Friday, 30 May 2008
Eventful walk
The weather this evening was very nice so I took the dog for a walk. Ironically after my tirade about the dachshund yesterday, we encountered it off the lead. We had walked past a field and heard a tirade of yapping. This gradually got closer until the damn thing appeared, heading in our direction. Fortunately it didn't attack the hound, just stood there barking. Eventually it stopped and then it looked quite cute. The owner finally appeared and was quite apologetic. I'm glad the hound doesn't generally respond to things like this.
After that, encountered the woman with the rescued red setter and her other dog. Both of them were rather aggressively staring at the hound so we didn't chat for long as they provoked one of the first real growls I've ever heard from him.
This evening was spent at Andy's, eating a large amount of pizza, watching some Robot Chicken and looking up strange things in Google and Uncyclopedia.
Thursday, 29 May 2008
Crappy existence
Apparently so. Why bother.
4x4 Charger
I really like the Dodge Charger. Here's one on a 4x4 chassis. It always intrigues me when people put normal cars on a 4x4 chassis. The one I've always wanted to see is a Jaguar XJ6 on Discovery chassis. It has been done but mostly as monster truck style things. I think at one point I worked out you'd have to extend the Land Rover chassis by 13", but the width of the axles would be about right. Yes, the resulting vehicle would be ludicrously heavy, probably need special suspension to not handle like a barge, and would have to have a powerful V8 to even move, but it would certainly have presence.
One bizarre thing I once encountered was an XJ6 that had been converted into an extended six wheeled pickup. It was even for sale.
ARGH COMPUTERS
I extricated it with difficulty from the position it has next to the TV and hook it up to a monitor. It complains again about the CMOS battery and reboots, and the drive is there. Bah. The battery issue means it never starts unattended and you have to leave a keyboard plugged in so when it beeps unhappily you can press F1 to make it boot.
I hate computers. The fact that they remain my primary talent and source of income is probably the greatest tragedy of our times.
ARGH DRIVING HOME
First I was nearly hit head on by someone driving a Mitsubishi Delica, one of those stupid Japanese 4x4 people carriers, who obviously thought that because he was bigger than me, he could ignore the rights of way and just force me to stop dead without any warning.
Then I was followed most of the way by a tailgating git in a black Astra who clearly thought he was God's gift to driving. He was cutting corners and generally being stupid, even nearly being hit head on by a TVR didn't stop him. This was particularly annoying as I know the road so well I can jolly the AX along at a good pace without reaching it's limits so there was no reason to tailgate.
Then on the single track road I turned off onto I was following someone and we met a woman in a blue VW Beetle (the ugly new one).
Despite there being two of us and one of her, she utterly refused to even try to reverse to a layby mere metres behind her and so the car in front of me wedged itself into a layby next to us. No room for me as there was a car already parked in it so I reversed about 50 metres up the road to the next one. Eventually the woman in the Beetle drove past without even acknowledging my existence or the fact I'd reversed all that way for her, which annoyed me a little.
I've seen her and her boyfriend/husband/toyboy/whatever around and they have an expensive house, the supposedly trendy Beetle, and a ridiculous unruly long haired dachshund that thinks it can take on a greyhound. I usually like dachshunds but that one is a little untrained vicious monster. Because of this I've never got close enough to speak to them in case it attacks the hound's ankles.
This is why I usually go the scenic route through the village. It's slower and the roads are narrow but there's much less traffic on it and this hardly ever happens.
Help Firefox 3 set a new record.
Wednesday, 28 May 2008
Bass workout
Work wasn't too bad today. It was my turn to have the work experience kid following me around. Fortunately for once we had one that actually was interesting in working in IT, knew something about computers and listened to what I told him to do so I only had to tell him once and not stand over him every time. Also he asked intelligent questions about how things worked and what we did. The worst one we had was a girl who had absolutely no interest in computers or IT at all, and whose sole ambition was to get a job doing filing.
Rained all day. Couldn't take dog for a walk. Boo.
Tuesday, 27 May 2008
Frustrating
Except that the damn thing is in London and is collection only. It ended at £101 - ludicrously cheap.
Countdown to Extinction, another great track.
Why do dog owners have to pick up after their animals but horse riders can leave their epic piles of steaming droppings in the middle of the road for any absent-minded dreamer to stand in and trip over?
When articles like this come up, there's always some twat who says 'Use public transport!'. Typically, they are from London and benefit from the Tube and buses. Round here it's just not that simple. I hope something is going to be done about fuel prices or things could get nasty.
I pretty much had a beard this morning as I hadn't shaved since last Wednesday and it grows so fast. Scary.
Got hiccups. Bah.
Sunday, 25 May 2008
I have sound, and a small Linux machine
Found a HP Jornada 690 at the car boot this morning for £8. It's one of the mini laptops running Windows CE that were vaguely popular at the end of the 90s. It has a 133mhz Hitachi SH3 processor, 32mb RAM, a 640x240 colour screen and a surprisingly usable keyboard. I had to make a power supply for it as it had the standard connector but needed 12v. It's in good nick but the non-TFT LCD seems a bit dim.
The built in operating system is Windows CE 2.11. While this was a BIG improvement over the useless pieces of crap that were CE 1.0 and 2.0, it's still not great. The huge flaw for me was the inability to install network card drivers without connecting it to a Windows PC. This was impossible because I don't have the correct cable. Giving up on that, I quickly found that both Linux and NetBSD have been ported to this machine and so I thought that would be preferable.
I partitioned up a 256mb Compact Flash I had lying round, and after some judicious copying of files, including the WinCE program that actually loads the kernel, it actually booted Linux. It works but I haven't had much of a chance to see what it can do.
I just took a load of crap laptops outside for the scrap pile. Any thoughts about keeping them were quickly halted as it then rained on them very hard.
Saturday, 24 May 2008
Megadeth
I've had a couple of Megadeth albums for years, but thanks to the miracle of YouTube, I've been able to check out some more songs, and it's pretty good stuff.
It's not often I want to learn to play normal guitar but Megadeth is one of those bands that has that effect on me, especially a pointy V shaped one.
A warm day
Although the V3i design still looks good four years after the original model came out, this is one of the remarkably tasteless Dolce & Gabbana limited editions. Apart from the gaudy gold colour, it also has the special D&G firmware so when it's turned on and off a scary voice growls 'Dolce Gabbana' very loudly.
Basically I got it because it was cheap (because it's very battered and worn) and I thought it would be interesting to compare to Nokia. It must be said that the design is really good. It's really thin and light but doesn't feel too fragile. The display is nice and the thing has a surprisingly powerful speaker and vibration motor. I keep looking at it and wondering how they were able to cram it all in. I can see why this phone was so insanely popular in it's time, to the point where it was called the iPod of the phone world.
The software is a bit crappy compared to the Nokia Series 60 platform, and why can't they standardise which is the space button? Nokia has it on 0, Sony Ericcsons have it on # and this has it on *. Also the predictive text and general use of messaging is awkward.
Also got a 2gb card for the N93 the other day as I did a bit of resaerch and found out which was the recommended model (Sandisk Ultra II), as the N93 is apparently picky about memory cards. It's been fine so far with this one. It was just £12.
I went through a phase a couple of years ago of collecting Nokia phones. As a result I have a shitload of them, none of which ever really worked. They are about to be packed up and given to one of the people in work is collecting them for schools so they can recycle them. In fact I've been through a lot of phases, hence the sheer amount of crap I have which I'm now trying to get rid of.
Took the dog for a walk in the sun, which was good, and saw the people down the road who recently rescued a red setter. It was neglected to the point where half it's tail went rotten and dropped off. The poor thing is still a bit underweight but is looking much better and seems quite happy considering.
Friday, 23 May 2008
Big fat Mexican
The afternoon was spent having our usual Friday meeting, which took place with a rather completative atmosphere and the occasional digestional rumblings.
Subways
GTA has a lot to answer for.
Still no fecking sound!
[ 0.000000] BIOS-provided physical RAM map:
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 0000000000000000 - 00000000000a0000 (usable)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 0000000000100000 - 000000009ff75000 (usable)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000009ff75000 - 000000009ff77000 (ACPI NVS)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000009ff77000 - 000000009ff98000 (ACPI data)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 000000009ff98000 - 00000000a0000000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000fec00000 - 00000000fec90000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000fee00000 - 00000000fee10000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] BIOS-e820: 00000000ffb00000 - 0000000100000000 (reserved)
[ 0.000000] 1663MB HIGHMEM available.
[ 0.000000] 896MB LOWMEM available.
[ 0.000000] found SMP MP-table at 000fe710
[ 0.000000] Entering add_active_range(0, 0, 655221) 0 entries of 256 used
[ 0.000000] Zone PFN ranges:
[ 0.000000] DMA 0 -> 4096
[ 0.000000] Normal 4096 -> 229376
[ 0.000000] HighMem 229376 -> 655221
[ 0.000000] Movable zone start PFN for each node
[ 0.000000] early_node_map[1] active PFN ranges
[ 0.000000] 0: 0 -> 655221
[ 0.000000] On node 0 totalpages: 655221
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 32 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 0 pages reserved
[ 0.000000] DMA zone: 4064 pages, LIFO batch:0
[ 0.000000] Normal zone: 1760 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] Normal zone: 223520 pages, LIFO batch:31
[ 0.000000] HighMem zone: 3326 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] HighMem zone: 422519 pages, LIFO batch:31
[ 0.000000] Movable zone: 0 pages used for memmap
[ 0.000000] DMI 2.3 present.
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDP signature @ 0xC00FEB90 checksum 0
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDP 000FEB90, 0014 (r0 DELL )
[ 0.000000] ACPI: RSDT 000FD4E7, 0038 (r1 DELL WS 450 8 ASL 61)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: FACP 000FD51F, 0074 (r1 DELL WS 450 8 ASL 61)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: DSDT FFFD53C5, 2989 (r1 DELL dt_ex 1000 MSFT 100000D)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: FACS 9FF75000, 0040
[ 0.000000] ACPI: SSDT FFFD7E8B, 00BA (r1 DELL st_ex 1000 MSFT 100000D)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: APIC 000FD593, 0084 (r1 DELL WS 450 8 ASL 61)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: BOOT 000FD617, 0028 (r1 DELL WS 450 8 ASL 61)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: ASF! 000FD63F, 0067 (r16 DELL WS 450 8 ASL 61)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: PM-Timer IO Port: 0x808
[ 0.000000] ACPI: Local APIC address 0xfee00000
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x01] lapic_id[0x00] enabled)
[ 0.000000] Processor #0 15:2 APIC version 20
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x02] lapic_id[0x06] enabled)
[ 0.000000] Processor #6 15:2 APIC version 20
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x03] lapic_id[0x01] disabled)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: LAPIC (acpi_id[0x04] lapic_id[0x07] disabled)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: IOAPIC (id[0x08] address[0xfec00000] gsi_base[0])
[ 0.000000] IOAPIC[0]: apic_id 8, version 32, address 0xfec00000, GSI 0-23
[ 0.000000] ACPI: IOAPIC (id[0x09] address[0xfec80000] gsi_base[24])
[ 0.000000] IOAPIC[1]: apic_id 9, version 32, address 0xfec80000, GSI 24-47
[ 0.000000] ACPI: IOAPIC (id[0x0a] address[0xfec80800] gsi_base[48])
[ 0.000000] IOAPIC[2]: apic_id 10, version 32, address 0xfec80800, GSI 48-71
[ 0.000000] ACPI: INT_SRC_OVR (bus 0 bus_irq 0 global_irq 2 dfl dfl)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: INT_SRC_OVR (bus 0 bus_irq 9 global_irq 9 high level)
[ 0.000000] ACPI: IRQ0 used by override.
[ 0.000000] ACPI: IRQ2 used by override.
[ 0.000000] ACPI: IRQ9 used by override.
[ 0.000000] Enabling APIC mode: Flat. Using 3 I/O APICs
[ 0.000000] Using ACPI (MADT) for SMP configuration information
[ 0.000000] Allocating PCI resources starting at a8000000 (gap: a0000000:5ec00000)
[ 0.000000] swsusp: Registered nosave memory region: 00000000000a0000 - 00000000000f0000
[ 0.000000] swsusp: Registered nosave memory region: 00000000000f0000 - 0000000000100000
[ 0.000000] Built 1 zonelists in Zone order, mobility grouping on. Total pages: 650103
[ 0.000000] Kernel command line: root=UUID=14ab892f-ad5a-4d2f-abc2-663b27b61340 ro quiet splash
[ 0.000000] mapped APIC to ffffb000 (fee00000)
[ 0.000000] mapped IOAPIC to ffffa000 (fec00000)
[ 0.000000] mapped IOAPIC to ffff9000 (fec80000)
[ 0.000000] mapped IOAPIC to ffff8000 (fec80800)
[ 0.000000] Enabling fast FPU save and restore... done.
[ 0.000000] Enabling unmasked SIMD FPU exception support... done.
[ 0.000000] Initializing CPU#0
[ 0.000000] PID hash table entries: 4096 (order: 12, 16384 bytes)
[ 0.000000] Detected 2392.090 MHz processor.
[ 15.813171] Console: colour VGA+ 80x25
[ 15.813175] console [tty0] enabled
[ 15.813637] Dentry cache hash table entries: 131072 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
[ 15.814133] Inode-cache hash table entries: 65536 (order: 6, 262144 bytes)
[ 16.023897] Memory: 2586392k/2620884k available (2157k kernel code, 33132k reserved, 998k data, 364k init, 1703380k highmem)
[ 16.023907] virtual kernel memory layout:
[ 16.023908] fixmap : 0xfff4b000 - 0xfffff000 ( 720 kB)
[ 16.023909] pkmap : 0xff800000 - 0xffc00000 (4096 kB)
[ 16.023910] vmalloc : 0xf8800000 - 0xff7fe000 ( 111 MB)
[ 16.023912] lowmem : 0xc0000000 - 0xf8000000 ( 896 MB)
[ 16.023913] .init : 0xc041b000 - 0xc0476000 ( 364 kB)
[ 16.023914] .data : 0xc031b5a4 - 0xc0414dc4 ( 998 kB)
[ 16.023915] .text : 0xc0100000 - 0xc031b5a4 (2157 kB)
[ 16.023918] Checking if this processor honours the WP bit even in supervisor mode... Ok.
[ 16.023968] SLUB: Genslabs=11, HWalign=64, Order=0-1, MinObjects=4, CPUs=2, Nodes=1
[ 16.103981] Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 4788.66 BogoMIPS (lpj=9577320)
[ 16.104016] Security Framework initialized
[ 16.104025] SELinux: Disabled at boot.
[ 16.104042] AppArmor: AppArmor initialized
[ 16.104047] Failure registering capabilities with primary security module.
[ 16.104058] Mount-cache hash table entries: 512
[ 16.104230] CPU: After generic identify, caps: bfebfbff 00000000 00000000 00000000 00004400 00000000 00000000 00000000
[ 16.104245] CPU: Trace cache: 12K uops, L1 D cache: 8K
[ 16.104248] CPU: L2 cache: 512K
[ 16.104251] CPU: Physical Processor ID: 0
[ 16.104254] CPU: After all inits, caps: bfebfbff 00000000 00000000 0000b080 00004400 00000000 00000000 00000000
[ 16.104268] Compat vDSO mapped to ffffe000.
[ 16.104284] Checking 'hlt' instruction... OK.
[ 16.120391] SMP alternatives: switching to UP code
[ 16.122227] Early unpacking initramfs... done
[ 16.491395] ACPI: Core revision 20070126
[ 16.505256] ACPI: Looking for DSDT in initramfs... error, file /DSDT.aml not found.
[ 16.531975] CPU0: Intel(R) Xeon(TM) CPU 2.40GHz stepping 09
[ 16.531997] SMP alternatives: switching to SMP code
[ 16.532699] Booting processor 1/6 eip 3000
[ 16.542697] Initializing CPU#1
[ 16.619901] Calibrating delay using timer specific routine.. 4784.46 BogoMIPS (lpj=9568935)
[ 16.619911] CPU: After generic identify, caps: bfebfbff 00000000 00000000 00000000 00004400 00000000 00000000 00000000
[ 16.619920] CPU: Trace cache: 12K uops, L1 D cache: 8K
[ 16.619923] CPU: L2 cache: 512K
[ 16.619925] CPU: Physical Processor ID: 3
[ 16.619927] CPU: After all inits, caps: bfebfbff 00000000 00000000 0000b080 00004400 00000000 00000000 00000000
[ 16.620146] CPU1: Intel(R) Xeon(TM) CPU 2.40GHz stepping 09
[ 16.620184] Total of 2 processors activated (9573.12 BogoMIPS).
[ 16.620483] ENABLING IO-APIC IRQs
[ 16.620674] ..TIMER: vector=0x31 apic1=0 pin1=2 apic2=-1 pin2=-1
[ 16.768028] checking TSC synchronization [CPU#0 -> CPU#1]: passed.
[ 16.788044] Brought up 2 CPUs
[ 16.788080] CPU0 attaching sched-domain:
[ 16.788084] domain 0: span 03
[ 16.788087] groups: 01 02
[ 16.788092] CPU1 attaching sched-domain:
[ 16.788094] domain 0: span 03
[ 16.788096] groups: 02 01
[ 16.788370] net_namespace: 64 bytes
[ 16.788383] Booting paravirtualized kernel on bare hardware
[ 16.789119] Time: 17:51:49 Date: 05/23/08
[ 16.789151] NET: Registered protocol family 16
[ 16.789455] EISA bus registered
[ 16.789462] ACPI: bus type pci registered
[ 16.808259] PCI: PCI BIOS revision 2.10 entry at 0xfbde8, last bus=5
[ 16.808262] PCI: Using configuration type 1
[ 16.808264] Setting up standard PCI resources
[ 16.880130] ACPI: EC: Look up EC in DSDT
[ 16.905309] ACPI: Interpreter enabled
[ 16.905315] ACPI: (supports S0 S1 S3 S4 S5)
[ 16.905336] ACPI: Using IOAPIC for interrupt routing
[ 16.946709] ACPI: PCI Root Bridge [PCI0] (0000:00)
[ 16.947183] * The chipset may have PM-Timer Bug. Due to workarounds for a bug,
[ 16.947185] * this clock source is slow. If you are sure your timer does not have
[ 16.947186] * this bug, please use "acpi_pm_good" to disable the workaround
[ 16.947236] PCI quirk: region 0800-087f claimed by ICH4 ACPI/GPIO/TCO
[ 16.947240] PCI quirk: region 0880-08bf claimed by ICH4 GPIO
[ 16.948249] PCI: Transparent bridge - 0000:00:1e.0
[ 16.948282] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0._PRT]
[ 16.948753] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI1._PRT]
[ 16.949109] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI1.PCI2._PRT]
[ 16.949405] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI1.PCI3._PRT]
[ 16.949783] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Routing Table [\_SB_.PCI0.PCI4._PRT]
[ 17.144168] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKA] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 *11 12 15)
[ 17.144495] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKB] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 *11 12 15)
[ 17.144819] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKC] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 *9 10 11 12 15)
[ 17.145143] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKD] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 *10 11 12 15)
[ 17.145464] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKE] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15) *0, disabled.
[ 17.145788] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKF] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15) *0, disabled.
[ 17.146110] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKG] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 11 12 15) *0, disabled.
[ 17.146437] ACPI: PCI Interrupt Link [LNKH] (IRQs 3 4 5 6 7 9 10 *11 12 15)
[ 17.146707] Linux Plug and Play Support v0.97 (c) Adam Belay
[ 17.146754] pnp: PnP ACPI init
[ 17.146765] ACPI: bus type pnp registered
[ 17.172456] pnp: PnP ACPI: found 11 devices
[ 17.172460] ACPI: ACPI bus type pnp unregistered
[ 17.172465] PnPBIOS: Disabled by ACPI PNP
[ 17.172811] PCI: Using ACPI for IRQ routing
[ 17.172814] PCI: If a device doesn't work, try "pci=routeirq". If it helps, post a report
[ 17.199838] NET: Registered protocol family 8
[ 17.199841] NET: Registered protocol family 20
[ 17.199932] AppArmor: AppArmor Filesystem Enabled
[ 17.203825] Time: tsc clocksource has been installed.
[ 17.211883] system 00:00: iomem range 0x0-0x9ffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211887] system 00:00: iomem range 0x100000-0xffffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211890] system 00:00: iomem range 0x1000000-0x9ff74fff could not be reserved
[ 17.211894] system 00:00: iomem range 0xf0000-0xfffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211897] system 00:00: iomem range 0xfec00000-0xfec8ffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211901] system 00:00: iomem range 0xfee00000-0xfee0ffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211904] system 00:00: iomem range 0xffb00000-0xffbfffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211908] system 00:00: iomem range 0xffc00000-0xffffffff could not be reserved
[ 17.211926] system 00:0a: ioport range 0x800-0x85f has been reserved
[ 17.211929] system 00:0a: ioport range 0xc00-0xc7f has been reserved
[ 17.211932] system 00:0a: ioport range 0x860-0x8ff could not be reserved
[ 17.242570] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:01.0
[ 17.242573] IO window: disabled.
[ 17.242578] MEM window: fc000000-fdffffff
[ 17.242582] PREFETCH window: f0000000-f7ffffff
[ 17.242590] PCI: Bridge: 0000:02:1d.0
[ 17.242594] IO window: e000-efff
[ 17.242600] MEM window: fe300000-fe4fffff
[ 17.242604] PREFETCH window: disabled.
[ 17.242610] PCI: Bridge: 0000:02:1f.0
[ 17.242611] IO window: disabled.
[ 17.242616] MEM window: disabled.
[ 17.242620] PREFETCH window: disabled.
[ 17.242626] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:02.0
[ 17.242629] IO window: e000-efff
[ 17.242633] MEM window: fe100000-fe4fffff
[ 17.242637] PREFETCH window: disabled.
[ 17.242641] PCI: Bridge: 0000:00:1e.0
[ 17.242643] IO window: disabled.
[ 17.242648] MEM window: disabled.
[ 17.242652] PREFETCH window: disabled.
[ 17.242693] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1e.0 to 64
[ 17.242708] NET: Registered protocol family 2
[ 17.279905] IP route cache hash table entries: 32768 (order: 5, 131072 bytes)
[ 17.280289] TCP established hash table entries: 131072 (order: 8, 1048576 bytes)
[ 17.281192] TCP bind hash table entries: 65536 (order: 7, 524288 bytes)
[ 17.281731] TCP: Hash tables configured (established 131072 bind 65536)
[ 17.281736] TCP reno registered
[ 17.292027] checking if image is initramfs... it is
[ 17.739892] Switched to high resolution mode on CPU 1
[ 17.743748] Switched to high resolution mode on CPU 0
[ 18.025527] Freeing initrd memory: 7683k freed
[ 18.025723] Simple Boot Flag value 0x87 read from CMOS RAM was invalid
[ 18.025726] Simple Boot Flag at 0x7a set to 0x1
[ 18.026364] audit: initializing netlink socket (disabled)
[ 18.026381] audit(1211565109.880:1): initialized
[ 18.026687] highmem bounce pool size: 64 pages
[ 18.029472] VFS: Disk quotas dquot_6.5.1
[ 18.029579] Dquot-cache hash table entries: 1024 (order 0, 4096 bytes)
[ 18.029757] io scheduler noop registered
[ 18.029760] io scheduler anticipatory registered
[ 18.029762] io scheduler deadline registered
[ 18.029776] io scheduler cfq registered (default)
[ 18.029859] Boot video device is 0000:01:00.0
[ 18.030315] isapnp: Scanning for PnP cards...
[ 18.384424] isapnp: No Plug & Play device found
[ 18.424919] Real Time Clock Driver v1.12ac
[ 18.425048] Serial: 8250/16550 driver $Revision: 1.90 $ 4 ports, IRQ sharing enabled
[ 18.425179] serial8250: ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 18.425337] serial8250: ttyS1 at I/O 0x2f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A
[ 18.426126] 00:07: ttyS0 at I/O 0x3f8 (irq = 4) is a 16550A
[ 18.426484] 00:08: ttyS1 at I/O 0x2f8 (irq = 3) is a 16550A
[ 18.427638] RAMDISK driver initialized: 16 RAM disks of 65536K size 1024 blocksize
[ 18.427731] input: Macintosh mouse button emulation as /devices/virtual/input/input0
[ 18.427954] PNP: No PS/2 controller found. Probing ports directly.
[ 18.430478] serio: i8042 KBD port at 0x60,0x64 irq 1
[ 18.430484] serio: i8042 AUX port at 0x60,0x64 irq 12
[ 18.439730] mice: PS/2 mouse device common for all mice
[ 18.439907] EISA: Probing bus 0 at eisa.0
[ 18.439949] EISA: Detected 0 cards.
[ 18.439953] cpuidle: using governor ladder
[ 18.439956] cpuidle: using governor menu
[ 18.440071] NET: Registered protocol family 1
[ 18.440106] Using IPI No-Shortcut mode
[ 18.440142] registered taskstats version 1
[ 18.440267] Magic number: 8:863:896
[ 18.440330] hash matches device ptyy6
[ 18.440382] BIOS EDD facility v0.16 2004-Jun-25, 0 devices found
[ 18.440384] EDD information not available.
[ 18.440674] Freeing unused kernel memory: 364k freed
[ 19.749532] fuse init (API version 7.9)
[ 19.778811] ACPI Exception (processor_core-0816): AE_NOT_FOUND, Processor Device is not present [20070126]
[ 19.778828] ACPI Exception (processor_core-0816): AE_NOT_FOUND, Processor Device is not present [20070126]
[ 20.187619] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbfs
[ 20.187656] usbcore: registered new interface driver hub
[ 20.187920] Intel(R) PRO/1000 Network Driver - version 7.3.20-k2-NAPI
[ 20.187926] Copyright (c) 1999-2006 Intel Corporation.
[ 20.188001] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:03:0e.0[A] -> GSI 24 (level, low) -> IRQ 16
[ 20.188068] usbcore: registered new device driver usb
[ 20.200893] USB Universal Host Controller Interface driver v3.0
[ 20.200987] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 17
[ 20.201003] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.0 to 64
[ 20.201008] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: UHCI Host Controller
[ 20.201386] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 1
[ 20.201417] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.0: irq 17, io base 0x0000ff80
[ 20.201586] usb usb1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 20.201618] hub 1-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 20.201627] hub 1-0:1.0: 2 ports detected
[ 20.211761] SCSI subsystem initialized
[ 20.304194] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.1[B] -> GSI 19 (level, low) -> IRQ 18
[ 20.304208] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.1 to 64
[ 20.304212] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.1: UHCI Host Controller
[ 20.304242] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.1: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 2
[ 20.304271] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.1: irq 18, io base 0x0000ff60
[ 20.304486] usb usb2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 20.304518] hub 2-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 20.304527] hub 2-0:1.0: 2 ports detected
[ 20.408172] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.2[C] -> GSI 18 (level, low) -> IRQ 19
[ 20.408186] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.2 to 64
[ 20.408190] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.2: UHCI Host Controller
[ 20.408223] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.2: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 3
[ 20.408253] uhci_hcd 0000:00:1d.2: irq 19, io base 0x0000ff40
[ 20.408402] usb usb3: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 20.408434] hub 3-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 20.408443] hub 3-0:1.0: 2 ports detected
[ 20.467212] e1000: 0000:03:0e.0: e1000_probe: (PCI-X:100MHz:64-bit) 00:0d:56:11:20:0c
[ 20.482127] Floppy drive(s): fd0 is 1.44M
[ 20.482730] libata version 3.00 loaded.
[ 20.497118] FDC 0 is a post-1991 82077
[ 20.512857] e1000: eth0: e1000_probe: Intel(R) PRO/1000 Network Connection
[ 20.514670] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1d.7[D] -> GSI 23 (level, low) -> IRQ 20
[ 20.514689] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1d.7 to 64
[ 20.514694] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: EHCI Host Controller
[ 20.514736] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: new USB bus registered, assigned bus number 4
[ 20.518647] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: debug port 1
[ 20.518655] PCI: cache line size of 128 is not supported by device 0000:00:1d.7
[ 20.518670] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: irq 20, io mem 0xfe500800
[ 20.531045] ehci_hcd 0000:00:1d.7: USB 2.0 started, EHCI 1.00, driver 10 Dec 2004
[ 20.531229] usb usb4: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 20.531267] hub 4-0:1.0: USB hub found
[ 20.531276] hub 4-0:1.0: 6 ports detected
[ 20.635310] PCI: Enabling device 0000:00:1f.1 (0005 -> 0007)
[ 20.635319] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1f.1[A] -> GSI 18 (level, low) -> IRQ 19
[ 20.635374] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1f.1 to 64
[ 20.635393] ACPI: PCI interrupt for device 0000:00:1f.1 disabled
[ 20.643378] ata_piix 0000:00:1f.1: version 2.12
[ 20.643400] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1f.1[A] -> GSI 18 (level, low) -> IRQ 19
[ 20.643455] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1f.1 to 64
[ 20.643551] scsi0 : ata_piix
[ 20.643616] scsi1 : ata_piix
[ 20.643654] ata1: PATA max UDMA/100 cmd 0x1f0 ctl 0x3f6 bmdma 0xffa0 irq 14
[ 20.643657] ata2: PATA max UDMA/100 cmd 0x170 ctl 0x376 bmdma 0xffa8 irq 15
[ 20.832407] ata1.00: ATA-7: WDC WD1600AAJB-00PVA0, 00.07H00, max UDMA/100
[ 20.832413] ata1.00: 312581808 sectors, multi 8: LBA48
[ 20.832442] ata1.01: ATA-5: WDC WD400EB-11CPF0, 06.04G06, max UDMA/100
[ 20.832445] ata1.01: 78165360 sectors, multi 8: LBA
[ 20.839356] ata1.00: configured for UDMA/100
[ 20.855175] ata1.01: configured for UDMA/100
[ 21.331116] ata2.00: ATAPI: SONY DVD-ROM DDU1615, FDS2, max UDMA/33
[ 21.331145] ata2.01: ATAPI: HL-DT-ST GCE-8483B, 1.05, max UDMA/33
[ 21.495015] ata2.00: configured for UDMA/33
[ 21.659107] ata2.01: configured for UDMA/33
[ 21.659249] scsi 0:0:0:0: Direct-Access ATA WDC WD1600AAJB-0 00.0 PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[ 21.659413] scsi 0:0:1:0: Direct-Access ATA WDC WD400EB-11CP 06.0 PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[ 21.660018] scsi 1:0:0:0: CD-ROM SONY DVD-ROM DDU1615 FDS2 PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[ 21.660352] scsi 1:0:1:0: CD-ROM HL-DT-ST CD-RW GCE-8483B 1.05 PQ: 0 ANSI: 5
[ 21.674173] Driver 'sd' needs updating - please use bus_type methods
[ 21.674294] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 312581808 512-byte hardware sectors (160042 MB)
[ 21.674314] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[ 21.674318] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 21.674346] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 21.674417] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] 312581808 512-byte hardware sectors (160042 MB)
[ 21.674433] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write Protect is off
[ 21.674436] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 21.674464] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 21.674469] sda: sda1 sda2
[ 21.680410] Driver 'sr' needs updating - please use bus_type methods
[ 21.703791] sd 0:0:0:0: [sda] Attached SCSI disk
[ 21.704492] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] 78165360 512-byte hardware sectors (40021 MB)
[ 21.704512] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 21.704515] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 21.704543] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 21.704607] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] 78165360 512-byte hardware sectors (40021 MB)
[ 21.704623] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Write Protect is off
[ 21.704626] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Mode Sense: 00 3a 00 00
[ 21.704653] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Write cache: enabled, read cache: enabled, doesn't support DPO or FUA
[ 21.704658] sdb: sdb1
[ 21.731359] sd 0:0:1:0: [sdb] Attached SCSI disk
[ 21.738569] sd 0:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg0 type 0
[ 21.738596] sd 0:0:1:0: Attached scsi generic sg1 type 0
[ 21.738621] sr 1:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg2 type 5
[ 21.738646] scsi 1:0:1:0: Attached scsi generic sg3 type 5
[ 21.739979] sr0: scsi3-mmc drive: 4x/48x cd/rw xa/form2 cdda tray
[ 21.739986] Uniform CD-ROM driver Revision: 3.20
[ 21.740058] sr 1:0:0:0: Attached scsi CD-ROM sr0
[ 21.743977] sr1: scsi3-mmc drive: 40x/48x writer cd/rw xa/form2 cdda tray
[ 21.744059] sr 1:0:1:0: Attached scsi CD-ROM sr1
[ 21.767783] usb 2-1: new low speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 2
[ 21.949893] usb 2-1: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 22.065292] Attempting manual resume
[ 22.065297] swsusp: Resume From Partition 8:2
[ 22.065299] PM: Checking swsusp image.
[ 22.065526] PM: Resume from disk failed.
[ 22.119190] kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
[ 22.119202] EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
[ 22.191622] usb 2-2: new low speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 3
[ 22.372728] usb 2-2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 22.614522] usb 3-2: new full speed USB device using uhci_hcd and address 2
[ 22.793545] usb 3-2: configuration #1 chosen from 1 choice
[ 22.796599] usbcore: registered new interface driver hiddev
[ 22.828021] input: Microsoft Microsoft Notebook Optical Mouse with Tilt Wheel as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.1/usb2/2-1/2-1:1.0/input/input1
[ 22.838512] input,hidraw0: USB HID v1.11 Mouse [Microsoft Microsoft Notebook Optical Mouse with Tilt Wheel] on usb-0000:00:1d.1-1
[ 22.852735] input: Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.1/usb2/2-2/2-2:1.0/input/input2
[ 22.862529] input,hidraw1: USB HID v1.11 Keyboard [Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000] on usb-0000:00:1d.1-2
[ 22.883649] input: Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000 as /devices/pci0000:00/0000:00:1d.1/usb2/2-2/2-2:1.1/input/input3
[ 22.902500] input,hidraw2: USB HID v1.11 Device [Microsoft Natural® Ergonomic Keyboard 4000] on usb-0000:00:1d.1-2
[ 22.902527] usbcore: registered new interface driver usbhid
[ 22.902532] /build/buildd/linux-2.6.24/drivers/hid/usbhid/hid-core.c: v2.6:USB HID core driver
[ 27.781430] pci_hotplug: PCI Hot Plug PCI Core version: 0.5
[ 27.829111] shpchp: Standard Hot Plug PCI Controller Driver version: 0.4
[ 27.870484] Linux agpgart interface v0.102
[ 27.912146] agpgart: Detected an Intel E7505 Chipset.
[ 27.915269] agpgart: AGP aperture is 64M @ 0xec000000
[ 27.978992] EDAC MC: Ver: 2.1.0 Apr 10 2008
[ 28.066271] intel_rng: FWH not detected
[ 28.179120] iTCO_vendor_support: vendor-support=0
[ 28.210254] iTCO_wdt: Intel TCO WatchDog Timer Driver v1.02 (26-Jul-2007)
[ 28.210421] iTCO_wdt: failed to reset NO_REBOOT flag, reboot disabled by hardware
[ 28.210430] iTCO_wdt: No card detected
[ 28.231244] input: Power Button (FF) as /devices/virtual/input/input4
[ 28.246187] ACPI: Power Button (FF) [PWRF]
[ 28.246306] input: Power Button (CM) as /devices/virtual/input/input5
[ 28.278186] ACPI: Power Button (CM) [VBTN]
[ 28.962257] nvidia: module license 'NVIDIA' taints kernel.
[ 29.727255] input: PC Speaker as /devices/platform/pcspkr/input/input6
[ 29.872958] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:01:00.0[A] -> GSI 16 (level, low) -> IRQ 17
[ 29.873221] NVRM: loading NVIDIA Linux x86 Kernel Module 96.43.05 Tue Jan 22 19:36:58 PST 2008
[ 29.879961] usbcore: registered new interface driver libusual
[ 30.021816] Initializing USB Mass Storage driver...
[ 30.065883] scsi2 : SCSI emulation for USB Mass Storage devices
[ 30.093769] usbcore: registered new interface driver usb-storage
[ 30.093778] USB Mass Storage support registered.
[ 30.093785] usb-storage: device found at 2
[ 30.093787] usb-storage: waiting for device to settle before scanning
[ 30.170122] dcdbas dcdbas: Dell Systems Management Base Driver (version 5.6.0-3.2)
[ 30.181602] parport_pc 00:09: reported by Plug and Play ACPI
[ 30.181660] parport0: PC-style at 0x378 (0x778), irq 7, using FIFO [PCSPP,TRISTATE,COMPAT,ECP]
[ 30.334065] ACPI: PCI Interrupt 0000:00:1f.5[B] -> GSI 17 (level, low) -> IRQ 21
[ 30.334090] PCI: Setting latency timer of device 0000:00:1f.5 to 64
[ 30.752638] intel8x0_measure_ac97_clock: measured 55056 usecs
[ 30.752642] intel8x0: clocking to 48000
[ 32.323183] lp0: using parport0 (interrupt-driven).
[ 32.391892] Adding 971924k swap on /dev/sda2. Priority:-1 extents:1 across:971924k
[ 32.951446] EXT3 FS on sda1, internal journal
[ 33.703980] kjournald starting. Commit interval 5 seconds
[ 33.712011] EXT3 FS on sdb1, internal journal
[ 33.712019] EXT3-fs: mounted filesystem with ordered data mode.
[ 34.251250] ip_tables: (C) 2000-2006 Netfilter Core Team
[ 34.680118] No dock devices found.
[ 35.093849] usb-storage: device scan complete
[ 35.106515] scsi 2:0:0:0: Direct-Access Generic USB SD Reader 1.00 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
[ 35.108943] scsi 2:0:0:1: Direct-Access Generic USB CF Reader 1.01 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
[ 35.111865] scsi 2:0:0:2: Direct-Access Generic USB SM Reader 1.02 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
[ 35.122953] scsi 2:0:0:3: Direct-Access Generic USB MS Reader 1.03 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
[ 35.125862] scsi 2:0:0:4: Direct-Access Generic USB FM Reader 1.04 PQ: 0 ANSI: 0
[ 35.169902] sd 2:0:0:0: [sdc] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 35.169959] sd 2:0:0:0: Attached scsi generic sg4 type 0
[ 35.213874] sd 2:0:0:1: [sdd] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 35.213935] sd 2:0:0:1: Attached scsi generic sg5 type 0
[ 35.257949] sd 2:0:0:2: [sde] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 35.258009] sd 2:0:0:2: Attached scsi generic sg6 type 0
[ 35.301839] sd 2:0:0:3: [sdf] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 35.301898] sd 2:0:0:3: Attached scsi generic sg7 type 0
[ 35.441731] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Spinning up disk...<6>apm: BIOS version 1.2 Flags 0x03 (Driver version 1.16ac)
[ 36.412128] apm: disabled - APM is not SMP safe.
[ 36.455218] .<6>ppdev: user-space parallel port driver
[ 36.642403] audit(1211565129.410:2): type=1503 operation="inode_permission" requested_mask="a::" denied_mask="a::" name="/dev/tty" pid=5100 profile="/usr/sbin/cupsd" namespace="default"
[ 37.586946] .<6>e1000: eth0: e1000_watchdog: NIC Link is Up 100 Mbps Full Duplex, Flow Control: RX/TX
[ 37.970298] Bluetooth: Core ver 2.11
[ 37.971503] NET: Registered protocol family 31
[ 37.971509] Bluetooth: HCI device and connection manager initialized
[ 37.971515] Bluetooth: HCI socket layer initialized
[ 37.999229] Bluetooth: L2CAP ver 2.9
[ 37.999235] Bluetooth: L2CAP socket layer initialized
[ 38.059942] Bluetooth: RFCOMM socket layer initialized
[ 38.060692] Bluetooth: RFCOMM TTY layer initialized
[ 38.060697] Bluetooth: RFCOMM ver 1.8
[ 38.722686] ..<6>agpgart: Found an AGP 3.0 compliant device at 0000:00:00.0.
[ 40.073042] agpgart: Putting AGP V3 device at 0000:00:00.0 into 8x mode
[ 40.073953] agpgart: Putting AGP V3 device at 0000:01:00.0 into 8x mode
[ 40.999723] .<6>NET: Registered protocol family 17
[ 42.197842] ...<6>NET: Registered protocol family 10
[ 44.680233] lo: Disabled Privacy Extensions
[ 45.609038] .........<7>eth0: no IPv6 routers present
[ 55.809550] .......................................................................not responding...
[ 135.558379] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] READ CAPACITY failed
[ 135.558386] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 135.558391] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Sense Key : Not Ready [current]
[ 135.558396] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] <
[ 135.604365] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Test WP failed, assume Write Enabled
[ 135.604374] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Assuming drive cache: write through
[ 135.604458] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Attached SCSI removable disk
[ 135.604525] sd 2:0:0:4: Attached scsi generic sg8 type 0
[ 135.804295] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Spinning up disk............................................................................................not responding...
[ 236.965572] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] READ CAPACITY failed
[ 236.965580] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 236.965585] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Sense Key : Not Ready [current]
[ 236.965592] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] <
[ 237.012557] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Test WP failed, assume Write Enabled
[ 237.012568] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Assuming drive cache: write through
[ 237.149499] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Spinning up disk............................................................................................not responding...
[ 338.325787] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] READ CAPACITY failed
[ 338.325795] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Result: hostbyte=DID_OK driverbyte=DRIVER_SENSE,SUGGEST_OK
[ 338.325804] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Sense Key : Not Ready [current]
[ 338.325812] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] <
[ 338.372775] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Test WP failed, assume Write Enabled
[ 338.372784] sd 2:0:0:4: [sdg] Assuming drive cache: write through
Thursday, 22 May 2008
Indy 4
We were driving back and I realised that the car was up to 395 miles since the last fill-up and the ridiculous fuel gauge was more in the red than anywhere else. We stopped at a 24 hour garage where diesel was up to £1.25 a litre. The local Morrisons is up to £1.24. This is really getting silly now. My previous record on a tank is 410 miles simply because I just forgot to look at the gauge. Fortunately I was near a petrol station at the time. I think there is a warning light on the gauge but because it's so unreliable I don't want to risk it.
I am so glad I got rid of the Discovery when I did. I kind of wish that I'd got a petrol car instead of diesel though, they're cheaper to maintain and it looks like diesel is going up quicker than petrol. The place actually had a white petrol AX for the same price but I didn't actually look at it. Small diesel cars can be troublesome, for example the front springs on my AX are different because the diesel engine is heavier than the petrol one.
Tuesday, 20 May 2008
Sayatnim
If you want to endear yourself to your friendly neighbourhood ICT technician, do not wait until 4:00pm the day before a new temp starts before telling him about it and then expect the said temp to be up and running by 9:00am the next day.
Reasons why I do not want a Sun Enterprise E4500 with 10 processors and 14gb RAM.
1) It is very big.
2) It would use a lot of electricity.
3) Despite the size it would probably require an external SCSI hard drive, possibly an array.
4) It is very heavy.
5) It doesn't run AIX.
6) The 10 processors only run at 400mhz each.
7) It is very noisy.
8) It generates a lot of heat.
The only reason I'd want one is to enjoy the prestige of having a machine which originally cost many thousands of pounds, has a ridiculous number of processors and memory and is generally not something you'd find at home. Rather like the lunatic in Sweden who runs an Enterprise 10000 'Starfire' with 64 processors and 64gb RAM at home. When it's on he can't have any of his usual appliances on (TV, cooker, etc) as it'll overload the electrics in his home. There's one on Ebay right now for £1600, not a bad price but they are apparently a bitch to get running.
I don't really want a Sun machine, but they are readily available when IBM kit isn't.
Sayatnim is the name of my village in Animal Crossing on the DS, a game which seemed great at first but quickly got repetitive and dull.
Monday, 19 May 2008
Handholding a printer
However it has periods where paper jams as it exits the output rollers. I had to keep grabbing each sheet and pulling it gently out to stop it jamming. Like helping a decrepit old dog to eat or something.
I wish I could figure out how to fix it, as I like these printers. They are big and square and remind me of college. We had hours of fun using software to get the network LaserJet 4s to display strange messages like '54.5 Out of Crayons Error' and things like that. Well, maybe not hours.
Saturday, 17 May 2008
Fail
I'm the same with data on my computer. A little while ago I consolidated all my documents from various machines into one giant folder, and it came up to 17.2gb. That's not including my photo library on the iBook (about 5gb) and the music collection on the Optiplex (about 14gb). Backing up all this shit is becoming a pain. I think the very earliest stuff dates back to about 1994 from college, not the actual work, but the stuff that we created when we were bored.
There's a bit of a gap between about 1996-1998 after the 1.2gb hard drive in my 48mb RAM Pentium 100mhz PC failed and I lost pretty much everything on it except for a few things that were saved on floppies. This was when I learned the value of backups...
After that disaster nothing really happened except for a bit of writing on a Macintosh SE/30. Document creation really started again in 2000 when I got my iMac and since then everything has been stored. Transferring things from a Mac to Windows and then Linux has been a bit troublesome due to some things being in obscure file formats.
The strange thing is that I seemed to get a lot more done on that Pentium PC than I did on any of the machines that came after. I suspect the Internet has a lot to answer for in that respect, especially since broadband came along. Also back then I didn't play video games as much, if at all.
I began tidying up my room today and put some things for scrap but didn't get very far because I started by emptying two bookcases and putting it all back. The problem was that the bookcases didn't just contain books, and so it required rather more sorting than I thought. I still have my very near complete collection of Discworld books in publication order, and I also have rather a lot of Stephen King. Other notable collections in that case are all the James Herriot and Arthur Ransome books. There's also a few Haynes manuals (Fiat Panda, Diesel Land Rover, Jaguar XJ6(!) and Citroen AX), a Greyfriars annual from I think the early 1950s which depicts the scary different world of the era, the original radio scripts for the Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (which I read a million times before hearing the actual thing), and quite a number of completely random books.
The weather has finally deteriorated again. Rain most of the day annoyingly as I was hoping to take the dog for a walk.
Lucretia is probably one of my favourite Megadeth tracks. The bass line is very hard.
Still no sound out of this damn machine. Annoying.
Java (inspired by testing software at my last job)
2) A great shout went up and as one they wailed ' It is true! Now our fate is sealed!"
3) The crowd cowered once more as the voice continued: 'Illegal State Exception.' And the Java process could not be killed by any mortal man.
4) The cowards amongst them proclaimed "This Java shall surely be the end of all things! It truly is the end of days!", The stupid amongst them turned their faces and voices to heaven seeking answers. The wise remained quiet, knowing that the only fate that awaited them was to perish with dignity.
5) Again and again, they tried to kill the Java, but there was no succeeding. It was not even aware of their pathetic attempts to kill it. The voice spoke again 'NoSuchRecordException' and several oddities were noticed in the obscure and mysterious Log Files.
Housewarming
Tired now. Great evening.
Thursday, 15 May 2008
Hayfever
Megadeth soundcheck
Wednesday, 14 May 2008
Crazy film
Weirdly, on the way back, we passed no less than four limos heading towards Llandudno, one white, one black, one pink and one stretched Hummer.
Tuesday, 13 May 2008
Mega poo
Didn't do much this evening, took the dog for a walk and put new strings on the acoustic. They were a late birthday present and were the Fender nylon tapewounds I've mentioned before. Basically a normal bass string with nylon tape around it so they are kinder to fingers and don't squeak. Installation went OK eventually but they were a right pain at first.
Took the dog for a walk which was good. Stopped off to visit someone at one point and he got a bit hysterical because he needed a dump. When he actually came to do it, it was truly epic. The dog that is.
Watched some Afro Samurai that a guy lent me in work. Hmm, interesting.
Monday, 12 May 2008
Computers suck
Finished Doctor Who Series 2. Really good, I thought. There were some really good episodes in there.
Sunday, 11 May 2008
Birthday weekend
The crew (Rob, Em, Andy, Will, Vicky and myself) set off yesterday to go camping and climb Snowdon. We set off early and met up in Betws Y Coed where I was instructed to buy walking boots and proper socks. After some advice from a knowledgeable woman I ended up with a decent pair and also a good pair of socks. The boots were slightly pricey at £80 but they turned out to be well worth it.
After we set up the three tents (I was sharing the extension of Will's) and things at the campsite, next to Llyn Gwynant, we headed off in search of the path. The one recommended by Andy was the Llanberis Path, which is the longest but also the flattest. It also follows the Snowdon Mountain Railway, which was good as the train geek in me was interested in seeing it.
The trip up was hard. I'm not all that fit at the moment so I found it really hard going for some of it. The worst bit was before the summit where it's all slippy shale and it's hard to keep good grip. The weather wasn't bad, cloudy enough to not be too hot but not totally grim either. We had a worrying moment near the Clogwyn railway station where a cloud went past and we thought it was fog coming in. But we made it to the summit without any major problems and joined the seething hordes at the top of the highest mountain in Wales.
Was it worth it? Hell yes. One of the things about living in an area like this is that it's remarkably easy to take it all for granted. Snowdonia is less than an hour's drive from where I live and the scenery around it is just spectacular. It was a little hazy but the view from the summit was still amazing. There was one bit lower down where you could see roads and houses, and it was like looking down from a plane. Very scary.
It was interesting to see the trains pootling up and down, both diesel and steam. It's quite impressive to see the tracks go right the way up to the very top of the mountain. They're rebuilding the top cafe at the moment so only work trains go up to the summit at the moment. I would like to go up on the train some time, just for the experience. As Andy said, now I've walked to the top, it's OK to go on the train now.
The journey back down was pretty uneventful, but by then people were sunburnt and achy so the stream of complaints did get louder. Scarily people were still heading up when we got near the bottom at 5:00pm. Also at one point some maniac actually ran past us heading downhill, possibly training for the Snowdon marathon. When we got back to the car park it was such a relief to drag the boots off and sit down.
After stopping off for a pint in the Pen-Y Gwryd, we headed back to the campsite for food and drinks. It was a good evening on the whole, toasting marshmallows on a reasonably sized campfire and talking nonsense. I had bought a bottle of blue WKD but it somehow didn't make it to the car when I packed it so Will and I went halves on a bottle of sherry. We stayed up till about midnight, talking shite and occasionally watching the antics of the next door group of pyromaniacs who seemed intent on creating the biggest inferno they could using tons of logs and petrol. I found my feet weren't too bad but the area that hurt most after the walk were my hips for some reason, and they were still bad in the morning. Not too bad now though.
Today was roastingly hot. After watching Will swim in the river and dismantling the tents, there was talk of going to the beach and we actually did set off. But we decided we were all too burnt already and so we headed home. On the way noticed that the lake was unnaturally smooth so got some great pictures. Once I got back home I basically spent the day playing some more GTA4 and trying not to walk around too much until a thunderstorm hit.
So yeah, my 30th absolutely ruled!
Friday, 9 May 2008
Thursday, 8 May 2008
Things
Someone took the piss out of my car yesterday. I was topping up the oil, which I always do in work because it's basically the only time it's parked on a level surface for any length of time. Anyway this guy's car was parked next to mine and he came along as I was pouring oil in. He says 'I think it's time for a new motor'. My reply was 'I'm just topping up the oil', whereupon he just harrumphed in a genuinely patronising way and drove off in his own car. Next time he logs a helpdesk call it's going straight to the bottom of the list.
In 1 day, 11 hours, 11 minutes and 11 seconds (or thereabouts) I will be 30.
Shit.
Wednesday, 7 May 2008
Argh
A shame really as the machine is nice to use and has a good controller. I know the old Xbox had some reliability issues but the 360 is really taking the piss rather. Reports are that the PS3 is selling more than the 360 now, and I'm not surprised. It's ugly, has less games and has a shit controller but at least it's quiet and reliable.
Monday, 5 May 2008
Long walk and subway fun
In the evening, played with the subway in GTAIV. You can push people in front of a train or ride a moped down the tunnels. Hilariously, I chased a hapless guy down the tunnels on the moped until he was squashed by a train. Saw some fairly interesting glitches. Sometimes the train would pull into a station and the entire world would be not there except for distant objects. Very weird.
Also threw myself off the Empire State Building in a blaze of glory, dropping molotov cocktails as I plummeted.
Sunday, 4 May 2008
Sketch sharing
Embarassing cursing
Went round to my Dad's to return his sat-nav which I'd borrowed for the Birmingham trip. I also took the 360 to see what GTA4 looked like on the 40" 1080p TV. It looked pretty decent and my Dad was quite impressed by the graphics and the physics and the detail and scale of the city. I took great care to downplay the violence and less savoury aspects of being an illegal immigrant heavily involved in criminal activities, and emphasised the more fun aspects of the game such as playing pool and darts, socialising with friends and enjoying the sights of Liberty City.
However I decided to do a mission and as a room of gyrating partly clothed women filled the screen, I felt slightly embarrassed. As I picked up some gangsta drug dealer and drove away, the embarrassment increased as a torrent of 'shits, bitches, niggas' and the occasional 'motherfucker' boomed out of the surround sound speakers.
The embarrassment climax was reached when some apparently drug crazed guy revealed himself to be a policeman by screaming 'LCPD! Reach for the sky, motherfuckers!' at the very top of his voice and brandishing a gun. This was followed by a particularly violent mission where I had to run around a building gunning down policemen and FBI officers, before escaping with the aforementioned drug dealer. As we sped away from the scene in a stolen car with the owner dangling from the door handle, he expressed his relief and gratitude with another torrent of cursing.
Oh well, it was quite funny, looking back.
Saturday, 3 May 2008
Acoustic Bass
I decided recently that the Peavey 5-string bass was not my thing. It looked nice, was well made and sounded decent but I couldn't adapt to 5 strings. I did consider stringing it with a high C instead of a low B but decided against it. I took it out today with the aim of trading it in for something, anything, as long as it was different. I wasn't necessarily after a bass, a guitar or something might have been a possibility or perhaps some more outlandish like a bouzouki.
It was an odd day for going to music shops, I got stuck in bank holiday traffic at least twice and couldn't park anywhere. Eventually I found myself in a shop in Colwyn Bay which is just insane. You have to walk around a literal maze of amps stacked to the ceiling and it's really cramped and awkward. They have some really nice stuff though. One thing that caught my eye there was a Shine acoustic bass. I had never really considered an acoustic bass before as they aren't all that popular. They still need an amp for anything more than a quiet noodle as they are quite small. With bass frequencies you need massive size, like the double bass or the guitarron.
Still, I had a go on it, the price was right and it really appealed. It's a cheap model but isn't bad. It has a really nice deep red finish (which is really hard to photograph) and the sound is good unplugged and actually pretty decent plugged in too. The guy in the shop was a bit of a fan of Peavey stuff so despite mine being a cheap Chinese one we quickly came to a deal.
The strings are a bit past it but they'll be OK for a while. It's nice to be able to just grab an play it without an amp, and in fact I just sat in the field for an hour playing with it while the dog had a run around. Great fun.
About to put the new 160gb hard drive into this machine and rebuild it with a clean install of Hardy Heron, and then I'm going to start on GTA IV again.
Yay bank holiday weekends.
Friday, 2 May 2008
An odd day and Iron Man
This evening went to see Iron Man with a couple of guys from work. First we went to Frankie and Benny's where we all tried the meatball calzone. Absolutely superb.
Iron Man itself was actually quite decent. Not spectacular but a solid film which was well made. I'm not familiar with the comics but it met with the approval of my comic book loving colleague.
Thursday, 1 May 2008
Huge meal
Starter: Garlic mushrooms.
Main: Epic chicken and leek pie.
Pudding: Hot chocolate fudge cake with cream.
Awesome.
GTA IV burnout = GEEK SPASM
The old DLT7000 tape drive made some bad noises and then ate a tape last time I played with it, so I ripped it out of the Linux machine and replaced it with an Intel 5-drive SCSI cage. This takes up three 5.25" drive bays and has 5 caddies so you can install hot-swap SCA drives. I scored it unboxed but new on Ebay for £10.50, not bad since the cheapest I found it new online was £70.
I chucked some old drives in it to play with, three from the old Proliant and two that I was given by a guy in work. Five elderly 9.1gb SCSI drives running at 10,000rpm each generates quite a lot of noise and heat. Fortunately there is a space for a fan on the back of it but the only one I had spare is an inch too small. Still, it does generate some airflow. I think one of the drives may have issues but I'm not sure. There's usually quite a few bundles of pulled server drives on Ebay quite cheaply so I might look into that after next payday.
It's currently running Linux with software RAID enabled as the on-board SCSI built into the dual PIII motherboard doesn't support any form of hardware RAID. I still have the huge full-length PCI array controller from the Proliant which supports all sorts of RAID configurations in hardware, but I'm not sure if it can be configured outside of a Compaq server. Still, might try that some time.
The machine really needs a new case. It's currently in an ultra cheap and crappy black tower which I once savagely attacked with a screwdriver, causing dents and holes. This was quite a while ago when it had a newer but very flaky AMD motherboard in it. The much older PIII motherboard has been rock solid despite being repeatedly experimented on with occasionally bizarre configurations.