Home Computers on Sirius Stuff

Kudos to Dell on making it easy to add parts - Dimension 9200

Thu, 01 Nov 2007 11:11:11 -0700

I bought a Dell Dimension 9200 with a Quad Core processor. It hasn’t helped a lot but I’m reserving judgment on that until I get a second hard drive into the box. I’m suspecting that things are more I/O bound. Anyway, I didn’t want to pay what Dell wanted for a DVD R/W drive instead of a DVD drive so I got the box with just a DVD drive. I tried buying a DVD R/W drive at Target but the connections are wrong for my box.

Pointer to Reviews of Dell computers with Ubuntu Feisty Fawn preinstalled - XPS 410n, E1505n

Fri, 08 Jun 2007 06:06:06 -0700

I’ve been waiting for people to start getting and reviewing their Dell machines with Ubuntu before ordering mine. There’s a nice article on the Ubuntu Forums:Review of Dell XPS 410n with Ubuntu Feisty preinstalled. Also good coverage of the Dell E1505n laptop.

I’m not ready to convert my 4-year-old Inspiron laptop over to Ubuntu because of suspend/hibernate and wireless issues but it sounds better with more modern machines. Maybe if Dell or HP or Lenovo comes out with a backlit LED screen like Apple’s I’ll be ready to switch. Also liked the tips on wireless with Ubuntu here.

Running a Windows Partition in VMware

Fri, 18 May 2007 05:05:05 -0700

I’m still trying to figure out whether I’m going to try and keep running XP on my laptop or try to run XP under Ubuntu. Big problem with running Ubuntu is that hibernate does not work and I’ve spent several hours on it. Enough time that I’m not willing to spend more without confidence that the time will be well-spent.

I may just wait for Dell or someone else to come out with Ubuntu on their machines officially and then buy one of those. Hopefully WiFi and hibernate will work without the kind of work I’m having to do.

Linux Audio Players Compared

Sat, 05 May 2007 05:05:05 -0700

Really liked this article. Linux Audio Players, Tested and Graded. I’m working my way through the Linux equivalents of Windows apps. I’ve used iTunes under Windows because it would talk easily to my iPod.

I tried Rhythmbox but it was out immediately. I want to keep my songs on a network-attached storage drive. Basically, the SimpleShare is a hard drive with an ethernet port. I don’t expect it to be as vulnerable to attacks as Windows XP. I don’t have to punch holes in its firewall that might allow people to get control of my Linux box or my wife’s Mac. Rhythmbox wants import all my music to one local location. No.

Dell offering pre-installed Linux?

Tue, 24 Apr 2007 04:04:04 -0700

Was reading Deep Jive Interests about Dell’s Crowdsourcing More Than Hype: Tells Microsoft to “Suck It!”

I’ve spent some time the past 10 days or so putting Ubuntu 7.04 on 3 PCs, all of them dual-booting some flavor of Windows. Obviously there’s a lot of interest in doing this on Dell’s site but it’s not clear at all that Dell is going to reduce the price just because they don’t install Microsoft. I still don’t have hibernation working properly on my desktop - haven’t tried on the kids’ or my laptop yet - so I’m a lot more interested in paying the same price as a Windows box just to have hibernate and wireless work without a glitch.

Ouch! Apple gets it right on Vista

Tue, 06 Feb 2007 02:02:02 -0700

Yesterday, I referenced what it was like living with Vista

Today I ran across an [Apple ad](https://images.apple.com/movies/us/apple/getamac/apple-getamac-security_480x376.mov mocking Vista). Unfortunately, they pretty much got it right.

I’m hoping for an update that fixes this. Please, Microsoft?

Living with Vista

Mon, 05 Feb 2007 02:02:02 -0700

OK, I’ve had Windows Vista installed for 9 days now and my verdict is … it’s not worth upgrading. Vista is supposed to be more secure than XP but this manifests itself in really annoying ways. The screen flashes black and a box pops up that must be dealt with. That’d be great if it were only for important things but it happens all the time!

I’ve had it happen when I want to change the smallest system setting. I’ve had it happen while downloading files. C’mon, get out of my way.

Too many choices = problems

Wed, 31 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

I installed Vista on my home desktop machine on Friday. I’ve already been bitten twice by the new (off( button with Vista. I’m going to have to figure out how to change its default behavior.

I enjoy reading Joel Spolsky’s articles. In Choices = Headaches he talks about the problems with Vista:

Every time you want to leave your computer, you have to choose between nine, count them, nine options: two icons and seven menu items.

Keep your add-ons/extensions while upgrading Thunderbird

Sun, 28 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

I installed Vista on my home desktop machine. I say “installed” rather than upgraded because Microsoft’s installation routine refused to let me upgrade. I spent a couple of hours on trying to figure out how to get around that and, in the end, decided that I’d rather install FireFox, Acrobat Reader, iTunes and the other programs that I want or need.

It so happens that Thunderbird 2 beta 2 was released recently. I tried “nightlies” or alphas and it was a little too experimental for me. No lost mail but just some inconsistencies in how things worked. Fair enough, they’re alphas. And beta 1 had issues with message filters. So I dropped back to 1.5 In the meantime, I’ve started using IMAP and procmail and message filters are less important.

DRM = Digital Restrictions Management

Sun, 14 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

In their article Want an iPhone? Beware the iHandcuffs published today, the Times makes a number of good points. Probably the best one is:

As some wags have said, the initials D.R.M. should really stand for “Digital Restrictions Management.”

One of the reasons I’m reluctant to switch to an Apple computer is because of the apparent lack of alternatives on the Mac. I don’t use Microsoft’s software or formats for music, I use AudioGrabber to rip to MP3 format and then listen to those in iTunes.

Would you pay to have less crapware on your new Windows box?

Thu, 11 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

What’s crapware or craplets? Ars Technica says:

Just what are craplets? It’s a cute nickname for all of the software an OEM installs on your new Windows PC before it arrives on your doorstep.

In $60 to keep crapware off of a Windows PC? Ken Fisher talks about how much it OEMs - Original Equipment Manufacturers, like Dell or Hewlett-Packard - might want to sell you a machine that’s not loaded with limited and trial versions of software. Because people aren’t likely willing to pay anything extra, Microsoft can fume but not do anything about it.

Why buy Windows Vista Ultimate?

Tue, 09 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

Ars Technica has a write-up of some of the features available in yet-to-be-released Windows Vista Ultimate.

There’s 3 features and none of them sound very appealing.

In reverse order:

a Texas hold ’em game. Yeah, we know, this is extremely popular. We have it featured in the latest James Bond movie. But “Hold ‘Em may cost you time, but your money is safe because the chips are not real?” Pass.
BitLocker is kind of interesting. It encrypts your hard drive so it can’t be stolen. It also can’t be read by hacking tools or another operating system. Seems a lot more useful on laptops than desktop systems. Also makes it impossible for people to dual-boot with Linux and use their Vista files as they can now with XP.
DreamScene sounds distracting, to say the least. Instead of a still image, you’re able to set a video file as your background. A few people think that ice melting or wheat blowing would be interesting but most people think it would be annoying beyond belief. I’m in the latter camp: isn’t that the reason we hate the “punch the monkey” ads, because they’re on the edge of our vision but moving?

We’re hard-wired to treat movement on the edge of our vision as threatening - it might be a tiger about to leap on us. Or just another person with a club. Windows Vista Ultimate combines all the various features of Tablet Edition, Windows Media Center, etc. Hard to believe that it’s going to be needed on one machine. So I think sales will be tiny.

Better spam - junk mail - control in Thunderbird

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

On my work accounts, we’re using SpamAssassin. For personal mail, I’ve switched from Hotmail to gmail in part because Hotmail does a poor job of detecting spam.

Lately, I’ve been getting frustrated by the amount of spam that makes it past the spam detecting routines on the mail servers. I don’t really want to do something involved on my own system. So what to do?

Junk Mail Controls gives instructions on how to adjust the spam filter in Thunderbird so it’s more sensitive to spam. I’m hoping that this helps reduce spam while still avoiding false positives. I have to say that gmail and Thunderbird have been stellar on this, which is a good thing. I’d much rather get a few annoying spam messages than lose real mail into the spam hopper.

Message aging in Thunderbird mail client

Mon, 08 Jan 2007 01:01:01 -0700

I’ve (mostly) switched from Outlook to Thunderbird for mail. If you, like me, subscribe to a few mailing lists, you know it’s a pain dealing with them. If I don’t have time to read the issue from 6 months ago, it’s nice to have it just disappear. No stress trying to decide whether to do a quick scan or just do a bulk delete. Just delete them.

One of the features I’ve missed with Thunderbird was that ability to delete messages automatically. No stress. Well, unless you delete the wrong messages. But Thunderbird has good filters and so it’s easy to avoid that.

Snippy - neat tool for saving parts of images

Wed, 22 Nov 2006 11:11:11 -0700

Snippy is a neat tool for capturing parts of images. From the description:

How often have you carefully selected some text from a Web page and copied it to an email message? Snippy makes this a snap! Simply click on the little Snippy icon in the taskbar notification area, and mark out the region of the screen that you want to copy — that’s it, you’re done! The cut-out image will now be in your clipboard, and you can paste it in another application."

How to shrink images in Windows XP without additional tools.

Tue, 07 Nov 2006 11:11:11 -0700

This is an easy way to convert images (photos or pictures) in Windows XP using the paint.exe program from Microsoft itself.

It takes 3 steps per picture, so it’s not the fastest way to do this. But they’re really easy steps. But it also means that you don’t have to download any additional tools. That’s good if you’re concerned about viruses. Or maybe you’re using somebody else’s computer and you don’t want to download something onto their machine.

Nice article on using Google Notebook

Mon, 14 Aug 2006 08:08:08 -0700

Get Organized With Google Notebook is a nice article that talks about working with Google’s fairly new notebook.

I like the notebook more than I do Google’s calendar or Gmail. However, the problem for me is that Google is mixing together different types of services and trying to use one Google login for all of them. I don’t want to use one login for AdSense, AdWords, Gmail, etc., etc. so I’m faced with having to logout and log back in just to check stats or to make a note. Or run two browsers, one for personal use and another for business.

Mozy - great free online backup for XP

Sat, 03 Jun 2006 06:06:06 -0700

Found a reference to Mozy in PC Magazine. If you are looking to backup a small amount of files - 2GB or less - it’s absolutely free. Even at 20GB, it’s only $40/year. That’s much cheaper than the competition.

They do require you to get a weekly newsletter that I bet is full of ads. Don’t know, since I haven’t gotten one yet. But that seems less obtrusive than having ads every time you read mail.

Fitness Hacks for Geeks

Wed, 24 May 2006 05:05:05 -0700

Not quite sure how I ran across Fitness Hacks for Geeks but it’s a very nice article about some of the options for making it easier to exercise.

I’m lucky enough to live a few blocks away from Mt. Tabor Park. It’s notable for being the only extinct volcano within city limits in the US. It’s a bit silly to call it a mountain, given that the mountain blew up many thousands of years ago. But the little (I assume) that’s left still makes for a challenging walk or run.

Nice summary of online music options

Sun, 09 Apr 2006 04:04:04 -0700

TechCrunch has a nice summary of online music services.

I’ve been pretty happy with the Yahoo Music service. I’ve got boxes of CDs that I need to rip some day so I often find myself using the Yahoo service to listen to songs that I have already … somewhere in a box in the attic. Using a streaming service is perfect for me, since I have no intention of buying those songs at $.99/each.

Windows XP How to move your My Documents

Sat, 08 Apr 2006 04:04:04 -0700

I’ve been looking at re-arranging the partitions on my Sony VAIO desktop. They gave me a 15GB C: and a 100GB D: and even with installing everything I could to D:, it was still getting tighter and tighter. Looked at some fairly scary Linux-based partition shrinking software. Problem is that all of my partitions are NTFS, not the older FAT file system. Nothing (easy( and free that I could find would downsize D: and then increase C:

Microsoft, I don't want macros

Thu, 30 Mar 2006 03:03:03 -0700

I downloaded something written in Word for my wife, who’s a Mac user, and printed it for her. Now, every time I open Microsoft Word, I get an unintelligble message about

“The function you are attempting to run contains macros or content that requires macro language support. When this software was installed you (or your administrator) chose not to install support for macros or controls.”

OK. What function that I am trying to run? Where is it? Microsoft.com is totally unhelpful. In searching Google, I ran across a pretty good screech about Microsoft’s Scripting Addiction

Got XP? Download LSP-Fix now. Right now.

Tue, 18 Jan 2005 01:01:01 -0700

I was really pleased with myself. Not only have I been running AdAware and SpyBot - S&D on a regular basis but now I’d added Microsoft’s real-time anti-spyware to the mix in addition to running Norton. I’m locked down, right? So I downloaded a home page editor that looked good and didn’t pay too much attention to the agreement. Who does?

Then it wanted to update the toolbar it brought along with it. Looked at the agreement. “Oh, dear” as Maxine, my two-year-old would say. Track everything I do in IE and send that off? I don’t think so. Even though I almost never use IE any more. So OK, remove that sucker. Hmmm. Things are acting funny. Must be time for a reboot. Hmmm. This is weird. I can’t get out to the network. Haven’t touched the cable. But XP says we’re operating with reduced or no capacity. That’s OK, I’ll switch cables. After all Max or her younger sister Charlie might have damaged the cable.

Microsoft adds anti-spyware

Mon, 17 Jan 2005 01:01:01 -0700

Well, Microsoft had decided to do something about the bad publicity that they’re getting over peoples’ computers being hijacked by various things that IE downloads. So they’ve released their own anti-spyware program.

As usual, it’s got a gotcha: it not only requires you to let it look around by running an ActiveX control but you also have to type in your 25 digit validation key. In the picture they show, the sticker is neatly attached to the side of a tower case. In my world, the sticker is attached to the back of my Sony mini-tower. Or on the bottom of my Dell laptop. So I got to practice building up my short-term memory by remembering 5 digits at a time.

Preventing Malware and Spyware

Sun, 16 Jan 2005 22:11:33 -0700

Two programs that every Windows user needs on their machine:

Lavasoft’s AdAware Free for personal use and I’ve found it a little more updated on bad things people are trying to put on my computer.

Spybot - Search and Destroy Totally free and very good.

I like to run AdAware once every two weeks and Spybot once a month. They take a while to work, since they go through every file on your computer and all the entries in the registry. You can set them to work faster but I feel like thorough is better. Maybe if you ran them every day it’d be good to run them in smart mode.