14
Jan 2009
For the majority of the time that Holly and I have been married, we’ve enjoyed the luxury of owning a dishwasher. I’d be lying if I said that I didn’t like having a machine that washed my dirty dishes. I think that I’ve become spoiled by technology over the years.
When we first moved into our house two-and-a-half years ago, we had a dishwasher that worked. Once. It passed the home inspection and then it never worked again though so we decided to upgrade. The one that came with the house was a very small, very cheap unit. We replaced it with a nice big Maytag that we assumed would serve us well for years to come. After all, Maytags never need to be repaired. That’s why Dan the Maytag Man never does anything but sit and read the newspaper.
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05
Dec 2007
I recently acquired a copy of the newest game in the SimCity franchise, SimCity Societies. I loaded it with no problems and started playing. It’s a great concept but very different from the previous SimCity games. There were problems with the game crashing at random though.
After doing a lot of research on the issue, I discovered that there is a memory leak in the game. There are also numerous other bugs that cause the game to crash. I figured that EA would release a patch to fix these problems but, as of right now, fans are still waiting. No big deal. The game was still playable even with the crashes.
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22
Aug 2007
Holly and I have decided that we should set up a webcam. I ordered a Logitech QuickCam Communicate STX last night from Newegg. I’m hoping that it will be here by Monday. Now I need to get some good software…
I’m pretty comfortable at a computer but web cams are new to me. I have done some research but I’m not really sure what the best software is. I’m looking for something that has motion sensing capabilities. I found Cam Wizard and that might work. I’m also interested in Webcam Monitor. That has motion and sound sensing capabilities. (A sound trigger would be nice.) Does anybody know of any others that are Vista compatible?
Let’s make this a contest. Whomever points me in the right direction can watch me play video games at my computer for a period of 1.5 minutes. I might even eat some chips while on the screen. (De-motivated yet?) Just kidding. No contest. Your suggestions are welcome though.
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02
Aug 2007
I have worked for a lot of companies doing technical support. When I read my Dilbert calendar yesterday, I realized how good I have it where I’m at.
This comic is funny because it’s true. I have worked for companies, MSN and Gateway come to mind, where this is the prevalent attitude. Places like that are really not very fun to work at.
I have never understood the purpose of having technical support available to customers where the main function was to tell them to call somebody else. It makes the caller mad and reflects poorly on the company. Fortunately, I can fix pretty much anything now. I like that.
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27
Jul 2007
Yesterday at work somebody discovered that one of our coworkers has his computer configured to open files and applications in Windows with only a single click of the mouse. This led to much mocking of the single click option and its inefficiency. A poll was even sent out by one of those involved in the discussion to see what people prefer. The single-click was soundly defeated and he who uses it was shamed.
I thought I’d bring this discussion here for a few reasons. The first is to show you what geeks argue about. We weren’t discussing who the better singer is or who’s better looking. We were arguing about the most effective way to open a generic file on a computer! How sad. Yes, I agree that we need to get lives.
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16
Jul 2007
Last week I developed a burning desire to upgrade to Windows Vista. I’ve had access to the software through school since it launched a few months ago but have held off on doing anything until now.
I decided on Thursday that I was going to upgrade over the weekend. Friday night and Saturday were spent backing up a lot of data in preparation of the event. I managed to move everything that I didn’t burn to a DVD onto our second computer. That part went fairly well although it took a long, long time. By Saturday afternoon, I was ready to go.
I inserted my Vista disc into the drive and booted up the system. Then I got a blue screen error. I tried again with the same result. I finally realized that I have an incompatible motherboard so I had to tweak the BIOS in order to make Vista load. It installed after that with no problems.
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29
Jun 2007
Tonight at 6:00 the much anticipated iPhone will be released at AT&T/Cingular and Apple stores. Already, people have been camping out for days in hopes of being one of the first people in their neighborhood to have this so-called “must have” gadget. The media has barraged us with their incessant chatter about how we all must run out and purchase one. You know, I really couldn’t care less.
For those who know me, my feelings toward Apple, and especially the iPod, are well known. For those who don’t, I have a strong dislike for all thing Apple, especially one button mice and iPods. It’s not that I think that they are poorly made. I just think that Apple products in general are too overpriced and I’m a Windows guy. If I can’t plug a MP3 player into my computer and have it work without installing additional software (read iTunes), I don’t want it.
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