There's a couple of ways to trasfer data (files) between computers. The official way is via the local network. This should be the faster, most transparent method, but it is not. Even on a network at home, where trust is 100%, Windows makes it hard to simply drag and drop files from one computer to another.
You need to set up "shares" on every computer, manually telling Wnidows that, yes, it is alright for my netbook computer to read and write files on my desktop computer. Sometimes those shares don't work; I don't know why. The other hassle is that you cannot access a computer over the network when the computer lacks a password. My son can't be bothered setting up a password for his notebook computer, and so I can't access it. Bizarre but true.
The hassle-free workaround is to use a USB memory stick; this process is slow, however, and is constrained by the size of the memory on the stick. Cheap USB sticks (the kind you are given by vendors) often contain slow memory, limiting write speeds to 1MB/sec or so. A 600MB file takes ten minutes to copy onto the stick. (The network is about 30x faster, in practical terms.) Then you need to wait as the file is read by the other computer.
I had read about USB transfer cables, but never saw one. I began to wonder if they were even legal! Then I found one on the bottom shelf of the local Wal-mart, and took it home to see if it worked. It did.
The 4-foot-long USB transfer cable looks just like a USB cable, but with one end looking like a USB memory stick. You plug the cable into the USB ports of two computers; software automatically starts up, looking like Windows Explorer. The upper half of the window lists the files on one computer; the lower half, the other computer. You just drag and drop between the two.
The cable works with PCs and Macs, and can xfer between any combination of the two. I tested the trasfer rate with a MB file, and found that data moved at 12.5MB/sec. It did not work with my Linux netbook.
The fat end of the cable contains a green LED to indication the connectionis live, and a small amount of memory that holds the PC and Mac versions of the transfer software; to the computers, the software look as if it resides on a CD drive.
The one I bought was made by Macally, and cost $30. I suppose the only improvement I could think of is a wireless version.
You need to set up "shares" on every computer, manually telling Wnidows that, yes, it is alright for my netbook computer to read and write files on my desktop computer. Sometimes those shares don't work; I don't know why. The other hassle is that you cannot access a computer over the network when the computer lacks a password. My son can't be bothered setting up a password for his notebook computer, and so I can't access it. Bizarre but true.
The hassle-free workaround is to use a USB memory stick; this process is slow, however, and is constrained by the size of the memory on the stick. Cheap USB sticks (the kind you are given by vendors) often contain slow memory, limiting write speeds to 1MB/sec or so. A 600MB file takes ten minutes to copy onto the stick. (The network is about 30x faster, in practical terms.) Then you need to wait as the file is read by the other computer.
I had read about USB transfer cables, but never saw one. I began to wonder if they were even legal! Then I found one on the bottom shelf of the local Wal-mart, and took it home to see if it worked. It did.
The 4-foot-long USB transfer cable looks just like a USB cable, but with one end looking like a USB memory stick. You plug the cable into the USB ports of two computers; software automatically starts up, looking like Windows Explorer. The upper half of the window lists the files on one computer; the lower half, the other computer. You just drag and drop between the two.
The cable works with PCs and Macs, and can xfer between any combination of the two. I tested the trasfer rate with a MB file, and found that data moved at 12.5MB/sec. It did not work with my Linux netbook.
The fat end of the cable contains a green LED to indication the connectionis live, and a small amount of memory that holds the PC and Mac versions of the transfer software; to the computers, the software look as if it resides on a CD drive.
The one I bought was made by Macally, and cost $30. I suppose the only improvement I could think of is a wireless version.
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