Thoughts, Passion, Technology
Exploring Kutch by Road “Why Kutch?” friends asked when I shared my mini-vacation plans with them and I said, “Why Not?”. Even Amitabh Bachchan say’s as a brand ambassador to Gujarat Tourism – “Kutch Nahi Dekha...
Canon vs Nikon: Which DSLR to Buy? When it comes to serious photography, photographers from around the world either prefer a Canon or a Nikon. But the question is: which one is the better of the two? To answer in one word: "Depends". In...
How to completely erase a Hard Disk Have you ever sold or given away your old laptop or desktop to replace it with a new one? Certainly you might have at some point of time in life and you must also have backed up your data and then formatted...
Mailbox Report Script for Exchange Server One of the tasks that every Exchange Server administrator faces as part of their daily or weekly maintenance is getting the mailbox size report of the Exchange Server. The PowerShell commands do help in...
SEO Tips for Web Site Designing We all have come across this word “Search Engine Optimization”. Some must have read it somewhere; some must have heard their web designing company talk about it, while some must be providing the services...
The Microsoft Partner Network Sales Specialist accreditation is a new initiative designed to help individual sales professionals strengthen their solution knowledge and gain recognition for solution selling expertise associated with select Microsoft solutions.
Cleared and earned the Sales Specialist accreditation on Microsoft Server Platform.
Category : General
It’s time for that important presentation. You open your laptop which is in Sleep Mode only to find that the laptop battery that lasted for 6 to 7 hours when you bought it now survives only for an hour or more. You have no choice but to run for finding an external power source.
Today, all portable computers use Lithium Ion batteries instead of the old style Nickel Cadmium ones. Advantage – these batteries are able to hold a greater charge as well as they are light weight – very important factors for laptops. Batteries come in different variations like 6-Cell, 9-Cell, 12-Cell, etc. Each cell has a defined capacity to store the charge and also each battery (comprising of these cells) has a limited number of charge cycles. A charge cycle is nothing but a full charge to discharge and then a full charge cycle. Since each battery pack has limited charge cycles, over a period of time, the battery wears out thus giving less battery time.
All laptop users face this problem. I did too on my HP DV6 as I saw the battery drain out in less then an hour after a full charge. The next thought in my mind was to get the battery replaced by a new buy which would cost $$$. But then my geeky mind cranked up and I decided to give Battery Calibration a try.
PC batteries expose information about battery capacity and health through the system firmware (or BIOS). The firmware provides information on the battery including manufacturer, serial number, design capacity and last full charge capacity. This allows the Operating System to know the exact amount of energy stored. However, due to the charging and discharging cycles, this sensor tends to be inaccurate overtime. An inaccurate gauge can lead to the fact that the the battery capacity values are wrong. So, how do we correct this? Perform a battery calibration. Before proceding to the steps, I recommend downloading a utility like Battery Care (http://www.batterycare.net) and installing the same. After installation, note down the wear level, the battery time, etc. This would help for comparing the results after calibration.
NOTE: Even if a battery pack is heavily used, it should not be necessary to calibrate it more than once a month. It is not necessary to calibrate a new laptop battery pack before first use. Calibrate only when you see that the battery is reporting the right capacity and you need to reset the guage.
Follow these steps to calibrate the battery
When I started with the calibration of my laptop battery, the wear level reported was 52.00% and the laptop used to shutdown even when the battery icon showed 30% of charge left. After running the calibration, the wear level reported is 37% and I’m not getting unexpected shutdowns anymore.
ERP systems are known to generate lots of data, but not much information. ERP does not contain all the information that is needed for business and hence various data sources thrive in form of spreadsheets or applications. For example, ERP may not include the results of a client survey or secondary sales data at channels or vendor data.
ERP systems tend to force businesses to re-engineer current practices to fit within the processes described by the ERP modules. Companies are investing millions in ERP solutions or have invested till date to improve the way they conduct their business. While these solutions provides significant benefits, organizations are finding that in order to achieve critical decision making business goals they often need to supplement it with additional external reporting capabilities. With the wealth of data entered and stored in ERP databases the ability to analyze and interpret the data is significant for management reporting. It’s time to take the next step for these businesses and explore Business Intelligence.
Business Intelligence (BI) means different things to different organizations and users. BI often refers to complex business applications, tools and technologies focused at understanding business metrics and performance. It includes such concepts as data warehouses, data cubes, dimensional analysis and performance monitoring – often refered to as KPI (Key Performance Indicator). BI often involves users accessing this data in spreadsheets, pivot tables and reports. BI typically represents systems where business data is aggregated from different enterprise systems with the goal of uncovering trends and insights.
Business intelligence and data visualization solutions often involve many components, hence the traditional complexity and cost. With newer tools now available in the market, many of the elements of BI and data visualization solutions can be implemented with reduced cost and complexity. Today’s businesses need analysis capabilities, not just the “flat-sheet” reporting to which they’ve grown accustomed. Simply stated, reports that provide statistics and raw data provide no intrinsic value. They need tools that provide meaningful “business intelligence” if management is to be able to use the information to support decisions and strategy.
Business Intelligence Solutions help fill this gap. BI gives the necessary insight to understand, analyze, and even predict the overall business performance. Moreover, clear visibility into all aspects of the operation can give companies the ordinance needed to combat business hazards. Business intelligence is about looking ahead rather than looking back and about creating answers and the tools to analyze new questions. When every user has access to the tools and the data they need to make timely and relevant decisions, the business becomes more efficient and effective while cutting costs and improving productivity.
