Forbes - Cold, Dark And Connected, Kind Of

I have three different battery backup units, known as Uninterruptible Power Supplies, or UPSes. One, a Tripp Lite AVR750U 750VA, is used with my iMac desktop computer; another, also a Tripp Lite, services my router, cable modem and TV; and a third is used by my wife for keeping her gear charged. The iMac can run for about 30 minutes on its UPS, a little longer if I don’t use the second monitor attached to it. The UPS for the modem/router lasts more than an hour if I don’t use the TV; with the TV, it lasts 30 minutes at most. My wife’s UPS, an older APC Back UPS 6000, is mainly used to charge other devices, including laptops, but it has an annoying alarm that can’t easily be silenced if the power goes out. We avoid using it except as a last resort. 

When the power died and there were indications it would be awhile before it returned, I turned off the iMac’s UPS with plans to use it for charging things later. I also turned off the UPS on the modem/router with plans to rely on our phones for internet access. There were times when I needed “heavy duty” internet access – such as filing final edits for last week’s debut of this newsletter – so I would turn it on. But Comcast, my home internet provider, was having power issues of its own and probably was up only about 60% of the time when I flicked on the UPS.

My wife and I both have iPhone 12 Pro Max smartphones with T-Mobile service. She also has an AT&T iPhone SE she uses for her business. I also have a Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra I have for review, also on T-Mobile. 

Power failures impact cell carriers, too, particularly those that last for days. A T-Mobile spokesman directed me to this October 2020 blog post about how carriers try to keep cell towers usable, with massive generators supplying power when it’s not available locally. But there are thousands of towers in the Houston area, and carriers can’t station generators at each one. As a result, cell service was spotty at best, and at one point we could not make phone calls or use data at all. Text messaging was our most reliable way to communicate at that point.

The most useful pieces of gear we had were several portable power banks. These vary in size but can be as small as a bar of soap and yet recharge a smartphone or tablet several times before they need to be recharged. These, along with time spent in the comfy warmth of our cars, kept us connected. My favorite: the Anker PowerCore 10000 PD Redux. During a break in the weather, I even managed to get one to my 91-year-old mother at her independent living community so she could keep her iPhone 6S alive. She may also have used it to charge her iPad. She loves to play digital Bridge, and she played a lot of it in the cold and the dark. 

When power was finally restored, I had some digital cleanup to do. For example, the settings on my Amazon Echo reset to their defaults, some of my WiFi light bulbs had to be rejoined to the network and my Nest Learning Thermostat couldn’t talk to the remote temperature sensor that keeps our bedroom comfortable. 

On one level, I’d say our preparations were worth it. We could stay connected, even entertained, with our phones, but we were at the mercy T-Mobile’s service reliability. I wound up not using the UPSes as much as I thought I would, but they might have been put to use had the outage gone on longer. After Hurricane Ike in 2008, we were without power for more than two weeks. I bought my first UPS after that ordeal. 

I’m already pondering what I should have on hand for the next disaster.

Questions? Talk to me.

• Can’t get an iMessage to send on an iPhone? As soon as you’ve composed it and hit Enter – or if its sending appears to be delayed – press and hold the message’s blue bubble. One of the options you’ll get is to “Send as Text Message.” Select it, and your message will be dispatched as an SMS or text message with a green bubble. (You will also get this option if the iMessage fails to send on its own.) I’ve known about this for a while, but my wife discovered it during Texas’ Icepocalypse, thanks to balky cell-tower connections. She suggested others might like to know, and I try to take her suggestions to heart.

• Flash is not long for Windows. An update rolling out will remove it from your PC if you are running the latest version of Windows 10. Originally this was to be an optional update – it’s been around since October 2020 – but it’s about to be required. (Adobe halted support for Flash at the end of 2020, and it has long been considered a security nightmare.)

• My first story for Forbes was a review of a Nomad Goods Rugged Leather case for my iPhone 12 Pro Max. At the time I wrote it, there was not yet a version that works with MagSafe, the magnetic charging adapter for the iPhone 12 line. But Nomad last week began selling one. I bought one (half-price for current case owners!) and will write a followup once it’s in hand. 

• Steven Sinofsky, who oversaw first the development of Office and then Windows for Microsoft, is rolling out chapters from his memoirs of his time there as a newsletter, called “Hardcore Software.” The first one is a grabber with a headline: “Steve, Bill Gates called. Call him back.” Apparently Sinofsky didn’t believe it was Gates and refused to return the call. 

• Put your mom on Mars. Or your cat. Or your significant other. Or you, with the Mars Perseverance Photo Booth. (And yes, that is my mom in the photo above.)

A. You can indeed use your iPhone’s hotspot feature as a WiFi connection to your Apple TV – or from any smartphone to any streaming device – as long as the connection from the cellular tower to your phone is robust. Otherwise, you'll have a lot of delays and video buffering.

But it may not be wise to use your phone’s hotspot feature to do this, depending on the data plan you have with your wireless carrier. If you don't have an unlimited data plan, streaming high-definition or even standard-definition video could get expensive with overage payments if you blow past your plan’s limits. Also, most wireless plans limit hotspot usage to just a fraction of the plan's limit, sometimes just a few gigabytes, which you'd burn through quickly streaming movies or shows in high-definition.

And even if you do have an unlimited plan, most cell providers throttle or slow your speed when you get over a certain amount of data per month. For example, both AT&T and Verizon both have lower-cost unlimited plans that will throttle speeds regardless of how much data you’ve used if the tower your phone connects to is congested. 

But if you want to do this, you would set it up just as you would connect to any WiFi network with your streaming box. Turn on the hotspot, which is located in your phone’s settings. Go into the streaming box’s network settings and find your phone’s hotspot name. Enter the password for the hotspot and it should connect. But don’t forget to switch back to your home broadband service once it’s available again. 

Got a question? Ask me.