Tag Archives: Windows

Grrr. Hard Disk Failure

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Came home this afternoon, and my Windows Vista system was sitting on a screen everyone loves to see. No, not the BSOD, but rather the boot disk failure screen. Yippie.

After a few reboots, the system came back online for a while. Though I did notice an odd sound coming from the system. Upon further inspection, I was able to narrow it down to one of two hard disks. And about that time, the system crashed again. Grrr.

Disconnected the FUBAR disk, disabled the RAID in the BIOS, and now Windows has been reinstalled and is downloading the available updates. I reckon a 2x 500GB setup was a bit overkill for a system that did nothing more than sit and run Folding@Home. I do have to hand it to Microsoft, Windows Vista does feel like it installs much faster than XP. Granted, it’s been ages since I’ve done a full install of XP.

New System

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So, it’s been an incredibly long time since I last built a PC, or really done any kind of hardware work. Heck, where I work we have to wait 2-5 days for a union electrician to come and install a new HDD in a removable rack, and if we try to do the two minute job we’d get a grievance filed on us. It sucks, but thankfully I spend my days stuck inside of PHP code and an Oracle database.

After making the switch to OS X, I really didn’t think I’d ever be inside a PC again. Oh, sure, I opened up my Mac Mini and added some memory and swapped out the HDD, but that’s no big deal. Well, a few weeks ago I had a mysterious package arrive at my doorstep. After ensuring there was no white powder or explosives inside, I opened it up to find half a computer system courtesy of Dave, an old friend at OverclockersClub.com.

With the parts he sent me, and the graphics card I received from the OCC Christmas Contest, I had the beginnings of a damn nice PC. Just needed a few more things and it’d be good to go. Once everything was ready, I dusted off my old custom Lian Li PC70 Disturbed case, and shoved all the components in.

And, nothing… no video, no error beeps, no post, nothing. My first build in ages would power up and proceed to do nothing. A few hours later, I had given up. Actually, I thought I may have damaged the CPU or motherboard when installing the heat sink.

This afternoon, I decided to give it another try. Took the video card out, and nothing. Took the memory out and the system beeped at me. Hmm… so I put the memory back in, put the video card back in, and magic the system booted. Stupid PC! :p

So, now I’m up and running. Vista (Ultimate 64) is grinding away downloading the first round of updates, all 84 of them. I now find myself wondering, what the heck am I going to do with this system? My wife chirps in often with the same question. Truthfully, I have no idea. I’m not crazy about Vista (or the much improved Windows 7)… everything I do these days is on my Mac.

Perhaps I should blow it away and install Linux (it’s been a while since I’ve messed with Slackware). Maybe this will become a test web server, or some kind of FTP/file server. Though it really would be a waste of that Radeon HD 4870. Hmm… MythTV maybe?

Yes, I’m Still Using The Mac

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I’m still a noob when it comes to things related to OSX, but I’m still going at it. Matter of fact, when I’m at home I hardly touch my PC. The only time I do that is once a week when I need to run Quicken. I must say, there is one incredibly annoying thing that I’ve found about using the Mac… Me.

I get so use to using the Mac, especially the keyboard shortcuts that I try using them when I’m on a PC. This happens when I first load up Quicken, and in the mornings when I get to work. I have to remember to “switch” myself back to the Windows world.

Aside from that, I’m loving it. :) I really wish I had the $$$ to buy a iMac or a MacBook, but for now my little Mac Mini (which I upgraded) is doing everything I need it to do. – Speaking of the upgrade, I’d been meaning to post pictures of that process, but I’ve been a little more than busy lately. I’ll get that done when I can.

Neowin 8,000,000 Posts Challenge

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Neowin.net turns 8 years old on October 1, 2008 and to celibate they are having a little challenge. If the Neowin forums can reach 8 million posts by 10/01/2008 then they will be selecting one active member and giving them a copy of Windows Vista Ultimate.

Ok, so it may not be the best price to win, but its sure better than buying the OS. ;)

What are the chances of hitting 8 million posts by then? Pretty good. 7 days left, they are already sitting at 7,984,042 total posts. All they need is 2,300 posts per day. Not a hard task if everyone helps out. When the contest was first announced (May 7th) they were sitting at 7,640,544 total posts which means they’ve been averiging 2,471.2 posts per day. See, we should be able to make it no problem!