Technology gets me down

Even a technophile can get dumped on by technology.
The mangled Windows 2000 partition on my eMachines Desktop is still mangled after almost 3 weeks (okay, I was on vaction for one of those weeks).
Now the combination CD/DVD writer on the aforementioned Desktop machine has been playing up. I can write to CDs, but re-writeable CDs and DVDs gives me weird burn errors.
Now that's something else that needs to be fixed...

Dumb Palm flies smarter

On a recent flight to Miami while I was blogging (off-line of course) into my Sony NX60, it hit me. If I had the current handheld of my dreams, the Palm Treo 650, I wouldn't be able to use it during the flight, at least with the current FAA regulations. That is of course because the Treo 650 is also a cellphone. That's something to keep in mind when buying a Palm Smartphone...

So long DSL...

Well, I really needed to get online this evening to take care of some last-minute finances before heading off on vacation. Of course when I needed it most, the DSL service was not working. I had reset the modem, rebooted the computer, switched the modem off for 45 seconds, but it still wasn't working. This was the last straw. I had been putting up with the speed getting slower and slower until it was only double or triple dial-up speed. Today I had planned to cancel Cable Internet service and switch to DSL. Instead I hooked up my main Desktop PC and was online in a reboot, speed somewhere above 3500 Kbps - yesterday DSL was down to less than 200 Kbps. Thank the Lord still I was still within the 30-day trial period, so I phoned them up to cancel. Understandably they wanted to dissuade me - could they transfer me to tech support? No, I was finding it difficult to be civil, I wanted to cancel. Apparently un-installing and re-installing the software would solve my problem. I was adamant and canceled the DSL service. It was quite a relief actually. After the relatively trouble-free cable internet service with fairly constant line speed, DSL just didn't cut it.
The free MSN Premium (soon to be switched to Yahoo Premium) and wireless access in New York City were non-essential perks.

Well, I've tried DSL, but the old adage seems to apply: "You get what you pay for".

A cheap Mac

According to ExtremeTech, in an article "The Mac Mini: Less Than You Think" the Mac Mini is not a cheap Macintosh. The premium on the prices of Apple Macs is for the cool factor, I guess. As for the iPod, that's ultra-cool.

Partitions Mangled

I feel so bright. Not satisfied with having my eMachines Desktop dual-booting between Windows XP and Windows 2000 Professional, I decided to add an extra instance of Windows XP as well.
Partition Magic 8 made it a breeze to create the extra partition between Windows XP (the first partition) and Windows 2000 (the second partition).

Unfortunately when the Windows XP setup rebooted the first time during the setup, I got this error message:

Windows could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt.
Windows root\system32\hal.dll.
Please re-install a copy of the above file

Fortunately for the Partition Magic bootable rescue disks, which let me set the Windows XP partition active again, and boot into it..

An Internet search found numerous solutions for this, even a blog. I didn't get far with the solutions, and decided to leave it for later.

Then I though I'd check that my Windows 2000 partition was still working. It wasn't, so I moved the windows 2000 partition back (forward?) so it was the second partition on the hard disk, where it had been before.

Then it gave this error message:

Windows 2000 could not start because the following file is missing or corrupt:
\(Windows 2000)\System32\Ntoskrnl.exe

Okay, now I'm going to have to fix this one first...

Trojan Exploits Windows DRM

According to InternetNews.com, Anti-Virus and security vendor Panda Labs is reporting the discovery of a threat that takes advantage of Windows Digital Rights Management (DRM).

Microsoft Abandons Passport

According to Speed Guide, Microsoft is abandoning Microsoft Passport, one of its most controversial attempts to dominate the Internet.

Microsoft Offers Virus-Removal Program

From My Way News: a Microsoft executive confirmed the company's plans to sell its own antivirus software, which would compete against programs from McAfee, Symantec and others.

DSL working

I finally got DSL working on my old Desktop PC. I needed a longer CAT-5 UTP (Unshielded Twisted-Pair) cable which bought from RadioShack. Apparently DSL won't worked with "Patch Cables" - which works with Cable. I also had to change the static IP address that I had assigned to the machine in Windows XP Networking

DSL for the New Year

For the New Year I'm trying DSL, or at least trying to try DSL. For a total of 4 hours over 2 successive nights the furthest I've got is installing the DSL software and setting up the account. That may sound good, but it took less than an hour to set up my Cable modem connection the first time.

So, if I have cable internet (fast cable internet I might add), why am I bothering with DSL?. Simple Economics: The DSL should save me over $100 per year.
I have 30 days to decide whether to keep the DSL. So far the prognosis is not good. Unless it goes smoother I'll be returning the DSL package...

Less Spam?

AOL Reports Drop in Spam Messages.
Good advertising for AOL - join AOL, get less spam?

Top 10 List

Well, here's my top 10 list of Tech products for 2004, in no particular order. I'll limit this list to products I've actually used or own - how can I put the Palm Treo 650 on my top 10 list (as much as I'd like to) if I don't have one?):

Mozilla Firefox 1.0 browser

Fedora Core 3 Linux

BackupMan PalmOS Backup software

StumbleUpon downloadable toolbar - channel-surfing web-style.

Google Mail - Free 1 GB - say no more!

Windows Ultimate Boot CD and Bart Preinstalled Environment (BartPE)

Scite4AutoIt3 - freeware editor for AutoIT scripting language downloadable here

Xandros Desktop OS Version 2 OS Open Circulation Edition, a free version of their excellent Desktop linux

Microsoft Virtual PC 2004 - yes, I know it's a Microsoft product, but it's still pretty neat.

Motorola V600 quad-band GSM phone. Although it's not really a smartphone, it has excellent reception, and some really cool games.

Linux has fewer flaws

From ZDNet: Research finds Linux has fewer flaws.

The Linux operating system has many times fewer bugs than typical commercial software, according to an upcoming report. Read the complete story.

Fedora re-installed

Well, I re-installed Fedora Core Linux. This time I did a Custom install, and excluded Open Office which takes up a lot of space. After that the updates went through without a hitch.

Fedora Core gone

As I thought, Partition Magic would not let me resize the Linux ext2 partition. I took one look at the Linux command line tool for resizing partitions, GNU Parted, and decided that deleting the partition and reinstalling Fedora Core 3 Linux would be my best option. Then Partition Magic gave an error when I tried to delete the Linux partition Error 510: "The version of the file system is not supported". Great. The Partition Magic support site says:
"Norton PartitionMagic 8.0 and PartitionMagic 8.0 may not work with Linux Ext3 partitions when the dir_index file system attribute is enabled. Recent Linux releases from Red Hat and Fedora set the dir_index file system attribute by default. To prevent the error, disable the dir_index attribute, perform the partition modification, then re-enable the attribute.
To disable the dir_index attribute
1. Boot into Linux single-user mode."

Okay, now I first had to figure out how to "Boot into Linux single-user mode"
A quick web search picked up the answer "How To Boot Linux (Red Hat Fedora) Into Single User Mode Using Grub".

A few minutes later the linux partition was gone - I had to re-format it in Partition Magic before I could delete it, but it worked.

Now I need to reinstall Fedora Core 3 Linux.

What would Windows do?

That's what I wonder: What would Windows do if I tried to run some major updates and I didn't have enough disk space? This is all in defense of Linux of course. The Fedora Core 3 Linux I installed on Saturday gave a lot of confusing error messages when I tried to apply 63 updates. It didn't take too long to figure out that it had run out of space. I wish it had warned me beforehand, like Windows (hopefully) would have done. I since its space on a partition that it ran out of, it can be fixed - my Linux knowledge isn't enough to quickly figure out how to move some Mount Points, which would solve the problem. Instead I'll first try to increase the size of the Linux partition using Partition Magic, but I suspect that Linux might object to that. If that doesn't work, its a case of increasing the size of the Linux partition from 3 GB to around 4GB (once again with Partition Magic), clearing it and reinstalling Fedora Core 3 Linux. Its time-consuming - but since its not my primary machine I can do it in the background.
For anyone who really likes multitasking, I would highly recommend running two (or more) Desktop computers with a KVM switch - I was able to check e-mail and update this Blog on my newer machine while installing Linux on the older one.

Fedora Core 3 Installed

Well, Fedora Core 3 is installed (and saying that there are 63 updates available). Let's just hope my Windows XP still boots!

Just call me...

A sucker for new technologies.

I'm just starting to install of (Redhat) Fedora Core 3 linux on my old PC...

Almost bought a Mini Mouse

I almost bought a Mini Mouse, sight unseen. That would have been a big mistake. Have you ever seen any of those mini mice? (hey, obviously I'm not talking about Mickey's main squeeze here). Fortunately I decided to go to a real store and check them out. Some of the mini mice looked like they would be more at home on a keying. A good compromise seems to be a "Notebook mouse", which is about two-thirds the size of a normal desktop mouse. An optical mouse was a must have - maybe because it's the in thing - I've still got an old mechanical mouse at home, and it works fine. Being wireless as well was a nice-to-have, especially when I saw the prices - I don't expect to use my Notebook that much to justify a wireless mouse.

Back in the USA

Well, after 2 weeks of rushing around in sunny SA, it's back to sunny but chilly New York.
Apart from the temperatures, the prices of technology are a lot lower here. At a computer chain store - The Incredible Connection - I saw the PalmOne Zire 72 on Sale for R2500 (about US$ 440! - normal price in the US is about $299!) The Treo 600 costs over $1000, the average DVD movie costs between $30 and $40; and Windows XP Pro costs around $590. But apart from technology and cars, lots of other things are cheaper in South Africa...