twincityhacker

I finally got a replacement for the laptop that blew up at school last fall. Since Acer stopped making a comparable model they sent a check. The new one was around the same price, I think. I never saw the check myself so I don't know for sure. Then we got the $200 service plan that covers it for three years, and since laptops don't last very long in my care, it's a pretty good deal.

I already have my list of programs to install: Firefox, GSpot, AV player, Winamp, Clamwin, Avast, Open Office, XVID, Photoshop/GIMP and flash player. I'm unhappy with both of the .pdf readers I was using, so I need to think about that.

And, it needs a name. Any suggestions? I'm thinking Holly.

I have installed the optical drive. Once I realize the front cover of the case swung off as well as the side - though with completely diffrent ways of doing so - it worked out fine. Very snappy opening and closing too!

It only took... an hour? Most of that time was spent trying to get the old drive out of the computer.

So I can now play and burn DVDs on Leo. Happy, happy time. Especially with Teresa acting all wonky.

OMG. It took me twelve hours to download Voyage of the Dammed. And two CDs and three DVDs. It wouldn't have been so bad if I just watched in on the computer, but I decided to watch it on television, and the DVD refused to play past 45:24.

I'm burning one final disk, but both files I have are skippy messes that only play in VLC, so I don't know how that's going to work out.

The preparation for viewing was so frustrating that it partly killed the mood, but at the end the tears I shed were sadness/frustration at the show instead of at the video files.

I also want Mr. Copper as a companion. Or at least some fic with him in it!

Am still working on the USB External Drive Thing. It's marketed as "Easy To Install!" though I've been working on the damm thing for two hours, so they are lying like woah.

The idea that the external drive - a Western Digital My Book Essentials 150 GB model - is plug and play in Windows XP. And it doesn't "plug and play" on either of the two computers I have access to. But I do know that it has plugged and played before, as it backed up the files on Dad's ex-work computer that he's turned in to the company.

There is a long and somewhat scary round about fix on the support site where you enter into the disk management portion of My Computer and then is supposed automaticaly bring up the Initialize and Convert Disk Wizard. Guess what its not doing as well!

Actually, the drive shows up in no way, shape, or form on the computer. It's not recognizing that anything is plugged in at all, when even if I plug in the USB printer, it at least shows up as a O KB drive in the Disk Management space. I just think the drive thing is broken.

But there's a Servo emedded into the device! I though I heard it mocking me, but now I know for sure. = )

Do you know how I was having trouble with Firefox 2.0?

I downloaded the British English version, and it got all better. I'd try re-installing the US English version, but I don't want to jinx it. So I'm sticking with the funny spelling until further notice.

Not that I don't spell funny anyway. However, it's funny as in badly.= )

Today I not only have one, but two computers to complain about.

The first, the desktop, is not actualy the box this time. No, .wav files still don't work. But this morning I go to check my email, and the computer screen is a lovely shade of magenta. After a fiddled with the monitor for a little bit, I got the deep magenta cast to turn into a light green. But since I can't tolerate more than ten minutes on it until I start getting a headache, the monitor will probably need to be replaced again. Since the monitor was replaced last June, the problem is doublely irritaing.

The other computer problem is also on a desktop, but this is a entirely new problem. When Dad and I helped move my sister, she gifted us with her old desktop, which I was all exicted to have since it has a cd burner and other hardware goodies like a co-axial input. I finaly find our old monitor, not the one that we replaced in June, but the one that went with the computer that ran Windows 3.0. For a monitor thats nearly ten years old, it works pretty good.

And no, I can't replace the broken monitor with this one because the connecters are diffrent.

Anyway, first the computer pops up with a pri slave hdd error, which is fixable, then it takes a v. v. long time to get to the login window, when it gets to it at all, since yesterday it sat their booting for two hours, then it's password protected, and the password doesn't work.

This has pretty much sealed the boxs fate as a server, because since it's a lot more useful than the faux-tivo I was considering, and I'm even less inclined to switch that computer to the main desktop and turn the current desktop into a server.

My Dad figured out why the internet connection wasn't working. For some reason, the connection that we use to access the internet does not like to be shared between computers. When we hooked up my Mom's laptop, the conection stoped working on the desktop.

Of course, that was only found out after I had rebooted the computer. -_-0

But it turned out all right in the end, because I was able to install the anti-virus software, so I don't get blamed for everything that happens on it. And for some reason there's about 2.8 GB of free space on the C drive, where there used to be about 800 MB. The computer runs a bit faster now.

See, my mother decied that she doesn't want to work in daycare anymore. It's not the fact she doesn't like taking care of the kids anymore, it's the part where the daycare centers she works at are crazy. I suppose this crazyness is in part in peole thinking if they do the tiniest thing wrong, the kid is damaged for life.

Anyway, she want's to stop. If she finishes her degree, she belives that she can get a non-day care job. She was close to getting it before, but she had to stop because she had me. Now, I'm all for her finishing it, but the only way for her to finish her degree would be to take online courses.

My mother gets fustrated by computers rather easily, so you can just imagine where this is going.

So far, she's had two days of classes. She's already behind because the book she's supposed to be working out of didn't arrive when it was supposed to, three days ago. Add to the fact that the printer that she was using upstairs isn't compadible with he comptuer, so we had to spend an hour hooking the damm thing down in the basement.

But that's not even the really nasty part. The program she needs to use to access her class information, Microsoft Outlook Web Acess is EVIL! The first post she had to make was a little tough, but it went thourgh. Unfotunatly, the option we used to post it was the wrong one, and the teacher bitched at her to follow proper threading procedure.

Her next task was to answer a question after reading the book that hasn't come yet. Luckily, she could make up an answer without the book, since the question was asking about how she planned papers. So she clicks on the reply to folder icon that would let her post her response to the question. Instead of opening a box that would let her type her response, the window closes. And this icon is the only thing that she can press to let her post her response in the proper threading fashion.

Repeat this for FIVE HOURS. She had about 45 minutes for her to post her response, when I finaly went to bed, since I couldn't help her anymore. I did tell her that if she just had ten minutes until it was due to just post it the wrong way again.

I don't think she did. She did try again this morning, but I don't think it worked any better today than it did yesterday.

My computer is either possesed or has become self aware. It randomaly restarted itself, with out me actauly doing anything. Well, I had clicked to read a post and the scren went black and it started the startup procedure. And I hadn't pressed restart, the power button, or even control alt delete!

And why, WHY Bravo must you subtittles and flash translations for Queer Eye for the Straight Guy UK Edition? I'll give you the tube/subway one, but the rest are unforgivable. Just let the Americans stumble though!

Speaking of UK English, is it werid when you hear a word with the US meaning and think of the UK meaning? The other day I was watching The Ellen Show and she was joking of having a game that was called "Pardon me, are these your pants?" I first though "jeans", but then thought "underwear?!".

I already found out today that I measure far better in the metric than the English system. We had to do some measureing in lab and the English for one was only off by a few millimeters, which was cool because the smallest unit on the meter stick was 1/8 of a inch, but the other was off by two centimeters! And I like the metric system too, except that the Farienhight tempeture system is easier that Celseius. But I just learned a kick ass convsersion equation, so I don't care much either way.

I blame science class and Britsh/Canadian comedy. Damm you Mr. T and Mrs. T and Father Ted!