rishel.org

As mentioned earlier, Meg's new computer is a Dell with Ubuntu Linux pre-installed. Overall, we're still happy with the system, but I wanted to mention a few "gotchas" i've found since being able to poke around the system a bit more.

First, Meg's system came with a widescreen monitor. X windows was only configured with one 16:9 resolution choice, so if Meg want's to reduce the resolution, everything is stretched out. I know if this is a fairly simple xorg.conf fix, and Meg's gotten used to the 1680×1050 resolution, so it hasn't been a big deal.

Secondly, in an effort to conserve power, I enabled power management so the system would suspend after after an hour of activity. Most of the time, this works. Every few times, it doesn't recover correctly and needs to be shutdown before coming back up. Other times, the network connection is unable to get a DHCP lease. I've turned this off to stop irritating Meg until I can get it to work more consistently.

Meg is busy taking grad classes and her only complaint about OpenOffice.org is the lack "WordArt" as seen in Microsoft Word. I'll have to see if the Format > FontWork option does the trick for her.

Overall, I'm still very impressed. The screen resolution is a minor nit-pick, and I'm not even sure if that level of polish exists on the windows side of the world. Suspend or hibernate don't work correctly on my own (older) system, so that fact that it works most of the time is still a good sign.

The portable DVD player we've been using on the upstairs TV hasn't been dealing with the heat lately, it kept locking up and it has been having trouble reading discs with my other player reads without problems. We decided to replace it with some of our remaining Target gift cards. I found a small (but not portable, next time I want a portable DVD player, I'm getting a new laptop.) cheap (right around $30) player at Target from Trutech. Model number T-600D ( I can't find a link on target.com…) One neat little "feature" was a hack to make the player region free. There are a number of possible hacks for this model on that page, but the one that works for me was this:
1. Press SETUP
2. Press 8, 8, 8, 8
3. Press NEXT CHAPTER (4 times)
4. Current RC should be displayed , upper right
5. Select RC with LEFT/RIGHT (255= codefree)
6. Press SETUP
7. Turn the player off


I order a new computer for Meg as her IDE controller appears to be flaking out. I decided to order one of the new Dells with Ubuntu pre-installed. On first boot up, I was asked to agree to the Terms and Conditions. This was before even the OS loaded, must be a BIOS thing. Once though this screen, Ubuntu 7.04 booted up, I created a user account for Meg and myself and we were up and running. I did an synaptic update and started to explore the system. Everything but my printer just worked. USB drives, Sound, flash installed right into firefox, no extra fiddling needed.

Extra work with the printer was to be expected and I was able to easily get it running with the lexmark driver and the directions from ubuntu forums. Dell did a good job on their blog explaining that they are only going to recommend certain printers. One odd thing was that the sales page for the linux systems didn't let me select a printer at all. I guess they are still ramping up the system and determining which printers would be best to offer.

It was pretty neat to unpack a new Dell PC and only have this one CD in the box:

I'm going to let Meg play with Ubuntu a bit, but I think we may end up switching back to Kubuntu, as that's what she's more familiar with. I do have an XP CD sitting here as a backup in case she decides Open Office can't handle her powerpoint needs or something else. I might try the Qemu > rdesktop trick if she decides this is needed.

Meg just presented me with my, er, present for Valentine's Day a bit early. Roomba is currently charging up for it's trial run. I hope it likes pine needles. I am currently anxiously awaiting for my initial 16 hour charge time to complete. I have never been so excited to vacuum in my entire life. I just hope it's not as sassy as Rosie.

One disappointment i had with my MDA, is that google's mobile apps don't work out of the box. Much googling later and I found my solution. (more…)

My Tungsten T3 palm finally wasn't cutting it. the stereo port gave out. (more…)

So, I kinda missed getting this up in time for my birthday, but the Complete Monty Python's Flying Circus DVD set I got from Meg is pretty awesome, and I wouldn't have thought to ask for it, which makes it all the better… but if need some ideas for Christmas and I'm not too late posting this time, here is my wishlist for this year:

• First, the witty t-shirts:
  • I'd like this shirt, don't worry, it's funny to me.
  • PEBKAC, the tech support battle cry.
  • This was supposed to be the future. They lied to us.

• And now, gadgets:
  • twin rotor RC helocopter. wee!
  • a USB gps receiver to turn my old laptop into a wardriving machine…
  • and a dc to ac inverter to run it all.

On May 27th, I went to Stacie's BBQ. You have to drive through the middle of nowhere and come out the other side to get to Stacie's new house. On the way home, my navigation system didn't turn on, instead it just displayed "check the system." It had gotten pretty hot in the car, and after a few minutes of running the AC, the system kicked back in. I thought the problem was solved… (more…)

Ever wonder why you never need to replace the batteries on your See 'n Say?  because their aren't batteries!  They're just a fancy animal-sound-filled phonograph.  I always figured there was some microchip and a fly-wheel or Van De Graff based generator.  Now I Know.

I'm still not exactly sure why it broke, but I was able to get my network connection back up on my palm over my phone. The problem might be on the palm, but for all I know, could still be the result of a configuration change on the T-mobile side, but what I do know is that the palm app Mobile High Speed got me up and running again.