Classic!

There is nothing funnier than seeing a BSOD when it is not on your computer...except if it's on the "Membrane" at the Olympic Opening Ceremonies.

Explanation on what the Membrane is:

The national stadium is surrounded in a sort of membrane. Unlike China's National Aquatics Center, or "Water Cube," another Olympic venue which is also surrounded in this membrane, the Bird's Nest version is curved and double-layered, offering gracefully decorative soundproof, wind-proof, rain-proof, and even UVA protection to its already impressive body. The outer layer of membrane, completely constructed in November of 2007, was created using 884 individual ETFE panels, covering a total of 38,500 square meters. The inner layer consists of PTFE material. 1,044 panels take up 53,000 square meters of area, whose main purposes are to better the acoustics in the stadium and to support the equipment within the steel frame.This special membrane can also help lighting within the stadium and effectively diminish glare and shadowing, allowing for a more favorable competition environment.

--http://www.the2012londonolympics.com/forum/showthread.php?t=11313

I Love The Venture Brothers

Olympics Part 1

The Olympics began almost 1 week ago and I have decided to post the various stories that news outlets are putting out. These articles are mostly critical of the Olympics coverage and various countries stupidity throughout. If you have a story that you don't see here please feel free to post it in the comments section. Let's start things off right here...

Another topic I have been discussing is the use of American pop music snippets during the beach volleyball tournament. This, to me, is the absolute worst display of cultural overlap. Why would you single out one sport and choose to play American pop music interludes during the break (not to mention that this is the worst selection of Pop music I have heard in some time, Chumbawumba, really?!)? Has the Olympics suddenly become nothing more than a cheap NBA game? I guess I might be over-reacting but I expected a certain amount of deference and respect to be placed on the games as opposed to treating it like some run of the mill competition. More info about this can be found in this Wikipedia article.

For an awesome round-up of cynical coverage of the Olympics turn to Slate.

Casual Flashing?!

3 hours in line,but the 3g is mine!

9/11 can be used for anything...

Video about defense of aircrafts from terrorists

The fun starts about 3 minutes in...good times.

Funny Web Clips

I just read this leaked memo from Bill Gates that chews out Microsoft design and programming staff for Windows XP usability issues. It probably is one of the funniest and sad letters I have read from someone dissatisfied with their XP operating experience.

I was part of the 8 Million...

I Love Duct Tape!

Above: Apollo 17 moonbuggy fender repaired with duct tape.

This Week in WTF...

A few weeks ago I posted a story about an awesome Rich Man's Toy. It was the R2D2 projector (with millennium falcon remote control). Seems this Japanese company has turned that relatively new product into a server monitoring system, as the easy to understand picture demonstrates...



Also Firefox 3 comes out in 30 minutes (yes I pledged to download it for the world record). For anyone that has cursed at this lovely browser for eating system memory, then get ready to be amazed...what's amazing is how dope that tank is on this buxom blond bombshell. Chicas take note. If you want to meet a geek at a bar, wear this shirt and see who comes up to talk to you.

This is Not a Joke

Although Steve Irwin has passed on, it's nice to see that his daughter is picking up the mantle as the world's most zany Australian...funny that she picked Amateur rapping though.

P.S. - Are those gang signs she is throwing up?

McHammer Time!

If you are not watching AOTS (Attack of The Show) you are NOT in the know. Olivia Munn, one of the hosts, mistakenly called MC Hammer McHammer (as in Mick Hammer) on the show last year. Most shows would have left it at laughing at her for a few days. This show, however took it to the next level. If you consider yourself "up on shit" then you better be tuning in, and here is one classic reason why:

Just In Case...

you haven't seen this yet...



The Wii...it's for the kids.

The New 3G iPhone

Cost: $199/8gb; $299/16gb
Native GPS Support (Using Google Maps)
Third Party Application Support
Smaller

Amazing!

Slate Story on OLPC type Programs

Here is the Story...

and here is my reply/post to the Author:

Implicit Value

by makinola




06/05/2008, 11:45 AM #

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I
agree with the main point in this story, that parental involvement is
definitely necessary to help push kids in the right direction when
using new technology. This is true for pretty much anything kids can
get their hands on. No matter what the device or tool is kids will
abuse it for their own enjoyment. Sometimes that abuse is beneficial
and sometimes it hurts them as is the case with computers. However the
Romanian study, like many other studies, cannot give you a complete
picture of the benefits that having a computer bestows upon the user.

I
was 12 when my Dad bought us out first computer, a 486 with 8mb of RAM.
Before that time I was using a word processor for writing reports. The
new computer didn't give me anything new in the way of academics. The
internet was just beginning, and writing reports was exactly the same,
although now I had a fancy laser printer instead of the Dot matrix
style printing of a word processor. I primarily used my computer for
games, and AOL connectivity when I finally got my 14.4 modem. I may
have even had the same stats that these Romanian kids had with their
computer in terms of less time watching tv and doing homework but what
the computer did give me was familiarity with the technology and a no
fear attitude when it came to discovering all that this new technology
had to offer. I learned about file formats and programs to run them by
looking at lo-res partially nude pictures of entertainment stars that I
received from a friend on a 3.5" floppy. I learned about hardware
architecture when my computer crapped out because of a busted power
supply. I familiarized myself with DOS and software installation as I
made the jump from Windows 3.1 to 95, and I learned about web pages
from the horrendous web page builder on AOL...version 3.0.

These
are all things that are not measured in a survey but which all
contributed to my semi-expertise with computers today, 15 years later.
The point is there are benefits that can't be readily measured by a
survey, parents, or even the kids that are using the devices that may
pop up years from now. Because a kid is playing solitaire and sharing
.mp3's on a LAN network and not writing the introduction to his
Master's thesis does not mean that the computer is being totally
misused. Also, who had the bright idea to ask children if using this
computer made them more open to going to college? What kind of answer
do you expect to receive from a kid who just found and loves
Minesweeper?

Is That A Wii?

No, it's Asus' new Eee Desktop Box. Someone should tell these guys to stop being so dope or I think I might go broke, or broker...

Goosh?!

Just Goosh it? Really?? Interesting...

Finally RIT has made it to Slashdot, although not on a mechanical engineering marvel, but an astronomical one...

Wolf in Sheep's Clothing (China)...and we are having the Olympics there.

If you had Dish or Satellite in the late 90's or knew someone who did then this story will be familiar and interesting to you. (Monsieur Scott I am looking at you). The thing I really want to know is what semiconductor company this guy worked for? Could it have been mine???

And last but not least, Prince and his DMCA antics. He is not only an ass but doesn't know his copyright info as well. "I Would Die for You" is no longer one of my favorite anthems.

Nasa Employee is

suspended for blogging at work...

P.S. - Check out when I posted this...no, I did not have the day off.

If You Put it In a Video Game

...they will make it. Compare and contrast Yamaha's latest concept with this semi-popular PS2 title from early 2001. Accidents in this thing would somehow be much worse than if you were really riding a motorcycle, but I would get one anyway.

Ade 2, Dell XPS 0

In the last few weeks I have had some minor problems with my desktop baby, and to my slight surprise I have been able to diagnose and fix both of them. Here's a quick rundown...

Problem 1: Loud ass noise coming from my computer while it's running.

This one was simple, it's gotta be the fan right? Sure, but which fan? A lot of new systems (desktops) have two fans, one for the power supply and one for the cpu. The CPU fan would have been a bitch to change, the power supply one, not so much. So I woke up on a Sunday (a few weeks ago) morning, took a ripper and began disassembling my PS. 12 screws and lots of dust later I got to the supply. I read online that there is usually a sprocket or some type of gear that you can apply oil to in order to minimize noise, unfortunately that was not the case for my supply. Instead I found a sticker and some basic circuitry under it. I cleaned out the supply box, spun the fan around and cleaned it out and put my PS back together followed by installing it back into my computer. Crossing my fingers I powered up only to be rebuffed by a sound that can only be described as "a sound that tells you something is definitely wrong". It was like a muted buzzer. Looking at the machine I noticed that my diagnostic lights were on. using my laptop to look up what they meant, I realized that an unseated RAM stick could be the cause. Opened up computer, reseat both sticks (2 512's), close up and reboot. Voila! Boot up and no noise whatsoever, in fact I think it might be running quieter than it did before.

Ade +1

Problem 2: I return home from work greeted by darkness on my first monitor and a blue screen on my second monitor (I run dual 19's)

Anyone who has ever owned a PC should be familiar with the Blue Screen of Death (BSOD). It is a windows error screen that tells you nothing about what could possibly be causing the error, at least not to the layman which for all intents and purposes is all of us. "Page Fault in non page area"? "Fatal Exception"? Come on now, why put in a screen that tells you that you have an error but make it so that you can't even understand it. Thanks MSFT, dicks. The BSOD usually has some numbers on it like 0X0000007E or 0xF78aD3B4. Believe it or not, these actually mean something although the numbers generated can be caused by a mix of things so even if you knew what they meant you still would be lost. After checking many forum posts from my laptop (it is 1000x easier to diagnose a problem with google, in fact I can't imagine taking my machine to a computer repair shop anymore, I hope I don't have to eat that statement in the near future) I realized that I would need the Windows Recovery Console to diagnose this further. One HUGE problem, most CD's that come with a computer these days are not actually the XP install cd but some OEM (Original equipment manufacturer) cd with restore garbage programs on it. It may contain the files necessary to set up windows, but for doing diagnostic work it is useless. Thanks Dell for charging me for an OS but NOT giving me the shit I paid for, fuckin Mike.

Anyway, I borrowed a CD from work and began the diagnosis the next evening (after the original problem). By the way, I did read that a possible cause of the BSOD was a hardware failure of some type, be it HDD, RAM, Graphics card or PS Fan. Thinking that this was def a software problem I neglected to check my hardware. Besides, I ran the HDD scan from my boot menu which told me I had no problems. Also while looking for diagnostic tools I ran across BartPE, if you want to know more about pre-installed environments, check out this guys page. Pretty neat and easy to understand. All the same, I ran the recovery console and was sent to a dos prompt, wait, what? I thought this thing was supposed to repair my windows, not have me looking at dos prompts. Running CHKDSK /r (check disk and repair problems) I was told that I had an "Unrecoverable error on my HDD". Fine, screw the recovery console I ran BartPE (which also needs the CP cd to create the build of the program) and it tried to start but then i got another BSOD. What the fuck?! Everything I run gives me a BSOD, no software is working, one tool says my HDD is fine and the other says it's fucked. That is when I had the idea, "I wonder if it's my RAM". Open up computer, remove one stick, power on. Boom, normal boot up. To confirm I removed the other stick and stuck just the one I had just removed back in, then BSOD. There it is, bad RAM causes BSOD, remove RAM and upgrade (I am currently typing this with only 512mb, tough in this day and age). Moral of the story, if you get a BSOD and you did NOT a)just install new software b)just upgrade software c)just install a new OS for dual boot or d)just install a new Hardware device AND it's drivers this is most likely a hardware problem. Use tools to check your HDD, make sure your RAM is not the problem and make sure your fan is running. Graphics card is a little hard to diagnose, but if it's not the other three, then it probably is your Graphics card.

Ade +1