I currently have a Sony Vaio Laptop. After writing for about a few minutes my system just crashes and powers my computer off. I have my USB root hubs to never turn off. I am connecting through a USB hub.
I only have a problem when I hook up two or more laptops. It doesn't seem to happen when I hook up just one. And other times my system will crash within minutes of hooking up and other times it takes a longer time.
Anyone have any suggestions how remedy the problem?
Thanks, Gilbert
You can't realtime with a USB-to-serial cable on your end and a USB-to-serial cable on the atty's end. It eventually causes your system to crash and reboot. If an attorney has a USB-to-serial cable, you must use only a serial port, or vice versa.
Stenocast solves that problem; however, despite the fact I have $700 tied up into my Stenocast system, I'm chucking it for good. I'll sell you the system...cheap.
I'm switching over to an ethernet hub which requires no downloading on the atty's end, is faster, more stable, no compatibility issues. It works really well when the attorney walks in at the last moment and says, make it work.
Just to be clear, file sharing and Stenocast are two totally separate things.
The problem I've had with Stenocast is, the USB receivers can't be trusted. Just requires too much massaging. You can establish a connection, and for no apparent reason, later it just stops working. The independent receivers require a USB-to-serial connection, and rarely will an attorney show up to a depo with one, so you have to supply them AND you have to install the drivers. Then you have to set up the realtime program. It's an easy thing to do. The problem with it is time. It's time consuming, and there are so many variables that affect the situation. And with attorneys showing up at the last minute, I'm lucky to get two done by the time the depo starts.
With file sharing, you pick one output in your realtime output: Caseview/file sharing. The files auto created by Eclipse will have a .cic extension and will be saved in your jobs folder. You can make unlimited connections to that same file. All you need is an ethernet cord. Connect it from your computer to the atty's computer. In his realtime program, pick file sharing instead of a com port. It'll auto ask you to browse for a file. You click on your .cic file.
I have an ethernet hub that has five ports. You can buy some with more. They're like $35 compared to the $700 of Stenocast.
Dorothy,
What model/type of ethernet hub do you have?
Thanks,
Wynne
Hi, Wynne,
I'm pretty partial to anything Netgear.
Dorothy,
Are ethernet hubs wireless or is it back to cables again?
It's wired.
It's wired, meaning physical cables, etc? ICKKKKKK!
LOL. Have you used Stenocast?
Well, I have the X1 and like it.
Have not gone to the X7 -- is it -- yet.
I must say, though, that my brain is SO TIRED of thinking about cables hooking from one type of connector to another type of connector and my hands are SO TIRED of untangling cables that I am seriously dreaming about the possibility of ELECTRICTY being wireless, which I know sounds bizare, but I understand it was a possibility way, way, long ago in Edison's day.
Wynne --
You're right, there was work done on wireless power back in Edison's day -- by Tesla.
Unfortunately, the guy that was financing Tesla's research realized that if the new wireless power system ever got fully developed, there would be no need for power companies, because they would have no way to charge their (now former!) customers for all that free power!
Fortunately, Thomas Bearden and other researchers are still working on it .... so, who knows? Maybe one day ...!
--gdw
----------------
"For a Good (steno) Time ..."
Hello. Who are you? It's rare that someone else knows about all that. And maybe there is hope for the future with no wires for electricity!
It is a great idea. The problem is, that's pretty much where the greatness ends.
The guys at Stenocast could and should do a lot more to make this product more user friendly, not so time-consuming, and more reliable. The biggest improvement they should make is so that the serial port receivers shouldn't require two USB ports just to operate: one for the power and one for the transmission. The electrical plugs Stenocast gives out with the receivers perform poorly. You have to hold your mouth just right to get a connection, and since they are so unstable, you have to use the USB power cord supply. It's stable, but what happens when the attorney wants to use a mouse but can't because you have taken up his only two USB ports? What if he would like to plug in his Blackberry to recharge it? Stenocast could easily make receivers that only require one USB port, but they won't.
The batteries that come with the receivers only last, what? Four hours? But the X1 lasts what? Eight? Four hours doesn't even make it worth the time to charge the batteries ahead of time. And the X1 is the same size as the serial receivers, so it's not like they couldn't have put a bigger battery in there.
The USB receivers are virtually the same size as a memory stick. Memory sticks automatically download the drivers necessary for a computer to instantly learn how to interact with the memory stick. Stenocast could and should have the drivers on the USB receivers just like a memory stick instead of requiring a CD disk, which I have run into the situation of attys not even having CD drives at all on their computers.. More importantly, the drivers should work the first time too, not the it's-not-working-so-gotta-figure-out-what's-causing-the-problem-this-time type of installation. Nothing Stenocast works correctly the first time. It always requires massaging. And when you're under the gun to get everyone set up, it's just not the kind of problem you need.
The last straw for me was, I was reinstalling my X7 onto my comp, and the setup disk didn't work, so I downloaded the setup download that Stenocast has on its website. That didn't work either. I got my Bluetooth drivers installed, and it still didn't work. I called support, and all I got was an answering machine. My call was never returned, probably because my warranty has expired. They could make drivers and programs that work the first time, but they won't. I'm certain if I spent a few more hours on it I could eventually get it to work, but it's just not even worth it. It's just more trouble than it's worth.
I will try to respond to the above post, although I must admit I don't fully underand it in its entirety. I will address the issues in the order they are mentioned.
The serial port receivers use only the serial port. If you want to draw power to the serial port receiver, you can plug in a short power cord that plugs into a USB port and draws power from that USB port. The comment regarding "...one for the transmission" I do not understand.
So to be clear, you can use the serial receiver alone, if the job is four hours or less, or you can plug in a power cord from the serial receiver to a USB port and run indefinitely. It does not use two USB ports in any situation that I can think of. So the comment at the bottom of paragraph one that states, "StenoCast could easily make receivers that only require one USB port, but they won't" is completely lost on me. You can use none or one, but you certainly can't use two. (This issue is probably moot, as we came out with a USB Ez Receiver in March of '06, and stopped selling the serial USB receivers shortly thereafter).
Paragraph two is puzzling. The serial receivers are smaller than the X1. The largest battery that would fit in the receivers was installed in the receivers.
Paragraph three: The StenoCast USB Ez Receivers do automatically download the drivers if there is an internet connection. If there is no internet connection, you can then install them from a CD or you can copy them onto a memory stick for installation.
This post would have been technically correct and valid at the end of 2005 or the first couple of months of 2006. I would just say that Dorothy's desires and ours were similar. I would also say it was never a matter of wanting to or not wanting to improve a product. Wireless realtime is all we do. We are constantly striving to make the best product possible. When you are dealing with a wide variety of steno machines and CAT softwares, and you also place Microsoft Windows in the mix, it does take time and energy to accomplish the task. The StenoCast USB Ez Receiver in combination with the X7 is very easy to use and has proved to be increadibly reliable.
Michael Appelman
StenoCast
The serial port receivers use only the serial port. If you want to draw power to the serial port receiver, you can plug in a short power cord that plugs into a USB port and draws power from that USB port. The comment regarding "...one for the transmission" I do not understand. So to be clear, you can use the serial receiver alone, if the job is four hours or less, or you can plug in a power cord from the serial receiver to a USB port and run indefinitely.
-The key phrase is, "or you can plug in a power cord from the serial receiver to a USB port and run indefinitely." So you've taken up two USB ports, aka, one for the transmission (the realtime being sent), and one for the power. I do a lot of realtime jobs, and over 90 percent of realtime jobs are over four hours, so the four hour battery life on these units is useless. Yes, you could plug in a power cord, but isn't that, number one, completely defeating the purpose of "wireless"? And secondly, the power cords are defective. You have to hold your mouth just right to get a good connection, not to mention they are only about five feet long so that if you have a table of realtiming attorneys, you have to string power strips every so often along a large conference table.
(This issue is probably moot, as we came out with a USB Ez Receiver in March of '06, and stopped selling the serial USB receivers shortly thereafter).
That's a shame. The serial receivers are better than the USB receivers because the Bluetooth driver in Windows XP is horrible. However, I will note that the Bluetooth driver in Vista is far superior and actually works like it's supposed to. The USB receivers will be more user friendly for Vista computers.
Paragraph two is puzzling. The serial receivers are smaller than the X1. The largest battery that would fit in the receivers was installed in the receivers.
The point was, if you can make an eight hour battery for the X1, why couldn't you have made an eight hour battery for the serial receivers so that it wouldn't take up two USB ports? An eight hour battery would be useful. A four hour battery is not.
Paragraph three: The StenoCast USB Ez Receivers do automatically download the drivers if there is an internet connection. If there is no internet connection, you can then install them from a CD or you can copy them onto a memory stick for installation
More often than not, an attorney will not have an Internet connection at a job; however, even if he did, the time that it would take to find the driver and install it is not practical. Because Windows does not recognize Stenocast as a signed driver, it won't automatically download it, so it would have to be done manually. And the driver for the XP version on CD is problematic, and I'll tell you why. Since I do a lot of realtiming, I can tell you that not all computers are the same. Anytime you are dealing with installing drivers -- and I don't care what kind of driver it is -- there are a myriad of problems you can run into as acknowledged in your post:
When you are dealing with a wide variety of steno machines and CAT softwares, and you also place Microsoft Windows in the mix, it does take time and energy to accomplish the task.
There is no way for you to state that your Bluetooth driver is a one-size-fits-all solution. That's why every single product out there has a help forum. There are a million and one things that can go wrong and often do. For instance, the IT departments of some attorneys do not allow downloads. Now, I know how to get around that, but most of your customers won't. And even if I do know how to get around that, I won't simply because it's too time consuming. Another thing that happened to me is, I set the Bluetooth USB device up for one attorney before the job, it tested fine, and just about every hour, the Bluetooth would just turn off on its own. He finally got frustrated with it and said forget it. Another thing that does go wrong is, attorneys do not have a CD drive. So I put the driver on a flash drive. I had one attorney's computer not recognize the flash drive at all at first, and I couldn't either browse or run F:/. What was really weird was that an hour later, the computer finally did download the flash drive. Of course, she had a Dell. If I had had more time, I would have been able to get around it all, but seeing as I was having to set up several other computers at the same time and theirs were less problematic, she had to go without at first. There are other reporters who are not even allowed to put downloads on to an attorney's computer because of the liability. I could go on and on about the problems, but you get the idea.
Now, does StenoCast have problems every single time? If you discount the time it takes to set it up, no.
The biggest problem with realtiming period is, all these manufacturers think the court reporters have all the time in the world to set up a connection before a realtime job. They think, well, it's just a simple little connection that you have to do. Yes, it is a simple connection; however, when you add that simple connection to all other other simple connections we have to do, then you start adding up the time.
I've had one tech at LiveNote actually tell me that the attorneys need to call the day before to make sure everything is working properly. That's not a real world philosophy.
I had a realtime job recently that I set up two first time ever connections in less than one minute. That would never happen with StenoCast.
So if you want to make a really useful product, you guys should follow Advantage's lead and become more interactive with your users to find out what it is they really want.
If you made a product that requires no downloads, that is self-contained, and only requires one USB port, that is instantly recognizable regardless of firewalls, virus programs, that either has its own realtime viewer and/or works with all the realtime viewers out there, and draws power from the computer itself, then you'll have a product that not only would I buy but I would tell others to buy too.
-The key phrase is, "or you can plug in a power cord from the serial receiver to a USB port and run indefinitely." So you've taken up two USB ports, aka, one for the transmission (the realtime being sent), and one for the power.
The serial receiver is plugged into the attorney’s computer. The serial receiver would occupy one serial port. If the job is four hours or less (and, thus, running off the battery), you would just utilize the one serial port. If the job runs longer than four hours, the attorney's serial port would be utilized, plus one USB port for power.
The transmission of the realtime is coming from the court reporter’s computer, so it too is only using one USB port.
If you are using the USB Ez Receivers, you would only use one USB port on the attorney’s computer. It draws its own power from that same USB port.
So, as indicated in the original post, you can use one USB port or no USB ports, but you will never need two USB ports on the same computer. Please also keep in mind we are discussing a product (serial Ez Receiver) that has not been sold since the beginning of 2006. There have been two newer generations since that time.
We have solved this issue because we are using a Windows-certified driver. It is not the Bluetooth driver provided by Windows XP. The USB Ez Receivers work equally well with Windows 98, Windows 2000, XP and Vista.
We took this suggestion one step better. We developed a USB Ez Receiver so that you would not need a battery at all.
More often than not, an attorney will not have an Internet connection at a job; however, even if he did, the time that it would take to find the driver and install it is not practical.
You do not have to “find the driver.” The computer will automatically locates the driver and downloads it. All you have to do is click “Next” and the computer will do the rest.
Because Windows does not recognize Stenocast as a signed driver, it won't automatically download it, so it would have to be done manually.
The new StenoCast USB Ez Receiver is a signed driver and is Windows certified. It is automatically downloaded.
There is no way for you to state that your Bluetooth driver is a one-size-fits-all solution.
I can state that there are several hundred StenoCast Ez Receivers in use, and we have yet to find a combination of hardware/software that could not use the Ez Receiver with our driver.
That's why every single product out there has a help forum. There are a million and one things that can go wrong and often do. For instance, the IT departments of some attorneys do not allow downloads. Now, I know how to get around that, but most of your customers won't.
If you could pass along to us how to get around the IT departments, that would be much appreciated.
If an attorney’s computer is basically broken or has severe issues, StenoCast will probably not fix it. The computers need to be functioning in order to receive realtime, either wirelessly or with cables.
Actually that is a daily occurrence with StenoCast. Again, I think your issues would be resolved with the USB Ez Receiver. Actually that isn't entirely true. If the attorneys do not have the driver already, it typically takes about a minute for each attorney.
We are more than happy to consider any and all suggestions. As a matter of fact, we will have an announcement to make regarding another innovation in the wireless realtime arena in the next couple of weeks. This innovation is a direct result of feedback from our customers.
Well, we have a product that requires no software downloads, just a driver, but is self-contained in all other respects, only requires one USB port, and is instantly recognizable, works with all realtime viewers out there, and it does draw power from the computer itself.
Because you have taken all this time and effort on behalf of your profession to critique our product, and you have done so in a professional and courteous way, I would prefer to give you a USB Ez Receiver for you to test drive, and if you like it, you may keep it. We would welcome your comments after you have thoroughly examined our latest offering.
That is a generous offer, and I'd like to take you up on it.
Actually, I've been asked to give a seminar on troubleshooting realtime hookups for our local association. If your new product works as well as you say it does, that would make for a very short seminar.
As I said in the other post that I responded to on this subject http://www.accucap.com/?q=node/1153, all the other connections have inherent problems. To date, there's been no "holy grail" of realtime connections.
If your product works, I promise not only to state that here on this forum, but I would gladly bring it to the seminar to allow any participant to test it out for themselves and do any training that comes along with it.
Give us a call, and we'll ship it out today. 800.961.9862
I'll do that tomorrow first thing.
Also, for your post:
If you could pass along to us how to get around the IT departments, that would be much appreciated.
The most common instance for me would be the USB-to-serial cable drivers. What I've seen is that in some instances the IT departments have turned off discovering devices in order to prevent downloads; however, they can't turn off being able to save files that are attached to an E-mail because then the attorneys would never be able to receive dirty ASCII's or E-transcripts (I've never tested my luck with an exe file, though). So I can send the USB drivers attached to an E-mail and just save them to the Documents folder once the E-mail is received on the client computer and have the USB installation look for the drivers there. I have a Clearwire modem that I can use for that purpose.
Another way that usually works is connecting via an ethernet cable. I've noticed most do not construe an ethernet connection as a threat. I just get on the attorney's computer and copy the necessary files to the Documents folder.
"The StenoCast USB Ez Receiver in combination with the X7 is very easy to use and has proved to be increadibly reliable."
I agree. I've had absolutely no attorney setup problems since exchanging my X-Micro USB receivers for the USB EZ receivers. I do have the drivers on a USB flash drive for installing drivers to computers with no optical drive. It's been a completely painless process as far as I'm concerned. FWIW, I've had no reliability issues with the Bluetooth connection to the attorneys either.
Laura
Hmmmm. Interesting.
Wynne
Thanks,
Wynne
Have had 2 "problems" with StenoCast wireless and don't believe they're StenoCast issues. One was realtime stopped sending from my X1 to my backup Sony in the middle of a trial. At a morning break, I got hold of StenoCast, and they had it fixed in less than 15 minutes. In fact, the information they provided MIGHT help with the "bombing out" of realtime so many reporters are reporting, i.e., use com 7 or 8 instead of a low number. Finshed the trial without incident, but my realtime stopping is intermittent, so it will take some time to determine if that fixed our ongoing problem.
Other problem is IT departments. Have had attorneys not able to download driver because their IT department wipes out the hard drive after each trip and locks out the ability to download drivers. A phone call later, I was able to download driver, but couldn't see what com port was assigned (because they locked that out too.) I have no sympathy for them, and if we know an out-of-state attorney is going to want realtime, we tell them to download the driver from StenoCast beforehand and determine the com port assignment.
I am one of four realtime reporters in the firm, all with varying levels of tech capabilities, and we can all manage to assist with downloading a driver & determining a com port. They usually aren't hooked up to the Internet. Frankly, there are several attorneys who really like it and comment on how slick it is. FYI, an attorney in town saw us use it, and lo and behold, it wasn't a week until his "in-house" reporter had hers too. And yes, I use that term literally.
That being said, it's whatever works for you. If cables are stable for you & help you sleep at night, don't fix what ain't broke, use the cables and sleep.
Theresa Coffman
I had the problem also where the Device Manager was locked out and I couldn't see what Com port was assigned. I found a workaround for that. If yo go to the Start menu, click on Help and Support and then search for Device Manager. you will get a list of topics and click on the "Device Manager" topic and then you will be given a link to open the Device Manager. It worked for me.
HTH, Dave
Or probably a bit faster, you can just add a device manager shortcut to the atty's computer desktop. Right-click on a blank area of the desktop, choose New/Shortcut and type "devmgmt.msc" without the quotes, of course. That'll give you direct access to the device manager even on those pesky computers that are on lockdown.
Laura
My other computer insists on bringing up a wizard to create shortcuts. It won't let me type in the devmgmt.msc -- it has a browse button. I know how to find device manager under the properties of My Computer -- but it won't go in there.
Both of my computers are XP Pro -- don't know why this one is insisting on bringing up a wizard.
Wynne A. Pauly, CSR
3419 Westminster, Suite 414
Dallas, Texas 75205
wynnepauly@sbcglobal.net
Wynne, same thing happened to me. Just type in the devmgmt.msc into the location box, click Next and then name the shortcut. Worked for me; don't click the Browse button.
You're right. It worked!
Wynne A. Pauly, CSR
3419 Westminster, Suite 414
Dallas, Texas 75205
wynnepauly@sbcglobal.net
Laura,
I don't care if I learn one other thing this year. This shortcut is like winning the lottery! Thanks.
Chuck Motter
LOL! I'm glad you like it.
I had the IT guy from one of the big local law firms scratching his head wondering how I got access to the atty's device manager after he wasn't able to. I guess he didn't know that shortcut either.
Laura
I just want to say it's a good thing we have this forum to share the wealth of knowledge and experience we have amongst us.
Wynne A. Pauly, CSR
3419 Westminster, Suite 414
Dallas, Texas 75205
wynnepauly@sbcglobal.net
Thanks for the info I appreciate that. I will consider Stenocast. However, I had another question with regard to filesharing with RT. If I am outputting to two or more attorneys with the same LiveNote on each attorneys' computer, do I have to add LiveNote each time for an output source or can I just add it once and my sytem will just know that I am outputting to more than one LiveNote?
Thanks again for you info.
Gilbert