Colin P.

OVH has a reputation among computer programmers as the cheapest place to rent a VPS server, usually for website hosting. They do have high bandwidth machines for the lowest price. If you are not a programmer you can purchase product support too. So far so good.

However, their marketing website frequently mentions "easy to cancel." Another paragraph states "just stop paying your bill and we will reclaim your server."

I signed up. Their service didn't work out for me. It doesn't matter why. When I tried to cancel they said I owed them $480 USA dollars because I had signed a 2 year contract.

Perhaps I missed some fine print. These are internet snakes. Their actions soil and tarnish the proud history of the French speaking peoples. There are better choices.

Finally: never ever sign up for any recurring charge by filling out a form. Always (always always always) call a sales person on a phone and speak to them in person.

I have a Roku model 1. I still use it, even though I recently bought an updated Roku 4. The Roku 4 does offer more streaming options than the first one. The search interfaces on both are clunky but usable. That's not the problem.

The Roku 4 has too much electronics packed into a tight, not ventilated plastic container. It gets hot and freezes up. To use it at all I had to pull the power plug and reboot it almost every time I turned on the TV. The older Roku 1 works without trouble.

I tried proping the Roku 4 up on home made wooden legs to keep it cooler. That helped a little but not much. My return period had past so I had no choice. I drilled many holes in the plastic case to ventilate it better. That helped too. It doesn't freeze up as often now. But it still does. Don't buy Roku 4.

I purchased a digital download file from the learnable site a while back, using a link that looked to me like I was making a one-time-only fee for the information I downloaded. Hidden in their proposal text was language I did not see, that said I would also be receiving a "trial subscription" of some sort. That spurious and unwanted subscription, it turns out, would be free for a month. If I did not log back in and discontinue it I would then be charged $15 USA dollars a month. All subsequent emails from learnable went into my Spam folder. So a half a year later I noticed my credit card had been billed for a lot of money. Learnable refused to refund my money. I complained bitterly and finally got a pompous product support person to refund half the amount. Be careful. They'll relieve you from as much of your money as they can. Any way they can, apparently.

I bought a Camranger device for remote control of my Nikon D7000 DSLR, from my Android cell phone. The best I can say is "it works, sort of."

My goal was to mount my camera on a tripod close to a well known bird perch, and then to take closeups of the bird when it arrives. But the app continually loses wireless connection to the camera, even when I'm hidden only 30' feet away. Even when I'm lucky enough to have a connection when a bird finally arrives it takes 2-3 seconds for the app to successfully tell the camera to click the shutter. But by that time the bird is usually gone. I've made some good photos but it's not worth the hassle. I do better with a portable blind and a manual shutter release device connected to a cable.

Are you a macro photographer interested in focus stacking? I wrote a positive review of ZereneStacker focus stacking software. I use that software in conjunction with a StackShot focusing rail. I am very pleased with both.

Stackshot works seamlessly with ZereneStacker. If you have a good studio lighting setup you can make microscope like blow ups of insects, jewelry and/or electronic equipment where everything from the foreground to background is in crystal sharp focus. I bought a fair amount of other software along the way I've since discarded. It took me 3 or 4 years to learn how to do this. StackShot and Zerene are what work best for me. They also have good tutorial resources that could have made my journey shorter and easier. They get my highest rating.

I have no connection. I have made at least one very negative review of another product. So perhaps that helps with credibility.

Are you a Macro photographer? Focus stacking is the latest new buzz topic. There are two parts to the process 1) make multiple exposures and 2) use software to combine only the sharpest pixels into one image. ZereneStacker runs on all platforms and it works. I spent more money on another system that does not work as well. Zerene maintains an active question and answer forum at http://www.photomacrography.net/ I'm asscocated with Zerene in any way. I'm a grateful customer.