Ever since the new benefits at Blockbuster, I've been converting movies like a fiend to fill the server. Since I'm on the 3 out plan, I can return these to the store to exchange for 3 more, giving me 6 for the week. Plus, with the two free coupons a month, I figure I'll be accumulating 26 movies per month, almost one a day. All for $20 a month. I know I could download them all for free, but this way I can control the quality. Besides ... this isn't illegal, is it?
Hey, if you think it's legal, it's legal.
Monday, January 15, 2007
I went over to Knappers house to fix his computer. He was installing a Kodak photo program and got the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD) on every reboot. After booting from the Windows XP install disk, we copied the DEFAULT, SAM, SECURITY, SOFTWARE, and SYSTEM files from c:\windows\repair to c:\windows\system32\config. The repair directory contains these 5 files from the time Windows was installed (i.e., unmodified versions). We were then able to boot normally into Windows without getting the BSOD. From here, we chose a Restore Point found at c:\System Volume Information\_restore{*}\RP%\snapshot (* is some large hex string and % is the latest restore that Windows is known to have booted fine) and copied the _REGISTRY_MACHINE_ files and _REGESTRY_USER_.DEFAULT file to c:\windows\system32\config (renaming them appropriatly to DEFAULT, SAM, etc.
BAM, rebooted perfectly.
BAM, rebooted perfectly.
Sunday, January 14, 2007
So as I was finally relaxing at home, I thought of another project I'd like to do. I have several very old laptops laying idle. My idea is to mount one of them onto the wall in the kitchen. I'd use this mainly to display Google calendar and other things, like grocery lists and recipes. I just have to find the easiest applications to use and integrate. I'll probably install a fairly small linux distro. All I really need is a browser. I suppose I could build my own application to access the server, but we all know how that'll go.
Saturday, January 13, 2007
I stayed up pretty late tonight (it's actually well into Sunday) , and passed Gears of War on the 360. By pass I mean finished the story on Casual, the easiest level. To fully "pass" the game, you need to complete all "achievements", which include finding secret objects and playing a lot of people online. All in all, an excellent game.
I'd also like to point out that I surpassed Karl in yet another game. It's not like he has babies screaming at his house.
I'd also like to point out that I surpassed Karl in yet another game. It's not like he has babies screaming at his house.
Friday, January 12, 2007
I checked on my recent batch of brew and things don't look good. I originally set the primary fermenter on the concrete basement floor, which brought the temperature to 55 degrees, too cold for an ale. I have since moved it to a different room onto carpet and now its up to 65 degrees, perfect for an ale. But I haven't seen any fermenting activity. So either the fermenting happened quick and I missed it, or I killed all the yeast with the cold temperature. I could pitch more yeast and see what happens, but I'll probably end up moving it to the secondary fermenter, and then bottle it after a few days. Worst case is that it'll be very weak, but hopefully still taste good.
Thursday, January 11, 2007
A pretty historic day in the family. Karl('s wife) had a baby girl today ... Marek Athena. Exciting times.
On a tech note, the hospital had free wifi (but you still can't use cell phones). This is good because there's a lot of down time when staying several days in the hospital room. I guess he's been listening to Pandora. I've given this site a third try, and it's a neat idea. I'm not sure it deserves all the buzz it's getting, but I've set up a few channels and will be experimenting over the next few weeks.
On a tech note, the hospital had free wifi (but you still can't use cell phones). This is good because there's a lot of down time when staying several days in the hospital room. I guess he's been listening to Pandora. I've given this site a third try, and it's a neat idea. I'm not sure it deserves all the buzz it's getting, but I've set up a few channels and will be experimenting over the next few weeks.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
I've been waiting until TiVo shares got to $5.00 and I was going to buy a few hundred. It was creeping down everyday, getting very close (lowest was $5.05) and then they officially announced that they were going to be putting their interface on Comcast's DVR's. It shot up close to $6.00. In my opinion that's still undervalued. One of these days I'm going to pull the trigger, buy the shares, and pray to Allah that Google buys them out.
Tuesday, January 9, 2007
It's good when work goes by quick. I'm back doing a little coding and the day flew by. Because I'm not busy enough as it is, I started looking at learning Python. (I'd put a link in to show those not familiar that Python is a programming language, but I'm using the Konqueror browser which Google (Blogger) doesn't support.) The main reason for wanting to learn Python is that XBMC supports it. There are a few scripts out there that can do some cool things, but probably 90% of them either don't work or are just lame.
Monday, January 8, 2007
I was able to play a little Xbox Live tonight. And as expected, it was quite fun. I still find it amazing that you can online with up to 8 people from anywhere in the world, and game play is as seamless as playing offline. Rarely any lag, glitches, hangs, or disconnections. I'm sure a lot of work went towards building that network, so why is mine taking so long?
Sunday, January 7, 2007
I was able to get to the homebrewing store yesterday to get some supplies. I made a batch of Aussie Light Ale. I want to set up a section on this site to track my batches. I guess yet another reason to switch from Blogger and host it myself. Until I do, here's the ingredients.
Malt Extract: 3.3 lbs Gold LME, 1 lb DME
Specialty Grains: 8 oz Carapils Malt, 8 oz crystal 10L Malt
Hops: 1.5 oz Tettnang pellet hops
Yeast: Dry yeast
I steeped the grain in 1.75 gallons of water for 30 minutes at 155 degrees, then turned off the heat and let sit for 10 minutes. Then I stirred in the malt extract and brought to a boil. I then added .75 oz of the hops and boiled for 60 minutes. During the last two minutes I added the remaining hops. My new wort chiller wouldn't fit in the pot I was using, so I transfered the wort to the fermenter, got the wort to around 80 degrees, then added ice cold water to fill the fermenter to 5 gallons. While doing this, I re-hydrated the yeast for about 15 minutes in warm water and added this to the fermenter before I sealed it up.
Now I need to find a bigger pot, hopefully at least a 4 gallon. The starting gravity was supposed to be in the range of 1.035 - 1.039, but mine was 1.022. Either I'm not using my hydrometer correctly or this is going to be very weak beer.
Malt Extract: 3.3 lbs Gold LME, 1 lb DME
Specialty Grains: 8 oz Carapils Malt, 8 oz crystal 10L Malt
Hops: 1.5 oz Tettnang pellet hops
Yeast: Dry yeast
I steeped the grain in 1.75 gallons of water for 30 minutes at 155 degrees, then turned off the heat and let sit for 10 minutes. Then I stirred in the malt extract and brought to a boil. I then added .75 oz of the hops and boiled for 60 minutes. During the last two minutes I added the remaining hops. My new wort chiller wouldn't fit in the pot I was using, so I transfered the wort to the fermenter, got the wort to around 80 degrees, then added ice cold water to fill the fermenter to 5 gallons. While doing this, I re-hydrated the yeast for about 15 minutes in warm water and added this to the fermenter before I sealed it up.
Now I need to find a bigger pot, hopefully at least a 4 gallon. The starting gravity was supposed to be in the range of 1.035 - 1.039, but mine was 1.022. Either I'm not using my hydrometer correctly or this is going to be very weak beer.
Saturday, January 6, 2007
Karl got an Xbox 360 for Christmas and has been raving about Xbox Live. I have been purposely not getting one, for the same reasons I didn't get the original Xbox for a while. Mainly because with my exams, I don't need any temptation to not study, but also just the whole time factor. Gaming can be quite expensive in terms of evenings. I have probably over 80 games for the Xbox, and I've really only played maybe 20. Plus, there are rumers that version 2 of the 360's are coming at some point, most likely summer. All good reasons to wait. But the only way to shut Karl up is to get my own, which is what I did today.
I signed up for Live, which is what Microsoft is claiming to be the main feature. Apparently echomoche is not a valid Gamertag, even though I also have it for a hotmail address. So for now, I chose echo3oche, which hopefully I can figure out how to activate echomoche. You can see my card in the sidebar. Hopefully my rankings will improve quickly, because as another study season approaches, little progress on the 360 will be made.
I signed up for Live, which is what Microsoft is claiming to be the main feature. Apparently echomoche is not a valid Gamertag, even though I also have it for a hotmail address. So for now, I chose echo3oche, which hopefully I can figure out how to activate echomoche. You can see my card in the sidebar. Hopefully my rankings will improve quickly, because as another study season approaches, little progress on the 360 will be made.
Friday, January 5, 2007
I received a reminder of Blockbusters new feature. Currently I get three movies shipped using their online service, and get 2 free in-store rentals a month. Their new promotion involves returning the movies to a store, they mail them for you, and you get 1 free in-store rental per mailer. Plus, I can still use my 2 free coupons. So essentially I'm getting double the movies. This just in time for the brand new server to get a workout.
Thursday, January 4, 2007
I got around to installing Ubuntu on the server. It actually was quite easy. I ended up having to burn 3 copies before it worked, and even then it didn't install all packages. Luckily, it was enough so that I could boot it and finish the install over internet. I then got Samba up and running so that the Xbox can see it. I started moving all my movies to the server from the various other computers. One thing that is odd is I'm only getting about 1M/s transfer rate. I know the Xbox can handle 10M/s, so maybe my servers card has improper settings.
Wednesday, January 3, 2007
In preparation of having a functional server once again, I decided to re-examine my movie converting process. I fired up DivX Converter and noticed there was an update. Now, DivX Converter isn't the best tool. For one, there's only a few properties you can change, which makes it an easy tool for one-click converting, but there's no flexibility if you run into issues. Anyway, they had a new converting "profile" named High-Definition. I gave it a whirl, and it actually is quite an improvement over their Home Entertainment profile. On the 55", it was almost hard for me to see any video loss. Guess I'll continue to use Converter for now ...
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
The home server has been down for some time. I was running a full version of Mandriva, but it was just bogging the ancient machine. I now burned a copy of Ubuntu Server. It's suppose to be a snap to install. We'll see about that.
Monday, January 1, 2007
Alright, so I missed a few more days. I'm really trying to get into a routine and get my nightly posts in. I guess it's fitting that it's a new year and I'm resolving to do this blog.
Anyway, we had some friends and family over for the eve. It didn't get too out of hand this year. Everyone either left or went to bed before midnight and there were only three of us still around. We ended up watching a movie and didn't even bother pausing it for midnight.
I got up early and made breakfast. I recently watched V for Vendetta, so naturally I made Eggs in a Basket. I don't eat eggs, but everyone that ate them said they were good.
Anyway, we had some friends and family over for the eve. It didn't get too out of hand this year. Everyone either left or went to bed before midnight and there were only three of us still around. We ended up watching a movie and didn't even bother pausing it for midnight.
I got up early and made breakfast. I recently watched V for Vendetta, so naturally I made Eggs in a Basket. I don't eat eggs, but everyone that ate them said they were good.
Wednesday, December 20, 2006
I found out today that I passed my exam. I learned that the level of excitement of passing is far less than the disappointment of failing. But I'll take little happiness over extreme sadness. With this one out of the way, I only have two more to take to be done. And due to the schedule, I won't have anymore fall exams, only spring.
Thursday, December 14, 2006
I was talking to some people today about my home network, on how I watch movies and listen to music using my Xbox to stream from the server. Nothing really too exciting, but they were impressed. It made me want to actually get some more work done on the network.
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
I flew into Hartford today for work. One good thing about plane rides is that I either get caught up on my diggnation or my sleep. Since I didn't have time to transfer any podcasts to the PSP, the sleep was great. I threw on my headphones and woke up when we landed. Since the plane didn't crash, I have proved that it's alright to keep electronics on during landing. Perhaps I'll submit a report to the FAA.
Monday, December 11, 2006
Well, another weekend went by and I didn't get to the home brew shop. I really need to get some sanitizer to brew another batch. I got a monthly kit for a gift and now have 7 kits to make. Hopefully the crushed grains are still good. What am I saying? I could brew some beer with lawn clippings and I'd still drink it.
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