Tips for sorting your photo library, streaming and device cleanup

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I was gobsmacked.

I spoke to you on the Tuesday.

Birthday afternoon, there's this lovely courier man at me back door with a parcel for

me.

Just to thank you so much, because whatever your involvement, you truly got some magic

powers and don't ever let us down.

Listen, I've got some breaking news for you here folks.

It's October.

Well, tomorrow as we publish this, but most people are probably listening in October.

I mean, isn't that wild?

2025 is almost over.

October, November, December.

Three months left.

That is crazy to me.

Crazy to me.

Now, I will say the magazine is coming along slowly.

I've got like days left to finish it.

Please pay attention to the man cave group on Facebook and or just EFTM.com.

At some point in the next little while, we'll put up a page where you can either

sign up for the magazine for free if you haven't had it before, or if you got the

magazine posted to you last year, you'll be able to update your address if it is

needed.

So we're just building a back end that allows you to check your address from

last year and fix it if you've moved.

So that's happening.

The magazine will come out second week of November for Black Friday and

Black Friday at the Gamesmen.

So I'll distribute it again to many, many customers, which will be amazing.

And you can get it delivered directly to your door by Australia Post for free.

We'll pay all the costs.

I'm printing the magazine.

I'm posting it to you.

All good.

No dramas at all.

Happy to help.

And I want you to see what we've been working on.

And it's basically a year interview.

2025 year interview.

Let's call it that.

Plus our awards for the year as well.

So there's a lot to get through there.

I look forward to seeing that and hopefully I can get it done in time

because, you know, it goes to print.

And there is a deadline, by the way, is about I need to get it back from print

in time for an event.

I have an event in the city with PRs and marketing people.

If I don't have the magazine on that day, it's going to look pretty embarrassing.

So yeah, we're working backwards from there, folks.

Pretty, pretty desperate.

But it's a fun process as always.

It just doesn't help when I don't know mobile networks,

triple zero calls go down or Apple launches.

These things just delay me and keep me busy on other things.

So that's strange, but we'll get through a lot to get through this week,

though, here on I nearly said your tech life.

That's how ingrained that is in me.

But we'll we'll help talk about everything from photos,

Wi-Fi, phone cleanups, more Wi-Fi and even streaming issues.

We're going to talk to the bloke behind all the fixed line networks

at Vodafone or TPG, the man that runs their NBN systems.

And we'll talk about the tricks and traps that people are falling into

when it comes to these exciting new speed upgrades.

So not new for regular listeners, but a refresher on exactly

how the speed upgrades work and what you need to do

to make sure you're getting the most of them.

But that's all ahead on this week's episode

of the EFTM podcast.

You're listening to the EFTM podcast.

Join the conversation.

Head to eftm.com and click Ask Trev.

Great to have you company.

Wherever you're listening, however you're listening.

Lovely of you to download.

And I forget to tell a friend if you want to chat to me,

get in touch.

You know how to do it.

Keith's on the line today.

Keith, how can I help you, mate?

Good morning and thanks for talking to me.

Look, I have thousands of photos going back years

and years and years.

I'm looking at some sort of software package that I can

sort my photos with maybe face recognition,

geographical locations or something like that.

Does that make sense?

Yep.

Are you looking to do this on your local computer, though?

I'm my desktop, yes.

So the problem is there used to be a great bit of software

called Picasa.

And I used to love it.

It was a great way of organizing photos.

However, Google bought it and turned it into what I would

argue is the greatest photo sorting system on the planet

and that is Google Photos.

But it runs in the cloud.

Now you may not be a fan, but I'm telling you.

It's the greatest thing you could ever do.

You know, all you need is...

So you've got all the photos already digitized,

yes, stored somewhere?

Yes.

Are they from digital...

So are they digital camera photos

or are they scanned images as well?

No, they're all digital photos taken on iPhones.

Perfect, perfect, perfect.

So every one of those photos has some data in it

that tells some of the basic things that you want,

which is things like location, date, et cetera.

And the way...

People who have listened for a long time know

I'm just going to go into full preaching mode here,

but the way Google Photos works is you just simply sign up

and I would encourage you to pay for an account

so that you're getting good storage

and you can upload in full resolution

so you're not sacrificing quality.

And you've got a big folder of photos on your computer.

You tick a box on the Google Photos app on your computer

and that's the folder that synchronizes with the cloud.

And look, it depends on your internet connection,

depends on the number of photos,

but it could take days, maybe even a couple of weeks

to fully upload your library.

But once it's done, once it's uploaded,

then what you do is you install the Google Photos app

on your phone so that anything new,

any new photos that you take

are automatically synchronized

into your photo library in the cloud.

So I haven't done anything specific,

but just logging on to now my website, photos.google.com,

I can see photos that I took on the weekend

because I took them with my iPhone,

the Google Photos app is installed on my iPhone

and it simply synchronizes regularly to the cloud.

And it's phenomenal because the first and foremost,

I can just, I can search,

I can log on to a browser or use the app on your phone

and I can go, I can just type a date.

I can go 2012, done.

And it will just show me photos from 2012.

I can then scroll through 2012

because they come up in chronological order.

But the more powerful thing about Google Photos

is people and pets.

So what it does is it categorizes all the faces

that it can see and you can name them.

So it doesn't know who they are,

I've obviously, the top five faces in my library

are Trevor Long, Harrison Long, Victoria Long,

Jackson Long and Amanda Long.

Now troubling, the next two faces are Stephen,

Fennink and Carl Stephanovic,

but leaving that aside because my mum is in like eighth place here,

it automatically finds faces.

Now I've got to scroll down a long way

because I've gone to the trouble of naming everyone in my library.

So I've just scrolled down a bit of a way to where there's no name.

And I can see, well that's Oscar Piastri,

I can see who that is.

So I can now give that album a name

and I can call it Oscar Piastri.

I can, if I recognize a person,

there's Christian, my hairdresser, boom, I can name him.

So I can name whoever I want or I can just leave them unnamed.

It doesn't matter.

But then, then I can,

so my youngest son, Harrison,

is turning 14 in a couple of days.

I can just go into my Google Photos and search for Harrison Long.

And it will just show me photos of Harrison Long.

Mate, it's unbelievable.

And it is very good.

And facial recognition, very good.

So mate, I can't recommend it.

I think you'll enjoy just how powerful it is.

And the last thing I'll tell you is this,

it also can just see things.

So let's say, let's come up with a green car.

I can search for green car.

And I haven't told it about anything,

but because it has the smarts to find green cars.

It's found me a photo of a Green Lamborghini I took.

It's found a photo of a Green Lotus

at a recent electric vehicle show.

It's found a photo of a Green BMW

I took just a couple of weeks ago in Berlin.

It's just coming up with photos of green cars.

Now, when I scroll down, I'm like,

there's no green cars in this photo.

What's going on here?

But, you know, it hit and miss sometimes.

But the top results most relevant to my search

are absolutely green cars.

And mate, it's awesome.

Very powerful.

Very powerful, mate.

You are going to be a cloud convert

once you kick this off.

So mate, photos.google.com.

Go and sign up.

Get an account.

Pay for the minimum storage that's there.

Because once you upload all your photos,

you might find you need to pay for more storage

or you might be fine.

And that's the last subscription I'll get rid of.

So if I start hitting the ropes and money's tight,

I'll get rid of Netflix.

I'll get rid of Paramount.

I'll get rid of Stan.

I'll get rid of everything

before I get rid of Google Photos.

Wow.

That's awesome.

All right, good luck.

Sounds like what I want.

Thank you so much.

Excuse me.

Much appreciated.

Enjoy.

Well, thank you.

There you go.

Enjoy the library.

Definitely well.

Thanks, Trevor.

Cheers, mate, anytime.

So yeah, look, I know I preach a lot about Google Photos,

but I've yet to find anything as useful.

I've got a local network storage here at the office

that's powerful and huge.

And I can fit gigabytes, terabytes of photos on it.

But it just doesn't do the categorization

like I'd want it to do.

People will tell me there's software that'll do it.

Sorry.

Not as good as Google's doing it.

Sorry.

This is not happening.

So check it out.

Google Photos.

It's a win.

The EFTM podcast, thanks to Swan MaxRanger 4K,

Strongest Wireless Maximum Security.

Great to have you company and happy to help wherever I can

get in touch.

You know how to do it.

Bill's on the line today.

Bill, how are you doing?

Good.

Thanks, Trevor.

How are you?

What can I do for you, mate?

I've just upgraded the Fiber to the premise.

Yeah.

And I've been running the old Gateway Tulsa modem.

Yeah.

And it's just really not strong enough to get the signal down

to the bedroom where I've got the Foxtel and, you know,

streaming services.

Yeah.

I'm just wondering is there a better router

you could recommend?

100%.

Just quickly, what were you on beforehand?

What technology?

Fiber to the node?

Yeah.

Fiber to the node, yeah.

And what was the maximum speed you could get then?

While I was only on the 50 plan.

Yeah.

Did you sign up to the 100 or more?

No, I signed up to the 100 and I just got upgraded yesterday

to the 500.

500.

How good is it?

Isn't that wild?

No, it's good.

Do you know what speed you're getting down the back?

About 10.

Wow.

Okay.

How far is down the back?

What are we talking distance wise?

It's about 18 metres.

Oh, so it's not.

And is that kind of the extent of the house's depth?

Like what are we talking to the size of the whole house?

It's about a 20 square house.

So the study is at the back of the house

and the front bedroom is the front, which is about 18 metres.

And the study is where the NBN connection is?

Yes.

I feel like you'll probably get away.

So what you need is a mesh system,

which is basically whatever's there now, you throw that away

and you plug.

A mesh system comes with at least one,

sorry, comes with two, three or more little boxes.

One of them is a router.

You just plug that directly into the NBN box.

You get online.

The other ones are called satellites

and they just need a PowerPoint.

And so a two, I actually think a two pack system

might be enough for you.

My only concern is, and I've said this to other callers too,

my only concern is that the three pack solution.

So let's say a two pack was $600 or $700.

An extra one, if you need it, is like another $600.

Whereas a three pack from the get go is $1,000.

So it's just a bit frustrating to say

you might need the bigger one, but you don't know.

But my gut feeling is you're probably going to be OK.

What sort of things are you doing in the home

other than obviously the obvious streaming and on your phones?

What other kind of...

Yeah, basically just the streaming and phones

and I've got the main computer is connected up to the...

It's hard to type.

Mate, I think you could probably get away.

I would hedge your bets here

and go on a not the latest system,

but a bit of bigger system.

So the Netki Orbi Wi-Fi 6,

I'm looking at the JV Hi-Fi website if that helps for reference.

They've got this.

It's called the AX1800 and it's $399,

which is discounted by about $150 right now.

It's a bloody good one.

It's a three pack system.

So one of them in the study,

one of them, you know,

a quarter of the way into the house

and then another, you know,

two-thirds of the way into the house.

Not in the bedroom, but, you know,

room or so before the bedroom.

And what you'll end up with there is a great coverage

across the whole home.

So if you can get a three pack...

So the compromise there is you're not buying

the absolute latest technology,

you're not buying Wi-Fi 7,

but with what you're doing,

I'm not sure you'll notice.

I think you'll still get what you want

is optimal speed and connectivity

and you're going to get that from the Orbi AX1800.

You're only going to need to spend $399.

What's the age of the household members?

That's just made my life.

So I take over the land

and she goes into the bedroom to watch her shows.

Yeah, OK.

Happy wife, happy life, mate.

Go and get yourself the Orbi AX1800.

$399.

You do that today.

Plug it in directly to the NBN.

Get rid of the other box.

And, mate, you will be blown away.

And before you do it,

do some speed tests around the house

in different locations to then write them down.

Draw a little map of your home

and write speed on your Wi-Fi on your phone

at the modem, at the front of the house,

at the side of the house, in the middle of the house

and do some Wi-Fi tests

and then put the Orbi in

and then do the speed test again, mate.

No worries.

Good luck.

Sounds good.

Thanks very much.

No worries at all.

Thanks for getting in touch.

Thank you. Bye.

There you go.

Another happy mesh customer.

As I said, it's definitely going to be the hot topic.

Simple as that.

It's everyone.

Look at that upgrade.

He's gone from 50 to 500.

He's now getting 10 times the speed

from a simple fibre upgrade.

It's just outstanding.

So really well done.

Yeah, let me know what you think.

If you've got solutions for people

or you've got a question of your own,

go to the website ftm.com.

047-657-657.

That's the text line.

Thanks to Vodafone.

Get in touch and Ask Trev today.

Happy to help wherever I can.

You can text us as Dixie said 047-657-657.

Jeff's on the line today, Jeff.

How are you, Trevor?

Yeah, mate, really good.

What can I do for you?

I've got a feeling I've got crap

running in the background on my iPhone 15.

And I'd like something.

Is there an app or a program

I can get to clean it up?

When you say crap running,

what do you think is running?

What are you experiencing?

It's the same as my iPad.

In less than 12 months,

the way that it doesn't hold the electricity,

the power, as long as it used to.

Now, I know they degrade over time,

but it's only about 10 months,

both of these,

and they're running out of power

in sort of the iPad

in about four hours

and the iPhone in about 10.

Interesting.

So the first thing is diagnosing it.

Before you take crazy action,

the first thing you want to know

is what's actually going on.

So as I look at my iPhone,

I go, well, it's coming up to mid-none.

I've down to 39% battery.

Now, that doesn't sound good,

but I've been up since 3 a.m.

So it's actually pretty darn good usage.

It's not really that big a deal.

But what I do is,

I regularly do this,

obviously, when I'm reviewing phones,

but I go into settings

and into battery

and then scroll down

to view all battery usage.

And what you'll get there

is a very clear indication

of what has used your battery today.

So for me, Tiktok, 23%.

Being on the phone, 6%.

So I do a lot of radio on a Tuesday.

And it's funny because

it's kind of alerting me

to differences in normal schedule.

Instagram is using Life360,

which is the kind of tracking app

we use as a family.

So I look at that and I go,

well, actually nothing there

that I could really do

other than not use Tiktok as much.

But if you go in there

and you see an app

that stands out

and you're like,

I don't even use that regularly.

What is going on?

Then uninstall the app.

Okay.

Delete the app.

Right.

The other thing you probably,

what model iPhone have you got?

15, iPhone 15, the big one.

Yeah.

So make sure you also check

the battery health

and check that you've got,

you should have 90% plus battery health.

It should be normal.

There should be no issues there.

If it's,

if the battery health

is getting towards 70%,

then there's something massively wrong.

And you should probably go to Apple

and say, what?

This is not what's going on here.

But yeah, basically,

what you want to do is

you want to monitor battery usage.

So on those days

where you truly notice

that something strange is going on

or the battery is depleting,

have a look at what it is.

Because you've got to remember

often we give permissions to apps

and we don't know why we did it.

So for example,

who?

The Maccas app.

He's a funny one.

My Maccas app

can use your location all the time.

Not because they're tracking you,

but because when you make an order,

you can close the app

and it can track you

when you get near a Maccas,

it'll pop up and say,

are you ready to pick up your order?

That's why.

But,

and they've built that smart enough

that it doesn't,

like today,

I haven't used Maccas today,

so it's not using my battery.

So if it was on a day

that I had made the Maccas order

and then maybe I'd stop,

turn off that permission.

I'd turn off the,

the location permission.

So over the course of a few days,

when you get home at the end of the day,

have a look at the battery usage

and to,

and see if you can see a trend.

You know,

Spotify streaming in the background.

Apple CarPlay,

Waze or Google Maps,

those things will chew through the battery

if you're in the car a lot.

But,

no,

yes,

that will chew,

that will chew.

Okay.

Oh, well, that's interesting.

I'll do that.

And if I,

if I find any other problems

or if it doesn't work,

I'll contact you again.

Yeah, get back in touch with the bottom line is,

you have control by,

A, firstly,

you could fully delete the app.

B,

you could change your usage of the app.

And C,

you could just look at the permissions

that you give each app

and kind of just look at it and go,

actually, I,

I don't need it to have that much permission

and go from there.

I think it's time I went through

and deleted a whole lot of apps

that I don't use.

And,

well, that's the other,

it sounds extreme,

but here's the other thing you can do.

Now,

I use a different phone

every few weeks, right?

And when I change

from an iPhone to an iPhone,

I don't restore from backup.

I start from fresh,

which is stupidly annoying

when you're,

when you've got,

you know,

25 million apps to download.

But

the opposite to that is,

it means that I don't have any apps on here

that I don't need.

Yep.

Cause, cause mate,

that makes a lot of sense.

Remember when you used to

have to download an app

it would take half an hour

cause you're on, you know,

whatever these days,

they download so quick.

You've got logins

that are remembered,

mate,

you could actually wipe your phone.

If you,

if you have no luck

with those basic things,

then do a factory reset

of the phone,

wipe it and start from scratch.

Install the apps

day by day

as you need them.

Question.

Well,

I'll lose all my phone numbers,

wouldn't I?

No, they should be backed up

in the cloud.

But again,

before you do a factory reset,

find out where they are.

Because if your,

if your phone numbers

are in iCloud,

for example,

most Apple users by default

are in iCloud.

What you do is

go to your computer,

put your phone away,

go to your computer

and,

and log into iCloud.com.

And,

and when you go to iCloud.com,

it's essentially a portal

into what Apple has stored

on their cloud.

Right?

And one of those things

is contacts.

So I'm sitting here,

my phone's down the desk,

but I'm just looking on the browser.

I'll click on contacts.

And there's only five contacts

in my iCloud.

And you know what that is?

That's a mistake.

Those contacts shouldn't be there

because I don't use Google,

iCloud for,

for contacts.

I use Google.

So now I know that

that person's number

I need to move over.

But the bottom line is

I can see

my contacts.

And I know that if I was to

lose my phone

or wipe my phone,

I know where they are.

Same with photos.

Go to iCloud.com.

Click on your photos.

Are they all there?

Yes, they are.

No, they're not.

It's,

that's the best way to do it.

Calendar,

contacts and photos.

Check that they're in the cloud

by looking at them

and through a web browser

and then format your phone.

Thank you very much, Trevor.

All right, mate.

No worries at all.

Let us know.

Here you go.

I appreciate your help.

Thank you very much, mate.

Cheers.

Thanks for getting in touch.

Kind of, you know,

it's a tough one

because you,

you think that it's

something going on in your phone

but it's actually just

something you're doing.

By the way,

if you use Apple CarPlay

and Waze

and you're not charging the phone,

that battery will deplete

so quickly.

It's not even funny.

And the reason is this.

So Apple CarPlay

is a,

especially if it's wireless,

Apple CarPlay is a

wireless projection

of a screen

in real time constantly.

Secondly,

if you're then navigating

through that screen,

it is real time updating

your location

and it's using GPS.

So it's using

both the mobile network

and the GPS.

It's using every antenna

on the phone.

It's working that

phone to the bone.

That's why it chews

through the battery.

Simple as that.

This is the EFTM podcast.

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Take any calls

if you've got a tech question

love to help you out

if you're looking to buy

something

I'll shop vicariously

for you

and if you've got

a problem with something

you've bought

let's talk about it.

But the NBN speed upgrade

is a

massive topic

and has been now

for several weeks

because A it was exciting

when it happened

B it was kind of

what is happening

and when do I get it

and then C it's like

well is it doing

what I wanted it to do

and it is creating

more traffic

shall I say

on the text line

and on the email

than normal

which I expected.

So let's just

go back to scratch here

and let's have a

talk about

your home internet

and there's no better person

to do that than someone

that lives and breathes

fixed line internet

and in this case

that's Andrew O'Connor

the general manager

of fixed line product

at TPG telecom

he joins me on the line

can I Andrew?

Hey Trevor how are you?

Really really good

this has been

an exciting couple

of weeks I guess

because

people are kind of

excited to be getting

better speeds

I reckon more people

have done speed tests

in the last two weeks

than the last two years

probably.

Oh absolutely

absolutely

is a truly exciting time

you know for

not only for broadband providers

but for customers

who at the end of the day

are getting a free upgrade

to far far faster speeds

But one of the things

that I think

is missed in this

and look I

you know I'm trying my best

I did a today show segment

on the excitement

of the update

the need to think about

what's in your home

and since the dawn of the NBN

there's been this

call it a battle

between what I expect to get

and what I'm able to get

based on what my home does

we have this with people

on fibre to the node

they have copper lining

to their home

they have old telephone

points in their home

they were often

the falling point

for speeds in their home

and now

people who've got

almost the best

technology

HFC

or the best

with fibre to the premises

coming to their home

they still have to think

about what's inside

their home don't they

100%

look now fundamentally

the bottleneck

is not going to be

what's going into the home

it is all about

the in home setup

and you know

making sure that

not only is your modem

up for the challenge

but then actually

thinking about

how you've set up

your home network

and that's where

things like

new Wi-Fi mesh systems

really kick in

and that means that

you can then get

that great signal

all around your home

what do you recommend

to people in terms of

diagnosing that

so let's talk about it

from a customer service perspective

I'm assuming

you've even had to

kind of pivot in that sense

you know it's gone from being

oh well

it's a likely case

that we need to do some work

you know the NBN needs

to do some work

on the actual line

coming in to now

it is most likely

to be in the home

what are the steps

that you recommend

people take

to check on

the Wi-Fi speeds

look

absolutely the best test

is to run a speed test

they're very very easy to do

but it's very important

when you're running that speed test

to make sure that

you're pretty close

to where you're using it

but close to the modem

and the challenge

that people have got

is that their modem

may not be in the best location

in the home

especially

if they've gone through

a recent fibre upgrade

from an old copper base line

to a new full fibre line

sometimes their actual

network termination device

may be in a really weird location

like in the garage

now

personally

I don't really use the internet

in my garage

I use it in and around the home

and the challenge

is getting the signal

out of your garage

which may be double bricks

and back into the home

and that's where

making sure that you've got

a really good setup

in and around the home

is pretty key

look

I think that

some people

don't see that as a problem

they think

oh no, it should just be

the internet works

and it comes in the home

but it's a complete change

isn't it in the

as you mentioned

a bottleneck

it's a change in

the infrastructure

of Wi-Fi in your home

because

you used to have these

kind of two lanes

of the super highway

coming in

and now you've

potentially got

5, 10 or 20 lanes

of this highway

at your front door

but you know

you've got toll booths

and things

it's a bottleneck

and you're expecting

people do this speed test

and they expect

that mega speed

on the balcony

or in the backyard

or in the games room

or the sun room

out the back

and that's where

you get this kind of

scratching point

for people's

scratching the head going

why is it not working

and Wi-Fi is the bottleneck

but it doesn't need to be

because there are

mesh solutions out there

that I've been talking about

for a long time

but even you guys

are now looking at those

solutions for the home

aren't you

100%

and look

mesh solutions

if you go to

a normal

sort of retail store

they can be quite expensive

and also quite complicated

you know

and that's why

different RSTs

they're looking at different

solutions

now

Vodafone for example

we've just released

a super Wi-Fi proposition

that means that

when you sign up

for a new

NBM plan today

you will not only

get a best in class

modem

so Wi-Fi 7 modem

but you'll also get

a paired mesh device

with it

which means that

then you can put

that mesh device

further around your home

and then means

you get that signal

that really really strong

good coverage signal

in those

further reaching parts

of the house

and you call it a paired mesh device

which means out of the box

it's paired with

your router already

it's super easy to set up

you're literally pressing

maybe one maybe two buttons

just to get it all set up

but there's very

very easy guides

on how to do it

when you get it out

in the box

there is an app

that you just

download onto your mobile

and it just guides you

through very very simple steps

just to set it up

and that's pretty key

because setting up these things

can be quite complicated

if you're just going to a

like a Harvey Norman

or a place like that

and like you don't know

what to do

who's eligible for that

for that mesh extend

is it people that sign up again

or to a new plan

how to

how do you determine

who gets those

yep so

at the moment

is directly available

for anybody who's

up to a brand new plan

and what brand

do you have to say

what brand you're

you're working with there

in terms of the modems

so that's Vodafone

oh sorry

oh okay so yeah

an ASUS

in terms of the modem

we've

we've actually

gone and developed

our own solution with

Arcadian

right

I'm looking at it now

it's like a

cylindrical unit

and I assume the smaller

cylinder

is the

satellite unit yeah

yeah correct

that's the mesh unit

yeah right

wow are you not

and you're not selling it separately

it's all about just

providing this to

individuals who sign up

to these plans

that's right

you know and

we've worked with

existing customers

if they're

if their in-home setup

isn't great today

then we will

offer them options

to upgrade

okay cool so

because some people

don't want to go shopping

for this stuff

they don't want the drama

they also want one point

of contact where they can

just call your call centre

and go

well you know

what's wrong

can you tell me this thing

how do I get it working

et cetera

like that's

that's a simplicity thing

for people

is it

are you doing other things

within the TPG group as well

yes

so we will be rolling this

out to

other brands

yeah nice

we've started

first of all

with

with Vodafone

and

you know

we're looking to

to really get

customers engaged with it

do you

find people

have awareness

of what

do you think that

like I've been talking about

Mesh for so long

maybe I'm in the bubble

but

and I think that's a problem

for me

that I'm stuck in the bubble

I just accept it

and I think that's the thing

but

do you find that people

need to be

taken on the journey

slowly

because they want this

fast speed

but they don't realise

they need to do

something else

different in the home

exactly

look we are

it's a constant

challenge

I think that

there are some great

advantages

but the

it's just setting up things

and

now there's

two

two units to set up

that's why

having a

an app to guide you through

step by step

makes it super easy

super simple

and just demystifies

the entire thing

and the app itself

will actually then guide you

to the best location

for that new Mesh device

as well

so practical tips

for people

whether you're a TPG

Vodafone customer

or not

when you're at a dinner party

Andrew

and people find out what you do

there's got to be

like I get the tech questions

you must get the

well my MBNs rubbish

and this be

you must get those

so

what is your advice to people

when they're talking about

wanting or being on these

higher plans

what are the steps

you take this weekend

as you're

cleaning up the house

for people to come round

for the AFL Grand Final

or the NRL

or whatever you might be

watching and doing

but you've got people coming around

and you want good internet

what are we doing

what are your steps

well

the first bit is just

actually trying to find out

which MBN technology

they're on

now the great thing

about this speed upgrade

that's happened

is that

it's available

on around about

50% of the

MBN network

so FTTP

HFC lines

now about half the rest

so are actually

eligible for a full

fiber upgrade

so firstly

get upgraded

to the full fiber line

it's available

it's free

where it's available

man not

and then

and then that means

that customers can get online

and have the option

to upgrade to the

the full faster lines

now 500Mbps

just means

that it's peace of mind

doesn't matter how many people

you've got round in your home

enjoying the AFL Final

they'll all be able to get online

and do what they need to do

and look the thing is

the difference in costs

from going from

a very slow plan to

essentially you're asking

because you have to commit

don't you too

to get the fiber upgrade

you have to

if you're on the 50Mbps

to get the fiber upgrade

you need to commit to

being on a higher plan

but I'm on the

Vodafone website right now

for example

and the 50Mbps

appears to be

$84 a month

the 500MB plan

is $89 a month

and that's not the discount

the discount up front

but if just on the normal

cost plan

it's like $5 different

to go 10 times

faster

I mean that's remarkable

Yeah, it is amazing

and even from Sunday onwards

we've been seeing that

the line share of customers

signing up to that

new 500Mbps plan

it's a fantastic plan

it's a fantastic deal

and it just takes

as I said

it takes the worries

about speed

out of the customers mind

and that's what you want

because I'm assuming this creates

a reduction in the load

on the call centre network

around people complaining

about speed issues or anything

because it's just

everyone's got a faster speed

and it really just becomes

now about servicing people

who have those needs

for they want the upgrade

they want to do those things

so we can legitimately

talk to people

about taking advantage

of the faster speeds

you know and I think

that's what people

get excited about

maybe in six months from now

when it all comes down

and everyone's got

the speeds they want

that becomes the conversation

getting 4K in multiple rooms

instead of being on the HD plan

on your Netflix

or whatever it might be

have you seen

speaking of the fibre upgrade

has this been the biggest

period for the fibre upgrade

request that you've seen to date

because of this speed upgrade?

In the four weeks leading up

to this speed upgrade

we saw a huge uptake

of people going through

a fibre connect process

of going from those older

copper based lines

to the full fibre

we are then expecting that

to further accelerate

over the next month or so

just as people

you know see those new

adverts out there

for 500 million per second

that say

I actually want that speed

it's a great price

I want to upgrade

And I'm not looking for

statistics and hardcore data

but do you know

anecdotally

the broad turnaround time

on the upgrade for people

because obviously for some

people it's more difficult

than others and whatnot

and it's an NBN thing

like is it a month?

Is it two months?

What's the broad

turnaround time

for people getting that upgrade?

Generally

generally it's about

you can get it upgraded

within about 20 days

but the thing I'll say

is getting quick

because as demand surges

it takes a technician to go out

It's going to be a backlog

Yeah

So get in now

and then you can

get your line upgraded

then you never have to

worry about it

Yeah

It's really quite simple

It's a free upgrade

There is a cost

because you need to be on a higher plan

but as I've just pointed out

it's

for some telcos it's $2

for some telcos it's $5

it's not a lot of extra money

for the vast difference

that you're now getting

it used to be that extra money

for double the speed

but now it's that little extra money

for 10 times the speed

so it's really the most compelling time

to get the upgrade

and I think Andrew

has advised us to

get on it now

before the backlog exists

and also from that point on

you've got that technology

in your home

I think it makes the home

more desirable

at a sales point of view

because you're saying

it's got 5 bit of the premise

it's ready to go

if you happen to do some

to have a change of job

and you're now

at work from home

and sharing data

you can get 2,000 megabits

a second

I mean it's quite remarkable

what you can now do on the NBN

and I'm excited about this period of time

as it sounds like you are as well Andrew

well mate great stuff

really exciting

the products you brought to market there

the, what do you call it

Super Wifi?

Super Wifi

It's a great name for it

I really like that

Wifi 7 by the way

we didn't mention it

but Wifi 7

so it's literally future proofing you

for whatever you buy

in the future tech wise

Exactly

Good stuff

alright mate good to chat

Okay thanks very much Trevor

The EFTM podcast

Thanks to SWAN

Home Security to Connect

Detect and Protect

Great to have you company

and would welcome

your questions or calls

on anything you like

in the world of tech

brag about something you bought

or ask questions about

what you want to buy

I don't mind

Aaron's on the line

Good to have you Aaron

Hi I'm Trevor

Yeah really good mate

what can I do for you

Just a question about

upgrading the rail

for this recent

upgrade with the NBN

from this month

Yeah absolutely

which telco are you with

Telstra

And the speeds come through

to you straight away

Correct

Yeah so basically it's upgraded

from the fiber to the house

and it's upgraded

to double the speed

or triple the speed you know

What were you on

were you on the 100

and now you're on the 500

I was on just the

20 kilobytes a second now

I'm up to 100 now

Hang on slow down

There was no upgrade

on the lower planes

No no from the

previous upgrade

that went through

with the fiber to the house

Yes

So the fiber to the house

What plan did you sign up to though

It was the 100 kilobytes

100 megabits

Megabots

And now you're getting 500

Correct

Yeah excellent

How good is that

That's awesome mate

The question is

Are you getting 500

everywhere in the house or not

Not yet no

because I've got the old

Telstra mode

Ah yes okay

Well there's your problem

Yeah correct

What's the plan

I want to get

hopefully upgrade the router

at least because it's got

fiber to the house

and I'm going to need

two ethernet ports

because I've got

security cameras

and I'm direct to a PC

Yeah right

I mean at this point

are you worried about

the speed of the Wi-Fi as well

or just the

just the router

and the cable connection

This is the ethernet

cables basically

Yeah right okay

I mean you know

Nick you have a little

I was I had it the other day

on the today show

because we were talking

about the fiber upgrade

and it was

it was quite shocking to me

it was a $200 product

but it's got Wi-Fi 7

it definitely has ethernet

ports on the back

I'm just going to

quickly now try

and find my segment details

and the product name

but like it's pretty much

like it's a tiny little thing

but it would

your Wi-Fi would be better

it might not be

further

if you know what I mean

it won't spread further

because you've still got

a single box

but it will be better

and then you've got the benefit

of the faster ethernet as well

so yeah that would be

my recommendation

it's $190

it's a Netgear

Nighthawk

Wi-Fi 7

it's a JB Hi-Fi

well my apologies

it's $259 now

it was obviously on special

that week because of the

upgrade

so it's

they call it a

BE 3600

but it's a Netgear

Nighthawk Wi-Fi 7

it'll be the cheapest one

there basically

$259

it's quite

I was quite shocked

at how small it was

but mate it's got

a two and a half gig

internet port

so you could upgrade

to the 2,000 meg

speed if you wanted to

oh beautiful

no worries

and then

one gig ethernet ports

so

and that's comes with

two ethernet cables

on the back too

we've got four ethernet

ports in the back

yeah

so four one gig ethernet

ports

now you've

did you say

you've upgraded the

cabling

the ethernet cable

yeah perfect

because you've got to have

the right cabling

to get the gig a bit

mate

you'll be flying

on the other end

of those ethernet ports

for just $250

mate get into it

that's a bit of a bargain

isn't it

look

so the thing about it

is obviously

it's not

the biggest unit

so it's the Wi-Fi

delivering to your home

but you've got ethernet

to other parts of the home

so you can

you can be happy with that

if you were someone

that was relying entirely

on Wi-Fi

this is not going to be

good enough for a

four bedroom home

no no

it's going to give Wi-Fi

to everywhere

but it'll get slower

as you get further away

but you know

what I'd love to know

from you

if you don't mind

I'd love you to do

draw a map of your home

and do a speed test

at the

right now

on your Telstra modem

on Wi-Fi

on your mobile phone

and you know

at four or five points

throughout the home

so you kind of get a map

of the home

and if you could imagine

faster speeds of green

and slower speeds of red

you can kind of imagine

a heat map

and then do the same

test after you get

this little netgear

and actually

I'd be interested

whether

firstly the Wi-Fi 7

provides better speeds

on Wi-Fi overall

and whether it gives you

any extra reach

as well

oh yep yep

worth a look

I'll give it a crack

might want to get

out for work yeah

yeah alright

yeah that's right

I know the question for

as well I was sending you

an email

was regarding a

dash camera

that you

for the Uni-Denz

I've brought one

off your

one of your recommendations

and after a

portable one

that's

go from

vehicle to vehicle

is tough

because in the end

yeah

I mean

we were doing

I was doing the review

cars for a while

but I kind of got sick

of the cable

being visible

right now look

your Uni-Denz

you'll probably find

that it'll keep going

for a little while

but you really do want to

go cigarette lighter

you know 12 volt

to

dashboard

pretty quickly

in the end

it's going to move

from truck to truck

more or less

yeah like

literally day to day

it's a different truck

you're in is that what

you mean

correct yes

so it becomes part

of your setup

then I would

just simply go

with the simplest

one you feel

offers

value

because it's really

you could

you could spend $900

on a dash cam

or $200 on a dash cam

the portability of them

is actually

exactly the same

actually now

thinking about it

a lot of them these days

have that little

sticky double sided tape

don't they

instead of a suction mount

correct yes

that's the issue

and that's the issue

so we want one

with a suction mount

alright

I'm going to take that on

notice

and I am going to ask

Brad at Uni-Denz

and I will text you

back and I'll tell

you on the show

I'll text you back

what model to get

okay suction mount

yep beautiful

good man

alright we'll find out for you

thank you very much

for your time

no buddy

any time mate

good to hear from you

thanks to him

have a good day

cheers

no worries

thanks very much

yeah I'll text

Brad Hales

I was talking to him

bloody 20 minutes ago

in fact

so I will

I'll text him

and we'll get

an idea there

because yeah

when you buy dash cam

these days

it's not as easy to move

car to car

so

yeah

I will text Brad

we'll get a model

for him

and we'll work it out

so there you go

if you've got a question

get in touch folks

join the conversation

head to eftm.com

and click Ask Trev

love to have you on the show

get in touch anytime

Greg's on the line

good day Greg

good day Trev

mate

yeah mate

and good to talk to you

what can I do for you

we've been on the Central Coast

New South Wales

and

for the past five years

since we moved from Sydney

we've managed to get

the nine now

Sydney feet

no problem at all

yep

until last weekend

when suddenly we got

redirected to NBN

in Hunter Valley

now

that's a

fine TV station

but

it's very parochial

Hunter Valley

yes

and we

really would like to

broaden our horizon a bit

and it is

specifically your

local station

I mean I think from a

broadcast perspective

sure

that is your local station

have you got an antenna

or are you just using

the nine now

always

just nine now

I mean I think

if you had an antenna

you would primarily

just get

NBN

but a lot of people

on the Central Coast

depending on how far up

the Central Coast you are

but certainly

when I lived on the

peninsula

you would point your

antenna towards Sydney

because

that's

that's why you would

get the Sydney

coverage

and the day

you couldn't watch the

cricket if the

SCG wasn't a sell-out

and so

on the Central Coast

in Wollongong

you'd point your antennas

to Wollongong

and Newcastle

so that you could

get the cricket

so it could work

both ways

in reality

so what

have you done

anything to try

and problem solve

or get it back

yes I

wondered the settings

on the

LG Smart TV

and

hit location

and

it asked me

for a postcode

but I put

2000 in there

that didn't work

because it knows

where we are

interesting

so here's the thing

I had

an interesting problem

I can say a month ago

maybe three weeks ago

where I

because I religiously

watched the

six o'clock news

with Peter Overton

and I do it

through the night now

on my

high-sense TV

sitting in the dining

room

kind of while we're

chatting as a family

I just put the news on

my wife hates it

because she just does

but good luck to her

and Alicia Loxley

in Melbourne

I'm like what's going on here

and it happened again

and then

I was at work

here in the office

which is just down the road

from my home

and

I noticed the same thing

I was getting

the Melbourne news

on what's going on here

and I

because I

do have some contacts

at night

I said

what's the hell's going on

and all they said

was update your postcode

and if

that's a problem

contact the help desk

but it was interesting

I know you've done this

on the TV

on a computer

go to 9NOW

and click on

your profile

and

so you click on your name

and then you go my profile

and it says your name

your date of birth

and your postcode

and I changed that

because weirdly it was

set to 3000

now

I know why I did that

a couple of years ago

when they launched Hubble

I was testing

which news

you would get

and how and where

and all this kind of stuff

so I think I changed it there

so I changed it

to my actual postcode

and

it didn't instantly work

I needed to essentially

shut the TVs off

so

let's just say

the app was still loaded

but once I

reloaded the apps

it picked up the postcode

and it worked perfectly

so I'm wondering

if the LG TV

when you say

you went into settings

was it on the 9NOW app

or in the LG TV

LG TV

so I think

that is giving you

things like

targeted advertising

and stuff

from LG

for your postcode

but it's not telling 9NOW

where you are

so

try

logging on to a browser

go to 9NOW

go to your profile

change the postcode

and what I was told was

look

if you have any problems

because

mine was a legitimate problem

try the help desk

and there's

on the

I think the profile page

or somewhere like that

there's

an FAQ

and you'll probably find

at some point

they won't make it

very obvious

but there'll be

an e-mail address somewhere

for help

and if you e-mail them

and mate

here's what you can do

just don't tell them

the full truth

just say you live on the

northern beaches

you live on the northern

beaches

and you've set your postcode

correctly

and maybe they can

force your account

to be

in Sydney

what do you think

okay sounds good

the only confusing part

was that

we were getting here

for the last five years

from Sydney

and then suddenly on the weekend

I wonder whether or not

they actually did

a bit of an update

because it was the same

for me right

I think

your issue happened

at the same time

mine did

I think

it was using a different metric

and it might have been

the TV data

that I gave it

because when you

when you launch a TV

these days

I think LG

I did one the other day

you type in a postcode

and I think that's

so that it has

that information

for the streamers

but I don't know

that they were

sharing that information

correctly

so maybe they started

sharing that information

and that's where we all got

booted off

but hey let me know

how you go

alright

well thanks Trevor

good on you mate

no worries at all

thanks for getting in touch

thanks mate

cheers

good to hear from you

yeah it was

it was a funny one for me

because I was getting them

I know I like Tom Steinfeld

he's a good bloke

I did my first ever

television

story with Tom Steinfeld

when he was doing a

current affair

now he's the host

of the 6pm news in

in Melbourne

awesome

he's been to 60 minutes

he's been to today

so he's done everything

but yeah I didn't want to

watch Melbourne news

I was pretty keen to watch

it was around

it must be

3-4 weeks

because it was around

the Desi Freeman thing

I was getting that coverage

and I thought

that's not bad

I might actually watch this

it was about a week

after that happened

that I started getting

the change

so I wonder

if that's happened to

more people

and we'll find out

whether that

fixes Greg's problem

The EFTM podcast

thanks to Swan

Home Security to Connect

Detect and Protect

Alright thanks for listening

we'll do it all again

next week

next week I want to

try and talk to

Chris Lau from Laser

he's the boss of

Laser

the Aussie tech company

and he

published a piece

on LinkedIn

which I

pulled some quotes

from an EFTM

a week or so ago

about their commitment

to

safer

batteries

and for a very

small company

to make that commitment

I think is

quite remarkable

we might try and catch up

with Chris

next week

I'll actually be in Italy

but we'll get a show out

don't you worry

and then we'll be back

in town on the 14th

for yet another show

so lots to get through

of course

and if you want to be

part of the show

I'd love to hear from you

as always

so never hesitate

to get in touch

you know how to do it

EFTM.com

download the EFTM app

or just text me

0-4-7-6-5-7-6-5-7

This is the EFTM podcast

www.eftm.com

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