Begone!

Okay, so I haven’t been posting cause I don’t have a computer!
Its coming Tuesday so don’t worry.

I’ll try to post more when I have time, finals are coming up so that could be a problem too.

Have Fun While I’m Gone.

Firey Laptops, Oh My!

Yesterday, I was using my HP laptop, and it decides that it has to light on fire!
So I’m typing up a History Outline, and all of a sudden, my screen turns dark. Usually, I just fidget with the hinge and it fixes, but this time, it turns rainbow colored.

I’m freaked out, so I close the laptop, and open it and see if it works. It does, but there’s one small white sliver across the screen. I fidget with the hinge ONE MORE TIME.

Bad Choice…
The Hinge lights on fire! I pick it up and extinguish it (thankfully). I’m not burned and totally fine, but I wonder what a hazard this is. I could have lighted my whole house on fire?

What a inconvenience HP as been to me….
No laptop, and a crappy replacement. Woo hoo.

Update: HP

FINALLY!
HP’s case manager decides to get off vacation and start helping me. I call him on Wednesday, and miss him, but the next day, get him to finally help me.
At first, he believes that getting the crappy Compaq is a great idea, but I convince him otherwise (customers always right!).
He agrees, and begins to send a replacement for the replacement, a HP dv5t Special Edition , which I believe is far superior.
Intel > AMD, and everything else is the same.

Too bad, they have to customize the laptop to make it to my laptop’s specifications but I should receive this great replacement in 12-15 business days (which I think is HP’s code for 1-2 months).

HP Laptop Issues….

Okay. So basically, this is a rant about my issues with HP over 2 months. We’ll start from the beginning.

So about the end of August, I get this wonderful laptop! The HP dv5 1004nr . Too bad they no longer sell it. After using this computer in school for about 3-4 months, I’m loving it and its working perfectly. Suddenly one random day, my left-side hinge (you know how the HP hinges are a full bar, not to separate hinges) becomes loose and over a couple days, starts to disconnect from the screen. So I immediately think, “WARRANTY!”. I go on HP Chat, they’re really nice and setup a free mail-in.
I get my computer back all fixed up and in 3 short days so I was extremely surprised. However, in 2 weeks, the hinge breaks again. Go to HP Chat again, they guarantee it will not break again.
Send it in, receive it in 3 days. I have to complement on how fast they work, but….

THEY RETURN IT UNFIXED.

So I think that HP got so lazy and became implementing a we fix, you assemble program. I mean, my screen case was cracked open (that snapped right back), the hinge was open (that didn’t snap back) and worst of all the hinge was still loose. Dang it.

HP Chat one more time. Yay they escalate to a case manager and he says he’ll replace my unit. Woopee!
So a week later, a replacement unit comes. I was excited until I realized that it was a different computer turns out it is the Compaq CQ60z-200
I immediately hated the computer. NO sexy touch buttons at the top. Just a stupid o’ power button and wireless button.
The keyboard has a number pad! Who uses a number-pad on their laptop? I’m not a shop clerk, what do I need it for?
No sexy remote control? Darn.
1 headphone port instead of 2. No watching movies/listening to music with my friends.
No HDMI!!! I guess no more videos/pictures on the T.V
Worst of all, its almost 2 inches bigger than my last computer. Way to save my back when I carry it around school all day.

Today, I call the case manager line. I spend 30 minutes being transferred from case manager 8 to 19 and then to some Spanish lady then the phone disconnects and I have to redial. I dial a random extension and the man named Hugo helped me! Finally they tell me that they’ll escalate the problem because my original case manager is on VACATION. Wow!
Hopefully I’ll get a phone call in 24 hours (if they keep their promise).

Can I get some help please HP??

Computer Prank

Here is a great prank that I pulled on my brother for April Fools Day!

First, a program that you’ll need is Tight VNC . This program allows you to connect to another computer on the network, and use it like a remote desktop if you have the ip address and password.

After downloading and installing it, there should be a Server and Viewer. The VNC Server is for the computer you want to be the one controlled. Viewer allows you to access the computer and control it from a remote location. Basically this is the perfect setup for a prank!

So when opening the server, you should see this:

Keep all the settings the same, and set a password. Then go to the command prompt by Run then typing “cmd”. Type “ipconfig” to find your ip address. You’ll have to use that for the viewer

Then go to your other computer and run the viewer.

Type the IP-Address of the computer. You can only do this for computers on your network, not from other locations.
After typing the IP-Address, it will prompt you for the password. Then, you’ll have access to the victims computer. Beware, the background turns blue, so they might recognize something is going on. However, it will scare the heebie jeebies out of them!

Have Fun!

Terabyte Drives

Yesterday, we thought it would be a good idea to get a External Hard Drive for our old vintage COMPAQ computer with only 40 GBs of Hard Drive space. So far I think its worth it, even if the price will go down in the future. We got the Seagate 1TB External Hard Drive. So far, I’ve only used about 20 gigs of it, for picture and such. I have no idea what to use the rest for, seems like a waste at this moment, but I’ll probably figure it out.

To make it especially useful, I use the network to share the use of the Drive. Connect it to the computer, then share it on the network using the router. Then, I can access it from the 4 laptops at my house, and move files to backup and save other files, instead of taking up space on the computers. However, the only issue is that moving a 2 gigabyte file took about an hour, which could pose a problem to fill the entire 900 gigs left. (450 hours!?)

Sporcle!

While with a friend the other day, I found Sporcle! Its basically a random quiz site, with hundreds you can choose from. It ranges from so many topics, like pokemon to presidents of the united states. What I find most interesting though is that it gives you stats on what people missed most and what people got most. Its pretty entertaining. Check it out: Sporcle!

Internet Explorer 8

Internet Explorer 8 was released! However, since my computer runs a 64 bit Windows, I am unable to install it. I’d say its quite a failure on Microsoft’s part, they created 64 bit in the first place and they can’t even support it.

Doesn’t seem that good though. It completely failed the Acid3 test.

Courtesy of louisvolant, flickr

Definitely not a download for me yet. I’m sticking with Firefox, or even the new Safari 4 Beta . But, its good that Microsoft is finally getting in the browser competition.

Rainmeter

Enhance your desktop with Rainmeter! I was looking at lietk12’s blog I created my own Rainmeter desktop. (Actually he found Rainmeter off of me. =P)
Again, it uses low computer resources, so it runs fast. Most importantly, it gives you a smooth look to your desktop. Try it!

This was made with 10-Foot HUD, Enigma , and HUD.Vision . (To install themes, go to C:\Program Files\Rainmeter\Skins and put the theme folder there. Then right-click the rainmeter icon to change the Config.)
Also, the dock at the bottom is RocketDock with the Stacks Docklet and Lucid Icons

MacHack!

Mac’s are known for not getting viruses very easily. Scary thing is, this is about to change. Charlie Miller was able to hack a Mac and get full control of it in one day! The craziest thing about this: he won 5,000 dollars for it. Full article here: Thanks Engadget!

Also, from this competition, seems as if Google Chrome is now the safest browser… hmmm.

In other news, I came across a cool program NaDa! Check it out! NaDa (Seriously….)
Also, desktops with Rainmeter are starting to pop up! Check out the “new” desktop: Rainy’s Rainmeter