offer calendars, maps, games... a whole host of little scripts to brighten up your day.
http://www.google.com/ig/directory?synd=open&source=asnd_pub1 I saved this in my favourites, and suggest you do the same. Tip: If you want to get people to mark your page as a favourite or even a home page, you will need to have stuff that makes your page look current and interesting. I use things like 'picture of the day' and 'joke of the day' on my other blog, that way it looks like you have updated your site content even when you have not touched it for a few days...
The gadgets can be configured a little to your requirements and then you are offered the script which you can paste into your own page.
One niggle though, I tried the mapping gadget and couldn't get it to distinguish between two relatively UK postcodes, I suspect that it doesn't recognise complete postcodes, just the initial part.
If you like games, have a go at the google gadget at the bottom of this page.....!

What next?

Still in it's fedgling state, I intent to add some interest to the site in the next few days alongside investigating more paid to blog programmes.
The sister site to this blog can be accessed at http://www.livewyre.blogspot.com this site is intending to help people with setting up a website or a blog. I have utilised some google gadgets on my livewyre blog and intend to do something similar to this one. I believe that it is important for your blog to look interesting and current so that you might persuade visitors to come back and revisit you.