theMediaman.com

Alright, no more excuses. Gotta spend a lunch-break writing in my Blog.

Part of the problem is that I haven’t had much interesting to comment on. I covered the majority of movies for the summer already, I get ragged whenever I put too many “techie” posts, and I can’t even write about “How Much I Hate Toronto” because the last two posts have been about that already. I guess I’ll just wander through the paragraphs and see where this post takes us. (WARNING: this may be a very boring post)

Toby’s moving into the basement apartment of the house Simone and Amanda rent. Now the conspiracies against me begin. The good news is that Toby will have someplace she can disappear to… the last couple of years, she’s co-habitated with friends even though she’s kind of a recluse like me.

She also has a Playstation 2… I’m gonna pick up a copy of Wipeout Fusion. Simone rolls her eyes whenever I mention this, but she’s gonna get more plants, two cats, and a new friend out of the deal.

After a bit of a struggle, (and a lesson learned about 16-bit vs. 32-bit PCMCIA cards) I’ve got the laptop (an AcerNote Light 350PCX) connected to the network. (Back story - I took a whole host of outdated computers and hardware from work to Reboot. My commission was a P120 laptop that was initially to go down too) There were countless problems with the laptop that I had to overcome… the least of which wasn’t that the onboard video had NO drivers for operating systems newer than Windows 95! So if I wanted to install Win98 on it, I’d be stuck at low-resolution, low-quality video.

Considering that a lot of software and hardware require Windows 98SE as a minimum, I wanted to get it on there. I used a program called 98Lite, which lets you select or deselect ALL the features that are normally installed by default in Windows 98. One feature lets you install Windows 98, but run the GUI with a Windows 95 shell… the older shell runs much faster (important, since it’s a slow computer) and lets the display run without a hitch.

The next step would be to find a wireless card - but the challenge is that it has to be 16-bit. They exist, but aren’t common. Should be an interesting hunt! After that, I have to justify to Simone why I need to spend $50 on a battery to replace the dead one that came with the laptop.

…next step after that is overclocking! I’ve read that the laptop can support a Pentium 200MMX, although at the expense of about 50% battery life. The RAM is already maxed out at 40 MB. The hard drive can be expanded to at least 8 GB… but that’s an upgrade I might only do if I want to install a bunch of retro-PC games.

I’m starting to get a record number of SPAMs in my day. I’ve always been careful, but these are all being sent to email addresses posted on my web site, and to the domain registration email - all open to public eyes (and web spiders). I haven’t taken the effort to install anti-spam software, because I want to use it as motivation to rebuild the site. Something I’ve been claiming to consider for the last two or three years (sigh).

Re-casting the site content in a uniform interface, and blocking all the old emails I had posted should cut down my SPAM to the trickle it once was. I may also use the changeover to move my journal from Blogger to some alternative. Doing so might put too many things on my “to do” list, and push the idea away from me… I fear too much work!

And just to get my stance in about Podcasting… I’m vain enough to think that people want to read my blogs, but I’m not vain enough to think that people want to listen to my goofy voice.

Maybe someday, when Podcasting becomes Vidcasting. Wouldn’t that be something? Syndicated, pirate television. Maybe I should start that!