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I ran a trace this morning, and, sure 'nuf, it shows the server is now located somewhere northwest of Atlanta. My web hosting provider [Communitech] was bought by a company named Interland. Hopefully Interland will provide service that's just as reliable. Everything seems okay this morning. It actually seems a little zippier than normal. It's not a good feeling when your site disappears. My buddy Evan went to a LAN party today at DefCom3 up in Marina del Rey, where these games are available, running off some 40 PCs. He'll be wearing this shirt and playing Couterstrike. Supposedly they are shutting down the place for "maintenance" and hosting a private party limited to invited guests. More LAN party info is posted at LANPartyCoalition,.. LANParty.com, and BluesNews. Guides to hosting your own LAN party are posted here and here. I've never been to one myself, but people who have say that you get spoiled. A decent Internet connection offers pings of about 50 [milliseconds]. The term ping refers to the time it takes [usually measured in milliseconds] for a signal to make a roundtrip from your PC to where ever the online game you're playing is being hosted [could be anywhere in the world] .. and get back again. LAN connections typically see single-digit pings .. in other words:
~10 times faster than a good Internet connection. That's
what makes playing at a LAN party so cool .. not to mention all the
love that's being shared across those blazing-fast connections.
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With regard to indulging your technolust, I must confess I've been lusting after the new Radeon 9800 Pro graphics card. Currently using the Radeon 8500, which isn't bad, but nothing like the "most visually advanced 3D performer on the planet". They won't be released for a few more days [the 31st]. But I can't see spending $400 on a gfx card [128MB version], especially when they become obsolete so quickly. Actually I don't like paying more than $150. I must have a thousand dollars worth of old gfx cards collecting dust in the closet. Maybe I'll open a museum someday. Anybody remember the Voodoo2-SLI from the now defunct 3Dfx? Perhaps prices of the 9700 Pro will drop when the 9800 comes out. They're still ~$300. The 9800 Pro comes with its own 4-pin power connector, just like your hard drive and CD-ROM. In other words, it requires a lot more juice than a normal gfx card. You can find reviews posted at the Firing Squad, .. Digit-life, [love that red PCB] .. [H]ard|OCP, .. Anand's and many other places. The kids have been bugging me to get one.
Last night I created a Ghost image before updating all my drivers & software programs, including Windows updates. This way, I can go back to my original system configuration if I start experiencing quirky problems. Then I defragged my drives and created a post-update image. If my system continues to run well for a few weeks, I'll delete the pre-update image. I try to do this every few months. Feels therapeutic, like washing the car. I have a folder that contains links to all the sites I need to visit to download these updates. This makes it quick & easy. If I hustle, I can usually be done with everything in ~60-90 minutes, depending on how well things go.
It's clear that you can do a lot with a PC these days without spending a lot of money on software. The average person doesn't need the advanced features offered by professional programs. And some programs, such as TMPGEnc & EAC, are better than anything you can buy. So put away your credit card. Save your money for something like a broadband connection. This way you can download these babies in a flash. In fact, I'm downloading OpenOffice right now: 49.6 MB, 350 KBps.
I guess that's what makes the movies so subjective: the same film I love, you might hate. No harm done. I thot Gangs of New York was the year's best film and it walked away without a single award. What a rip. And how about the music award? Eminem never even sang that song in 8-Mile. They rolled the credits over it at the end while everyone was walking out. He wasn't even there to pick up his Oscar. Sup wit dat? Steve Martin was funny. I cracked up when he said: I just saw the teamsters helping Michael Moore into the trunk of his limo.
I'm predicting Daniel
Day Lewis will win Best Actor, Martin
Scorsese Director, Catherine
Zeta-Jones Supporting Actress, Julianne
Moore Best Actress, Paul
Newman Supporting Actor, Chicago
Cinematography, and Gangs
of New York Best Picture. If wrong, I can always go back
and edit this entry to reflect the true winners. Gonna get together with some friends up in LA and make an event of it. My buddy Frank thinks The Pianist will win Best Picture.
This 'update' was more like a new install. There are lots of files to replace, and if one isn't right, the whole forum won't work. Afterwards, I was sweating bullets when I got a blank page. I knew I shoulda left it alone, I thought. I've done this upgrade enough times to know all the places where something can go wrong. For example, the files must be uploaded using ASCII protocol [in FTP client]. If you use either the Auto or Binary setting, the board won't work. Also, I have a directory named YaBB. One of the board's default settings points to yabb [no caps]. If I don't change that setting to YaBB, it won't work. That one isn't very obvious either. But after tweaking and configuring various settings, it seems to be working okay. I swear the forums seem zippier now, but I'm probaly just imagining it. SP1.2 was released January 27th. I wouldn't have upgraded if they didn't consider it 'critical'.
What I *do* know about is the PCMark 2002 benchmark. I downloaded this freebie last night [8.4 MB] from Download.com. Results for the mighty rad rig are posted here [35KB]. But I'm getting this error message, and can't find the dang files anywhere. Also been getting lots of mail regarding the security-related posts of March 17 & 18. Most interesting is one from Jim Homer who sent a link to a site called Diceware. This site discusses ways of generating passwords [passphrases] that are hard to crack [take longer than 6 minutes with LC4].
I changed my password using this method. LC4 is still working on it [brute force crack]. I'll let you know how long it takes to crack this one. Another reader recommended Hushmail, which I just signed up for. It seems more secure than Ziplip, which I've been using for years. I don't really need such high security. I simply find it interesting. I updated the Radified Guide to Norton Ghost to include a batch file [scroll to bottom of page] sent in by Maurice Taquino. Also Alex sent word that he released a new version [5.3.0.0] of his popular Motherboard Monitor. Grab it here.
A benchmark for a blog: my head is swelling so big I can barely fit thru the front door. If you're not familiar with the term blogging, see here. Only recently did I learn that I've been blogging for years. When Sidney asked me last October [21st]: "What is blogging," I replied: "Not sure, but I think it's British slang for talking about meaningless bullshit." That's obviously before I knew I was doing it. =) Heck, they even have blogging software now [more here]. Everyday I try to add another tidbit of helpful or interesting information. It wasn't that long ago when the site generated virtually no traffic. Now we're close to breaking 1 million hits per month. Blog on, baby!
They still offer a freeware version, but have removed most of its functionality. They probably want to encourage users to upgrade to [read: pay money for] the personal version [US$80, for 1 year, $165 for a perpetual license]. Anyway, I thought I'd upgrade to version 8.0 [released 03dec2002]. What a mistake that was. PGP installs Encrypt & Decrypt buttons [plug-in functionality] to your email client [I use Outlook Express], which allow you to easily encrypt & decrypt your email. With the freeware version of v8.0, these buttons no longer work. Instead a dialogue box pops up saying: This feature isn't available with the freeware version. You need to upgrade to the Per$onal ver$ion for plug-in functionality. I traded a few emails with PGP's "Limited Support" group, asking them what's the point of even releasing the freeware version of v8.0, because it has been stripped of all its good features. Their reply:
If you're using Windows XP, you have no choice but to use the freeware version of PGP v8.0, because v7.03 doesn't support WinXP. Or you have to pay for the personal version, which offers the cool features. If you're using Windows 2000, I recommend you stick with PGP v7.03 [freeware], which is loaded with all the cool features. I actually uninstalled v8.0 and reinstalled v7.03 [Win2000]. My PGP public key is listed with my contact info, linked at the bottom of this main page. I like all that crypto-techno-cyber-geek stuff. Windows 2000 offers a similar Encrypting File Service (EFS), which you can read about both here and here [how to here]. Windows XP Pro offers a similar feature. More info posted here. While we're on the topic of encryption, I also like Digisecret. It's only US$29 and user friendly. Snadboy's Revelation is a nifty utility that allows you to see your passwords hidden behind the stars.
After reading Ice Czar's list of Internet Security related links, I've been playing Rad-Hacker with a few programs such as the LC4 password cracker [uh, "Password Auditing & Recovery Application" for those who have a problem with the word "cracker"] from @stake. LC stands for LOpht Crack. Hardcore hackers teaming up with industry. Thought I had created a tough Windows Administrator password to crack, but LC4 broke it in 6 minutes .. using the brute force crack option [screen shot]. Pretty pathetic, wouldn't you say? I'm using a Pentium4 1.6A CPU overclocked to 2138 MHz. You can download a 15-day trial here. Fun stuff. I found it here. See the Radified Guide to The Best Software Programs and Applications for more cool programs.
I noticed he prefers NOD32 as his Antivirus software of choice. Might have to check that out myself. You can grab a free trial version here. An installation guide is posted here. Speaking of AntiVirus software, I noticed that AVG now offers a free version, which you can use for life (personal use only). I posted my own little ditty on Network security here.
Good movie, great cinematography. The jungles, with an occasional fog, make for gorgeous filmmaking. Worth seeing. I loved the soundtrack. Moody African chants. Depressing in parts showing graphic scenes of man's inhumanity against his fellow man. But that's nothing new. We see it everyday on the six o'clock news. Before the flick, I saw previews for an upcoming film titled Anger Management, starring Adam Sandler & Jack Nicholson. Made me laugh out loud. Admittedly, I have a warped sense of humor, but I'm looking forward to this one. It's so indicative of how bureaucratic systems tend to unwittingly create the very things they attempt to stamp out. You don't have to deal with bureaucracies very long to appreciate the humor in this. They couldn't find two better people than Nicholson & Sandler to drive home the message.
After updating my video card and mouse drivers, the game installed fine. I have a Radeon 8500 gfx card and a P4-1.6a overclocked to 2138 MHz. We created an online subscript account and launched the game. [Kids are so impatient.] The game offers over a dozen different worlds to choose from. The graphics looked surprisingly beautiful. At night, when the monitor is the only source of light in the room, the game look absolutely stunning. It actually feels like you're in another world. Of course, they fight over who plays.
Anyway, I had my first yoga class last weekend. I have worked out in weight rooms and gyms most of my life, but this was the first time I tried yoga. The first thing I noticed was that I was the only guy in the room. Then I noticed how stiff I was compared to everyone else. It became painfully obvious how weak my intrinsic muscles are. I can do squats and bench-presses fine, but these yoga moves kicked my butt. I mean, 7-month pregnant ladies were making me look bad. I was sweating like a pig, but enjoyed the experience. Most compelling is that yoga is a 4,000 year old practice. People were doing yoga over a thousand years before the roots of Western civilization sprouted with Socrates, Plato & Aristotle. It was kind of strange working out while incense was being burned and listening to meditative music. They usually play hard, driving music at the clubs. Yoga is very much in vogue right now here in Southern California.
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