Toshiba Tecra S11

We recently replaced our old portable Lenovo ThinkPad T61 by the Toshiba Tecra S11, Intel® Core™ i5 M520, 2,40GHz, 4GB Ram.
Although this new one is certainly not the best device available, as can be read in this technical review, it has some nice new features like a finger print reader, SmartCard reader, webcam, DisplayPort and a larger HDD (320GB).

Drivers

When we received the laptop, not all drivers were installed correctly. Additional drivers can be download and should be installed in the provided order:

• TOSHIBA Assist


• TOSHIBA Extended Tiles for Windows Mobility Center, Windows Mobility Center can be opened in Windows 7 using the shortcut key Win+X


• Infineon Trusted Platform Module Software


• Intel Chipset SW Installation Utility


• Intel Management Engine Interface


• Active Management Technology (AMT)


• Display Driver, switch between displays in Windows 7 using the shortcut key Win+P


• Intel Storage Driver


• TOSHIBA Value Added Package


• Realtek Audio Driver


• NVIDIA HD Audio Driver 1.0.2.0


• LAN Driver Intel


• LAN Realtek


• ALPS Pointing Device Driver Touch Pad


• Ricoh Card Reader


• O2Micro Smart Card Reader Driver 1.1.4.207G


• TOSHIBA Software Modem


• TOSHIBA Software Modem Region Select Utility


• Wireless LAN Driver


• ConfigFree


• TOSHIBA Network Device ID Registry Setting Tool


• TOSHIBA 180 Degrees Rotation Utility


• TOSHIBA Fingerprint Utility


• TOSHIBA Face Recognition slows down Windows logon and not very effective


• Bluetooth Stack for Windows by Toshiba


• Bluetooth Monitor


• TOSHIBA eco Utility 1.1.12.64


• TOSHIBA HDD/SSD Alert 3.1.64.4


• TOSHIBA HDD Protection 2.2.0.3


• TOSHIBA Service Station V2.1.40


• TOSHIBA PC Health Monitor 1.5.1.64


• PlayReady PC Runtime


• TOSHIBA USB Sleep and Charge Utility 1.3.2.0 allows charging (power) external devices over USB, even while the pc is in sleep or hibernate mode


• TOSHIBA Web Camera Application V1.1.2.6


• BIOS Upgrade


• ReelTime


• Rapid Storage Technology Driver


• Registry Patch


• Security Assist


• Service Station


• TEMPRO


• Turbo Boost Technology


• Wireless Manager

Toshiba official software download site: http://aps2.toshiba-tro.de/, 64 bit drivers

Extras

• The build-in SmartCard reader can be used to read the Belgian eID cards, and thus also to login on the Tax-On-Web pages. After installation of the SmartCard driver (see above) and a reboot, install the eID software and reboot again.


• AutoSensitivity allows you to define different mouse sensitivities (speeds) for your touchpad and mouse and automatically switch between them (based on mouse connect / disconnect). This can be useful since the touchpad on this Toshiba is rather slow.


• Windows Explorer extentions

Update 22/05/2012: As I moved to Windows 64 bit, I added the link to download 64 bit drivers.

Personal expense sheet

With the formula I presented in my previous blogpost on Excel look-ups I created an Excel sheet to monitor my personal expenses.
It is based on the data I extract from my different online banking systems (currently for the Belgian banks Argenta, Landbouwkrediet and KBC).

In the 'Categories' sheet, different keywords linked to the category name need to be filled in, this could be the name of a company or the account number. The keyword will be looked up in the account and comment of each transaction. And this will make it possible to automatically categorize each bank transaction and automate some analysis/summary overview on the transactions.

Every now and then, I copy the data from the online banking system into the 'data' Excel sheets. All expenses are categorized automatically with my formula in the column 'Auto Type', but if some exceptional category needs to be assigned, a 'Manual Type' column can be set to override the 'Auto Type'. Based on these categories, I created some sheets with an summary overview for each month and some averages per month and per year. This way, I can get a clean overview on our expenses and incomes and keep a copy of our banking data offline as well (since many banks only keep last 2 years online).

Based on my personal sheet I created this empty (dutch) template sheet, but it will still need some custom changes to be usable for someone else. But it could be a nice starting point.

House mortgage calculator – Excel template (Flemish)

Since we recently bought a new house, I spent some time to be able to calculate the best construction for our house credit / loan / mortgage. I tried to list all costs in an Excel sheet, combined with our earnings, to get a clear global picture on what we will have to pay. Based on these calculations, I extracted an Excel template that could be used by anyone. The costs taken into account are quite specific for Belgium (Flanders) and for our case but I suppose the sheet could be used as a start for others (let me know if this is the case)…

When using this template, some data will have to be filled in, before the calculated results will be meaningful. The fields that can be filled in/changed/selected manually, are marked in the following style: 

The most important fields to fill in at start are: price, cadastral income, savings, average pay, average outlay, interest rate of the banks, etc within the ‘kosten’ sheet. Within the ‘interesten’ sheet only at the top some fields should be filled up to denote how you would like to calculate a split loan (to benefit most of the fiscal revenue). Again the same format style is used to denote these fields should be filled in. The other fields are locked on the sheet (although they can easily be unlocked without a password).

Once the basic numbers are filled in, one can start to play with the list boxes to easily compare different constructions (split loan, fixed capital payment, years, banks, etc). One can now change the control to show how much will have to be paid and gained in the selected year. This way, you can easily check if you will be able to pay all costs and still save some money.The template can be downloaded here.

The site rentevoet.be has also made a nice excel to calculate different loan payments, besides some other calculators.

Some interesting links I used to make all calculations:

• renteopdevoet.be
• Berekening hypotheeklening
• Fiscale voordelen van de woonlening
• Verzekering gewaarborgd wonen
• Simulator woonkrediet
• Tips om te besparen op woonkrediet
• Fiscale wetgeving
• FAQ Federale Belastingsadministratie: Woning kopen
• Bereken fiscaal optimale lening
• Hoeveel kost mijn huis: rekenmodules
• DefA’s woonkrediet rekenmodule
• 10 beginnersfouten bij het kopen van een huis

Update 08/10/09: extra info link

Update 05/01/10: new template download link

Update 03/12/10: link to renteopdevoet.be