![[SimGuy.net]](/shared/logo.png){kind=logo}
February 2004 Archive
Sunday, February 22, 2004
[Comments: 0] 3:08 PM - multiple-guess-testing
Apparently that floppy wasn't the problem. Now we're thinking it might be the RAM timings. I'll have to find myself some other memory or tweak the timing settings.
Saturday, February 21, 2004
[Comments: 0] 4:09 AM - can-never-have-too-much-hardware
I picked up this all-in-one sort of motherboard that my friend Ed referred me to for a grand total of $15 after shipping costs. Without shipping, the hefty rebate brings the thing down to $5. (The board is no longer available for purchase, but the link provides its archived listing with specifications.)
This $5 board has (basic quality) on-board lan, audio, and video. It also has a Via CPU soldered onto the board. This makes upgrading very unlikely, but it seems to be a pretty nice package.
In the meantime, I picked up a Pentium II machine from another friend of mine, and I decided to take the case for that machine and use it for my new motherboard. I'm still not certain what I'll do with the displaced parts.
For now I'm borrowing an extra hard drive and some RAM my roommate had kicking around, but those should be returned before too long. I have a 20 GB drive I'll grad from home over spring break, and RAM pricing's decent lately, so I should be able to pick up 256 or so without too much trauma. :)
The big ordeal was that the power supply appeared to be inadequate, so I upgraded the supply on my main box and replaced the one in the other case with my old supply. This was all well and good, but suddenly the computer picked up this nasty habbit of turning off randomly, for no obvious reason.
After several hours of troubleshooting and resuming my Gentoo install at least 15 times, I started to try to figure out which devices were causing the random shutdown. My roommate had suggested a short might cause the problem, so I started to unplug devices. At one point I thought the board was dead, but it must have just gotten annoyed with me.
After resetting the BIOS settings, I plugged things back in one by one hoping to pinpoint the failure. Eureka! The floppy drive started smoking! I have a good feeling that the floppy is probably the culprit because the machine's been running under load for a while now and it's still powered on.
Hopefully it will stay that way, but now I've got to find a new floppy drive.
The end result, some extra Pentium II PC parts, a few broken pieces of hardware, and a fully functional computer for a final estimated cost of about $100 to $125. Cool.
Saturday, February 7, 2004
[Comments: 4] 3:15 AM - some-people-should-not-be-allowed-to-speak
Lots of people talk to me online every day. I manage a hosting network, and chat room, and a student-run TV station, among other things.
If I don't talk to you, there are several plausable explanations:
1) I am not here or I am not using my computer.
This is something people clearly have no concept of. I see people that repeatedly, every 5-10 minutes say my name. They never tell me what they want. They don't leave a message I can answer later. They just repeatedly tell me what my first name is. I'll never understand the point of this exercise.
Furthermore, saying my name in a capital letters may be the equivalent of shouting in chat, but it does not make your message louder, only more annoying. The chances of my answering you go down each time you do this.
2) I am busy or otherwise unable to response immediately.
This tends to result in people deciding that since I'm not idle, I must be waiting poised to respond instantly to any messages I receive. If you leave me a message when I'm not idle and I don't answer, I might be doing something else. It is possible that I can't even access the IM window your message is in.
If you flood me with messages, as many are apt to do, you'll quickly find your way to my block list... or, if I have immediate access to my IM client when you're flooding and I'm too busy to think about it, I might simply quit my IM client. You don't want that, because I'm going to discard whatever you said to me and forget about it completely.
3) You annoy me and I don't feel like dealing with whatever nonsense you intend to spout.
If you happen to annoy me regularly, I may not answer you. Not only will I lie and tell you I was simply busy or away, but I'll close the window a lot and I won't get back to you.
Best ways to ensure I ignore you often and with pleasure:
a) Spell as much as you can incorrectly, consistently, as if you think whatever you're writing is right. Internet lingo doesn't bother me, but obnoxious abbreviations that don't even look like words fit here. Use "summat" to mean "something" or abbreviate more than half the words in a sentence. Don't pay attention to the meaning of the word "ironic" and use it improperly at every opportunity. Ignore the extremely significant differences between "your" and "you're," as well as "there," "their," and "they're." Use them interchangeably. You will make me cry.
b) Ask me dumb questions, like "are you there" every time before you say something. Say "Hi" more than anything else, and don't ever tell me what you want. Sign off every time you ask a question for ten minutes and then sign back on and ask the question again.
c) Message me on several different chat networks with the same message. Repeat until you get bored. Have other people tell me that you want to talk to me. I really need to hear from someone else that you want to talk to me when you're talking to me already.
d) Definitely order me around. Tell me what I am obligated to do. Don't tell me why. Threaten to sue me if I don't cooperate. That will go over well.
If people were a little less inept at having conversations, I might talk to them more often. I love to chat with people, but you've got to be someone I can stand talking to. Take this as a lesson and shape up.
