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Buying a new power supply: Antec
Most reviews really like the Antec (Tom’s Hardware love the True 480). These power supplies are big BTW, for the traditional AT or PS/2 size cabinets, so they won’t work in mini-PCs like the shuttle. The big bruiser is the True550. Guess which one I want đ Here’s a good review that covers most of…
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asus a7n8x random reboots: could it be the power supply?
Hmmm. Connie’s machine is now in a strange state. Seems to randomly reboot and now it hangs on IDE detection. I’ve turned off all the overclocking, but basically, it gets blown back to the power up. As if the reset button were pushed. I noticed that if I have the reset jumper in, the machine…
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Voip and Wifi
IMHO, the next big change is coming. A couple of clips from wifiplanet: * “Wifi Phones and Dual-mode”:http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/voip/article.php/3287901. Atmel’s AT76C901 is a single chip wifi phone. Several manufacturers, including Cisco (Quote, Chart), have developed handsets using the chip. The Cisco phone, which the networking giant announced in April, is shipping now. The first dual-mode phones…
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Will someone become the Wifi Test Center?
Hey I’m begging someone to be the wifi test results center. I’m amazed at how few standard test results there are. In contrast to the many sites doing PC testing. I’ve only found one C|net test ever done that does range testing. And, the folks at wifi-planet.com do a great job, but it isn’t indexed…
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Why is Windows XP Startup So Slow
Well, I have an old laptop. a Compaq Evo400n, running an 850 MHz Pentium III, I’m really curious why it takes 2 minutes for the thing to boot up. First I defragged the hard disk. (Using O&O Defrag), then I started removing startup junk. It’s amazing what people are throwing into the startup system these…
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Super G Wireless compared: D-link vs. Netgear
AGainst my better judgement, I’m going to try one of these out. D-link has actually been OK for me, but Adrian has had terrible experiences. OTOH, I have a 24-port D-link switch at home and it seems fine. It does have nasty interference problems because of Super-G, but what the heck, give it a try.…
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New Computer Recommendations: February 2004
Well, we’re getting closer to a big architectural shift. In 2H04, there will be a new pinout for processors from Intel (over 700 pins), a move to a new bus (called PCI Express). Intel’s Prescott has shipped, so their costs have gone way down (going from 130nm process to 90nm means its much cheaper), so…
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Researching and Searching within Office
“Office 2003 Research Pane”:http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dno2k3ta/html/odc_customizingtheresearchpane.asp. John Ludwig points out there is this new research pane. Wow, talk about not going through a product. I had no idea it had this. Need to figure it out. One of the problem with hidden menus, is well things are hidden, you choose Tools and Research. Apparently, this is one…
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Alias Reruns
“Know Buddy”:http://knowbuddy.dyndns.org:81/torrent/index.cgi. ok, i admit it since I’ve been flat on my back, I’ve been watching this mindless show. Connie can’t understand why I like it. Maybe because its the same show over and over. Anyway, here’s a spot that has Season 3 on it. I’ve l already gone through Seasons 1 and 2 via…
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Outlook 2003 and Blackberry Update
Blackberry now happy with Outlook 2003. Ludwig explains why the sync problems with Outlook 2003 have been happening to me. Need to download
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Rubik Cube Solver
“Lego Cube Solver”:http://jpbrown.i8.com/cubesolver.html. Alex and Calvin got a Rubik cube, now there’s a way to build a Lego solver of the Rubik cube. HOw amazing. “Rubik’s Cube”:http://www.rubikscube.com/cubesolutionother.html. Here’s a cornucopia of solutions. Good to learn.
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19" LCD Final Decisions
I’ve been looking through the conflicting reviews again on X-bit and Tom’s Hardware. Here’s my short list of displays to look at: * Acer AL1911 or Benq FP992. These are the same displays really. Decent quality. Now just $550 at Newegg. The Benq is slightly ahead as it has DVI and analog inputs. Unfortunately, it…
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Remote Desktop Connection on Windows XP
This must be one of the most hidden features in XP. Right now I’m on an incredibly slow laptop. But, there is a utility inside Windows called Remoted Desktop Connection, so I’m on a terminal session to my fast desktop in the other room. An amazing security hole, but also an incredibly cool feature. Another…
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Panasonic Fax Film Roll KX-FA53 and FX-FA55 Fax Film Ribbons
Can’t believe I forgot to Blog where I got this. We have an el cheapo Panasonic Fax machine. Takes carbon paper (remember that stuff) rolls. I’m lying in bed with a bum knee, so time to buy one: * “Aimlower”:http://www.aimlower.com/best/price/OpID_mpbr/mTRN_TRN20030726212617994002248/sfx_6484/bot.htm. I’ve not heard of this price comparison site before, but in any case, they have…
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Ogg and Opera for the mac
Always looking to duplicate environments. now I need Ogg Vorbis and Xvid on the mac so that I can watch all those .OGM movies I’ve made. here’s the first step: * “Oggdrop”:http://www.nouturn.com/oggdrop/. Ogg Vorbis for the mac. * “Opera”:http://opera.com for the Mac as well. now this needs java, so I’ll need that too! Ogg players.…
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Prescott is here!
“Tom’s hardware”:http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20040201/. It’s here. February 2, brings the next salvo in the processor wars, the new 90nm Prescott from Intel. The amazing result is that it isn’t faster than the current Northwood Pentium IVs. That’s interesting given they have twice the cache (1MB) and also are 90nm vs. 130nm chips. They’ll be much cheaper to…
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Wifi Networking Guide
Well, now that 802.11g is out, it seems like a good time to figure out what Wifi network I’d buy. Will be nice to get a network up. Or course, the decisions aren’t easy, because as usual, although we have 802.11g, everyone is in the business of doing proprietary extensions that either interfere, cause interoperability…
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Polar Power s720i output meter is broken…
Darn it, I like the monitor, but thing has mysteriously died. I get heart rate and speed, but I don’t get cadence or power anymore. Sent a note to the folks at Polar and they think: _If the Power sensor shows green light, then cadence should work. Have you chosen the cadence ON (also power)…
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Diet K lives
“Diet K”:http://www.dietk.com/. Now that Kazaa lite has been hammered by Kazaa, Diet K seems like the new replacement. Like Kazaa lite, it removes the spyware. Get it now before it disappears. I’ve also tried E-mule. Smarter protocol, but doesn’t have nearly as much content it seems.
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Printing directly to a CD or DVD
“Tom’s Hardware”:http://www.tomshardware.com/howto/20040127/index.html. Given that doing the label and then affixing it to a CD and DVD is a pain, maybe the better way is to print directly to the CD. The Epson R800 and a couple of other models do this. Could be the tipping point for me in buying one of these. Here’s what…
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Captcha: Telling humans apart from machines
“Captcha”:http://www.captcha.net/. Bill Gate mentioned this in his Davos talk, but the idea is that if you don’t want spam send something back which computational hard for a machine, but easy for a person. Here is the CMU version of this. Ticketmaster uses this as does quite a few bulletin boards and some other places. He’s…
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Interesting Trends: Knoppix, USB Flash, OceanStore and RDF
Interesting to see how two trends could make the PC quite different from what we know it. Beside Google, “Citeseer”:http://citeseer.nj.nec.com/cs is an incredibly useful way to find related academic documents. Give it a try. # “Knoppix”:http://www.knoppix.org/ . Now that modern BIOS let you boot from just about anything. Not just a floppy, but really anything,…
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Photo Printers: January Update…
OK, based on a couple of reviews at popphoto.com and also photo-i.co.uk, here’s a list of printers to consider at the top end: * Epson 2200. $600 street. The grand daddy anmd most folks still love it. * Epson Stylus “R800”:http://www.photo-i.co.uk/Reviews/interactive/Epson%20R800/. $400 street. Brand new, has 8 inks. Can also print directly to DVDs/CDs. Some…
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HP Printer Cartridges…
We have an old HP Deskjet 970Cse. Printer cartridges are amazingly expensive at $25 for large black (45A) and $50 for large color (78). “Omnipro”: http://store.omni-biz.com/. Trying a place that sells remanfactured cartridges for $10 and $15 respectively a pop. A little bit of a risk, but interested to see what the quality is like.…
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Opera Browser
Been using this browser called Opera. Pretty nice. Very fast. Also allows multiple subpages in the same browser and it restarts from where you left off. Very convenient for us shoppers who close the browser and then want to get back to where we came from. Also has a nice mail browser. Best thing about…
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What is MyTues, QTFairUse and Audio Hijack?
Chaosmint :: QTFairUse, MyTunes, and Protected AAC Explained. I’ve been using itunes for a litle bit on the Mac. Because it does such a good end-user job, its hard to see what’s really going on underneath. Great notes from Chaosmint about what is really happening: * File Formats. There are unencrypted formats MP3 and M4A…
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Entourage Problems
I’ve been using Mac OS X for a while now. Finally getting used to it. Main issue is that Entourage seems very slow and also seems to crash. * “Entourage Unexpected Quits”:http://www.macfixitforums.com/php/showflat.php?Cat=&Board=OfficeX&Number=370362&page=19&view=collapsed&sb=1&o=&fpart=1. Another in a series of great errors messages. Have this with both Entourage and Ecto (a offline blog editor). Seems like the equivalent…
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Popular Photography Buying Guide
Popular Photography Magazine Buying Guide. A good review of things photographic. I’ve used it to get a quick overview of at least good products. The printer review is particularly good. As is the digital SLR review. Here are some notes. First, all the printers they thought were pretty good. Epson used to be way ahead,…
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Command prompt at the toolbar
a little ludwig goes a long way: Command Prompt Explorer Bar. Nice find from Ludwig, command promots on the explorer bar. I use command line stuff all the time.
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Ghost Recon
Ghost Recon Jungle Storm. Got Ghost Recon as part of my video card bundle. Wow, how much these tactical first person games are using the machines. Amazing how graphics and so forth. Its an old game, but here are some links to folks modding it: * “Walkthroughs”:http://www.ghostrecon.net/html/recon.htm#wt. A detailed walkthrough of all the missions. Missions…