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THE GAB’ER
Newsletter of the Greater Albany AppleByters: January, 2019
GAAB is celebrating its 35th year (2018-2019) with our informal meeting format.
The next meeting will be:

Tuesday, January 8, 2019

7:00 PM
at
Panera Bread
161 Washington Ave Ext, Albany, NY
A map can be found at the GAAB website at
http://applebyters.com/index.php/meeting-
information/meeting_map/
GAAB Meeting Agenda
Greetings and Dinner
Discussion: Topics presented by members and
News from Apple including Mac OS X and iOS Updates

GAAB Help Desk: Bring your questions

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5G Is Coming This Year. Here’s What You Need to Know.

By Don Clark, The New York Times

The transition to new fifth-generation cellular networks, known as 5G, will affect how you use
smartphones and many other devices. Let’s talk about the essentials.

In 2019, a big technology shift will finally begin. It’s a once-in-a-decade upgrade to our
wireless systems that will start reaching mobile phone users in a matter of months.

But this is not just about faster smartphones. The transition to new fifth-generation cellular
networks — known as 5G for short — will also affect many other kinds of devices, including
industrial robots, security cameras, drones and cars that send traffic data to one another.
This new era will leap ahead of current wireless technology, known as 4G, by offering mobile
internet speeds that will let people download entire movies within seconds and most likely
bring big changes to video games, sports and shopping.

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Officials in the United States and China see 5G networks as a competitive edge. The faster
networks could help spread the use of artificial intelligence and other cutting-edge
technologies.

Expect to hear more about 5G soon at events like the big consumer electronics trade show
CES in January in Las Vegas and MWC Barcelona (formerly the Mobile World Congress) in
February in Spain. Wireless service providers including AT&T and Verizon are already
talking up 5G. And device makers are previewing gadgets that will work with the technology.

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Samsung recently demonstrated prototypes of 5G smartphones that are expected to operate

on both Verizon and AT&T networks. Many other manufacturers are racing to follow suit,
though Apple is not expected in the initial 5G wave. Analysts predict that iPhones with the
new technology won’t arrive until 2020. An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment.

Here’s what you need to know.

What exactly is 5G?

Strictly speaking, 5G is a set of technical ground rules that define the workings of a cellular
network, including the radio frequencies used and how various components like computer
chips and antennas handle radio signals and exchange data.

Since the first cellphones were demonstrated in the 1970s, engineers from multiple
companies have convened to agree on new sets of specifications for cellular networks,
which are designated a new technology generation every decade or so. To get the benefits
of 5G, users will have to buy new phones, while carriers will need to install new transmission
equipment to offer the faster service.

How fast will 5G be?

The answer depends on where you live, which wireless services you use and when you
decide to take the 5G plunge.

Qualcomm, the wireless chip maker, said it had demonstrated peak 5G download speeds of
4.5 gigabits a second, but predicts initial median speeds of about 1.4 gigabits. That
translates to roughly 20 times faster than the current 4G experience.

The 5G speeds will be particularly noticeable in higher-quality streaming video. And

downloading a typical movie at the median speeds cited by Qualcomm would take 17
seconds with 5G, compared with six minutes for 4G.

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Rather than remembering to download a season of a favorite TV show before heading to the
airport, for example, you could do it while in line to board a plane, said Justin Denison, a
Samsung senior vice president.

Is that the only speed that matters?

No. There’s another kind of speed, a lag known as latency, that may become even more
important with 5G.

Issue a command now on a smartphone — like starting a web search — and the response
isn’t exactly immediate. A lag of 50 to several hundred milliseconds is common, partly
because signals often must pass between different carrier switching centers; 5G, which uses
newer networking technology, was designed to reduce latency down to a few milliseconds. It
was also designed to deliver signals more reliably than earlier cellular networks, which today
frequently drop bits of data that aren’t essential for tasks like watching movies on a phone.

That improvement could bring many benefits, notably in fields such as virtual reality. The
highest-quality VR applications now typically require bulky headsets that are connected by
wire to nearby personal computers that generate 3-D images. With 5G, that would be off-
loaded wirelessly to other machines, freeing users to move and making it easier to develop
goggles the size of eyeglasses, said Cristiano Amon, president of Qualcomm’s
semiconductor business.

In the related field of augmented reality, people could point a smartphone camera at a
football game and see both live video on the display and superimposed player statistics or
other data, said Patrick Moorhead, an analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy.

And 5G’s impact extends to medicine and other fields that increasingly rely on high-speed
connections.

“If you talk about remote surgery or connected cars, you don’t want latency times to be too
long,” said Fredrik Jejdling, an executive vice president at Ericsson, a maker of cellular
equipment.

When will 5G be here?

The answer for smartphone users in the United States appears to be by the second quarter
of 2019; precise timing is uncertain.

AT&T has actually switched on its mobile 5G service in 12 cities, with seven more targeted
in its initial rollout plan. But smartphones aren’t ready yet for a direct connection to 5G
networks. So AT&T will initially market a 5G hot-spot device, made by Netgear, that can
funnel wireless broadband connections to nearby phones and computers using Wi-Fi.

Andre Fuetsch, president of AT&T Labs and the carrier’s chief technology officer, said the
first Samsung smartphones for AT&T’s 5G network will be available in the first half of 2019.

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Verizon is already selling a 5G-branded service — based on its own variant of the
technology — to provide wireless internet connections to homes in limited parts of Houston,
Indianapolis, Los Angeles and Sacramento. The carrier predicts that it will begin serving
smartphone users in the first half of 2019, without identifying cities or specific timing.

Sprint said it might also switch on a 5G service first for smartphones in 2019, initially
targeting nine American cities. Its prospective merger partner, T-Mobile, has stressed a
nationwide 5G launch in 2020, but said it was installing gear in 30 cities that would be ready
when 5G smartphones appeared in 2019.

Countries expected to follow the United States with 2019 rollouts of 5G include Britain,
Germany, Switzerland, China, South Korea and Australia, according to a timetable compiled
by Qualcomm.

Will consumers see the full benefits of 5G?

Verizon and AT&T will introduce their 5G offerings with the first use of high frequencies that
are known by the phrase “millimeter wave.” Using this, the wireless providers can pump data
at high speeds, but the signals don’t travel as far. So the two carriers are expected to first
target densely populated areas — “parts or pockets” of cities, as AT&T’s Mr. Fuetsch put it.

Sprint and T-Mobile plan to start with lower frequencies. The result may be somewhat slower
initial speeds but broader range, said Michael Thelander, president of Signals Research, a
wireless consultancy.

Still, 5G’s full benefits aren’t expected until American carriers upgrade key central switching
equipment, which may not happen until late 2019 or sometime in 2020.

So should I buy a smartphone that works with 5G right away?

A consumer study sponsored by Intel in August found that 58 percent of Americans were not
knowledgeable about 5G or had not heard of it, though another survey in December by the
chip maker indicated solid demand once the benefits were explained.

Confusion actually could increase over the short term because of some technical details.

You have a lot to consider. For example, while Verizon and AT&T plan to later add 5G
services based on lower frequencies that offer wider coverage, the first 5G handsets may
not work with those portions of their networks. So the reach of 5G signals for those phones
may remain limited.

“I wouldn’t buy a 5G phone until it supports 5G in one of the lower-frequency bands,” Mr.
Thelander said. “For all operators but Sprint, this means at least late 2019, and more likely
2020.”

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Why Are SSD Prices Suddenly Plummeting?

By Alexander Fox – Posted on Aug 8, 2018 in Hardware Guides
Making Tech Easier

For years SSD prices were annoyingly stable. Anyone looking to buy an SSD could rely on
prices that hadn’t budged much since launch. Sure, you would see the occasional sale, but
ongoing price drops for older drives were nowhere to be found.

Suddenly, that’s all changed. SSD prices are dropping like a stone. What gives? Is now the
best time to buy an SSD?

The cause of this price drop is, as always, supply and demand. For some time, the supply of
SSDs was restricted based on a shortage of available flash memory. But now, most fabs
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have completed the transition to 64-layer 3D TLC NAND flash memory. This new NAND
technology allows for denser storage and faster drives, increasing drive speed and capacity.

However, these new drives take time to make, and old drives don’t just disappear. Retailers
still have a substantial stockpile of SSDs using the previous generation’s 32-layer 3D TLC
NAND flash memory.

As such, prices are being slashed on SSDs with last-generation technology, including older
but still excellent 32-layer 3D TLC NAND. Newer 64-layer NAND brings improvement to
performance and power efficiency, but older 32-layer technology is inexpensive enough to
provide compelling deals.

How much did prices drop?

When you hear about price drops, it’s important to keep perspective in mind. A decrease of
a few dollars probably won’t change your purchasing behavior. But a drop of a significant
percentage of price can send you reaching for your wallet.

Using Camelcamelcamel we can see that SSD prices have plunged for the top selling SSDs
on Amazon. The top seller, the Samsung EVO 860 500GB, has dropped 30 percent from its
price at launch, a decrease of more than $50. If we look at a more recent stable price back
in the spring, the drive’s price is still down more than 10 percent.

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Other popular drives see similar decreases. In the last six months the WD Blue 500GB SSD
has dropped $51 dollars, or 36 percent.

Most consumer 2.5-inch SATA SSDs have dropped their price as substantially, with some
plunging even further. Even m.2 and NVMe devices, which have historically been resistant
to price decreases, are showing the same downward trend.

Conclusion: Should I buy an SSD today?

If you’re still running your system off of a spinning hard drive, you won’t find a better time to
buy. No matter what type of SSD you get, the performance increase will be noticeable and
dramatic.

What if you own an older or smaller SSD that you want to upgrade? Now is a good time for
you to buy as well. SSD speed will increase with the newest technology, but only on the
margins. Maximum capacity is going to be the biggest difference between 32-layer and 64-
layer 3D NAND, rather than speed. So if you want to jump from 256GB to 1TB, the market is
ripe with deals.

If you have an SSD you’re happy with or you want to purchase an SSD larger than 2TB, hold
your horses. The same goes for users who need the fastest drives. Unless you want to build
a RAID0 array from SSDs, wait for 64-layer SSDs to hit the market and drop in price. If
you’ve been longing for a 5TB SSD, that day is coming soon.

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Broadband connectivity is rising in K-12 as cost falls, report finds

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Written by Colin Wood
Jan 4, 2019 | EDSCOOP

Wi-Fi and broadband connectivity is expanding in K-12 school districts across the U.S. as
costs continue to decline, according to annual survey findings released Friday by the
Consortium for School Networking.

The group attributes these gains to increased rural investment funneled through state
governments and the 2014 overhaul of the Federal Communication Commission’s E-Rate
program, which provides a maximum of $3.9 billion annually for school and library internet
connectivity projects.

In surveying nearly 400 school districts, the Washington D.C.-based association shows in its
2018-19 report that 69 percent of school IT administrators are “very confident” in their
wireless network’s ability to support one device per student, a common benchmark for
school broadband efficacy. This is an increase over last year’s figure of 58 percent.

The report shows 92 percent of school networks say they are meeting the FCC’s short-term
bandwidth goal of 100 megabits per second per 1,000 students. But the biggest gain can be
found in the 35 percent of districts that say they are now meeting the FCC’s long-term goal
of 1 gigabit per second per 1,000 students — nearly double the percentage found in last
year’s survey.

“These strides demonstrate the impact of the E-Rate modernization, as well as state
investments in rural broadband,” said Keith Krueger, CEO of CoSN, in a press statement.
“Policymakers and local leaders should continue to make these infrastructure investments
over the long run to support schools in every community.”

The FCC’s 1997 program to subsidize broadband for schools and libraries was reformed in
2014 to relax some of its construction requirements, offer new incentives for building last-
mile facilities, and provide additional options for schools, such as the ability to build their own
facilities if that was deemed the most cost-effective option. The modernization also put a

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new requirement on broadband carriers receiving subsidies from the FCC’s High Cost
program, designed to encourage rural broadband construction, that they must offer
broadband to schools and libraries in the subsidy area comparable to those in urban areas.

State governments have also taken an increased interest in the rural-urban divide in recent
years and there are now at least 20 states that operate statewide broadband offices that are
responsible for drawing outside investment, providing technical assistance and coordinating
projects across public entities. Oregon and Washington are two of the most recent states to
establish broadband offices; governors of each earmarked funding for offices and rural
broadband projects in their 2019-2021 budgets proposed last month.

In spite of this progress, CoSN and its survey partner, The School Superintendents
Association, point out that there are challenges ahead — cost, in particular. Ongoing
expense to maintain broadband networks was cited as the leading concern among survey
respondents. Fifty percent named ongoing cost as the top barrier, down from 55 percent last
year.

A dip in concern with ongoing cost can be linked to lowered costs; 75 percent of districts
report paying less than $5 per megabit per second of connectivity, compared to just 60
percent in 2017.

Even where there is an abundance of connectivity, challenges persist. Juxtaposed with a

shortage of internet access in many rural areas is a common complaint raised by districts
that they have more internet capacity than they need. Forty percent of districts named “lack
of need” as a top challenge.

Cybersecurity was also fielded in the report, with breach detection named as the top concern
among districts, named by 68 percent of respondents.

Only 12 percent of districts reported having dedicated network security personnel. North
Dakota’s state government has uniquely taken responsibility for this challenge by
establishing a statewide cybersecurity governance structure and requesting funding for 37
new cybersecurity staff members to assist both K-12 and its universities. How educational
institutions in other states plan to handle this this staffing shortage is unclear; according to
the report, just 36 percent of districts allocate 10 percent or more of their techology budgets
to cybersecurity.

“One trend is clear: Learning is going digital,” Krueger said. “Improved wireless access and
broadband connectivity means more schools are better able to meet the modern technology
needs of students and teachers.”

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Make tech updates a breeze

Cindy Heagwood
October 23, 2018
Education
Connected Teaching and Learning

Technology in the classroom, whether it’s a one-to-one initiative, laptop carts or a BYOD
program, can provide amazing opportunities for teaching and learning. But only if everything
is working smoothly.

Making sure a school’s technology program runs without a hitch is the job of the district’s IT
department. This can be a challenge, especially if the district has a small staff managing a
growing number of devices. Among the biggest issues these employees deal with are:

• Keeping up with the ever-changing requirements of state-mandated testing.

• Dealing with security concerns and making sure devices and passwords stay up to
date.
• Installing program updates in a timely manner. This might require IT staff to work after
school or on weekends to ensure devices are ready for teachers and students on
Monday.
• Making sure students aren’t accessing sites they shouldn’t and are using the devices
in an appropriate manner.

I dealt with these issues when I was the technology coordinator for the Blevins School
District in Arkansas. We served approximately 480 students and 450 devices for students
and staff. One of our biggest headaches was the state testing system—it changed every
year, sometimes more than once. Each time we had to uninstall the old testing program and
install the new one. Sometimes this took an entire Sunday afternoon. We were also
stretched thin trying to address concerns about what students were accessing online while
also responding to help-desk requests.

Last year we implemented Impero Education Pro, a software platform for classroom
management, network management and online student safety. This helped improve our
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operational efficiency. For example, it used to take myself and two counselors one to two
weeks to get all of the district’s computers ready for testing. Today, I can do it by myself in
90 minutes while sitting on my back porch. I can also push out updates regularly to all
devices to keep them secure.

Multi-faceted software can be a great support for your school IT desk. But not all solutions
are created equal. Here are four things to consider when selecting classroom or IT
management software.

1. Does it allow the IT staff to perform tasks remotely? This is especially important in
school districts with multiple buildings. It saves an incredible amount of time when an
IT employee can log into a single console and from there, remotely access and
update all systems at once.
2. Does it have good customer service? It is frustrating to purchase a software solution
and then have difficulty getting it to work properly or trouble getting support. Make
sure the program you select has a good track record for responsive customer service.
3. Does it do more than one thing? Purchasing one software program for classroom
management, another for security, and yet another for IT installs, will work. But it’s
much easier and more efficient to find an all-in-one solution. For example, the
software that Blevins selected provides all of these things plus monitoring software
that help teachers make sure students are using their devices appropriately.
4. Does it integrate well with other systems? The solution must be able to work
seamlessly with other programs and systems. Make sure to ask about this and test it
out before you purchase.

Cindy Heagwood is a teacher and former technology coordinator for the Blevins School
District, located in Blevins Arkansas. The district uses a combination of personal computers,
laptops and iPads to support learning in the classroom. It was voted no. 1 in the southwest
region for eleventh-grade literacy.

Tech Tips is a weekly column in SmartBrief on EdTech. Have a tech tip to share? Contact us
at knamahoe@smartbrief.com

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