Upgrade downtime
Inside Dope Industries just received some major technological firepower in the form of a new Dell XPS 700 computer which will doubtless come to take over everything in time.
It, like all the others before it, is so massively fast, capable, and has so much storage space that it will be the last computer I'll ever need. Why not, the last 3 have been.
The massive logistical and physical challenge involved in changing over the old system to the new will likely involve all my patience, cunning, and mental endurance over the weekend.
It's kind of like taking off in a space capsule. I expect to be back, but with such massive technological challenges ahead, all of which have to work perfectly, and even worse, depends on me doing things correctly and in the right order, who knows?
I don't anticipate it will take too long, and I hope that's not overly optimistic.
If all goes well, I should be back on line maybe in a day or so. (maybe sooner)
But in the meantime, I will be completely off-line. This means no posting, no e-mail, and comments won't be posted. You can still leave comments, of course, but they won't be moderated and posted until I return online.
For the geeky out there, allow me to boast a bit. The rest can safely skip the following mumbo jumbo.
The new TID command central features:
- Intel Core2 Duo Duel Core technology processor at 2.67 GHz, 1066 front side bus & 4MB cache
- 4 GB DDR2 SDRAM memory at 667 MHz
- dual 256MB NVidia GeForce 7900GS video cards
- Serial ATA 2 performance RAID 0 w/ dual 320 GB hard drives totaling 640GB
- Second hard drive at 180GB
- External hard drive at 250 GB
- over 1 terrabyte (1000GB) storage total
- Windows XP Media Center w/ free upgrade to Windows Vista Premium
- 13 in 1 media card reader & floppy drive
- Creative Labs X-FI PCI suround sound audio card
- Dual TV tuner w/ remote (can record one channel while watching another)
- Dual 48x CD player plus 16x DVD+/-RW double sided recorder
- alluminum chassis w/ two temp controlled fans, adjustible LED illumination with choice between 8 colors
- 8 USB and 3 firewire ports, and lots of other cool junk that's too technical for me to understand.
This rig better scream. And at about 70 lbs, I hope I don't drop it on my toes.
posted by The Inside Dope @ 11/03/2006
19 comments
19 Comments:
Dope,
Wondering, what are your thoughts on the Democrats taking over the House and the Senate?
Will it happen?
I certainly don't have any special insight into what will happen in 5 days, and my opinion is just as valid as yours, but....
From what I've seen and read, I think....
The Dems take the house and end up with a 8-10 seat majority.
The Dems really have to run the table to take the senate. If everything falls their way in the swing races, they'd only be up by two.
Frankly, I'm kind of shocked that Harold Ford Jr. isn't polling ahead at this point and may actually lose his race. But of course, I suppose I'm not giving Tenneseeans enough credit for just how racist they are.
Missouri between Talent and McCaskill is too close to call as well, though I'd think McCaskill should have a decent poll margin by now, but she doesn't.
It looks like old Lieberman has his "joementum" back, unfortunately, and whether he'll be a loyal Dem is doubtful at best, despite his assurances.
Santorum is toast, Allen's race is tighter but if there's any justice, he'll go down too.
The moderate Republican Chafee in R.I. is behind and looks to lose.
New Jersey is tight and needs to go Dem with Menendez.
Bottom line? MAYBE a one vote majority.
And what's the wild card in all of this?
Well, of course whatever party gets more people to the polls. In this area, the CW is that Republicans have a much more sophisticated targeting and mobilization effort in place and should do well.
But the real wild card is Karl Rove. He seems confident beyond what the polls indicate, and with Diebold and the others on his side, and many sec. of state tight with the W.H. as well, I truly fear that they definiltely have some contingency plans in place to tinker with the electronic votes.
There are literally hundreds of ways to prevent people from voting, manipulating the count, etc. And if you think Rove et. al. are above it, think again.
I only hope that the watchdog organizations are effective in spotting and hopefully preventing vote fraud.
Overall, I think it's going to be a good night for Dems, certainly in the House and Governorships as well.
But anything can happen, and usually does, as the line goes.
Well, here goes.....
I'm going to initiate the transition sequence.....
Wish me luck.
I'll be off line until I come through on the other end sometime within the next day or so. (I hope)
Racist in Tennessee?
What, if a black Democrat loses a race, it's because of racism????
Unless you're big into computer gaming (like I am), what in the world do you need to be messing with SLI dual video cards for?
Apparently your ads make a lot more money than mine...
: )
It's overkill most likely. I'm definitely not into gaming at all. My idea of "gaming" is playing chess or monopoly. I don't even own any games.
But this configuration was offered and it was actually the least expensive graphics configuration, if you can believe that.
Apparently there are kids (and adults) out there who will literally spend 6 or 7 thousand bucks on systems just to make their games look good. They offered dual 500 something MB cards. I think that option cost over $800 alone!
I sure wasn't going to go there. I also thought I might want to go with dual monitors, or a monitor and TV if I can figure out how to set it up.
This came with a dual TV tuner thing with a remote which allows you to use your computer like a digital VCR I guess. I've yet to set it up, and actually I now think that I'll have to upgrade my TV as well, due to the fact that you have to connect your TV via an S-Video cable, and my TV has no S-Video jack.
Maybe I'll have to go to Radio Shack and hope I get lucky and find a clerk who knows what they're talking about. Maybe there's some adaptors or something I could use to get by.
I've got way way way way way too much other stuff to figure out and adjust and set up and install, etc.
Down the line I'll try to figure all that stuff out.
The software I bought that promised to make migrating programs and settings from one box to the other has proven to be a nightmare.
I only have one monitor so I have to go back and forth between the computers and each time switch the monitor, mouse, and keyboard. UGH.
And of course I have to shut everything down, etc.
The program has to be running on both computers to work and they're connected by a very slow USB cable.
After getting all the files ready to move, and starting to move them, it turned out that the program would take... get this... 46 hours to transfer all the data! (about 166GB)
It had been running for about 8 hours when the connection dropped. So I've about given up on it.
Windows has a settings transfer "wizard" but I'm not sure how that works either, and it too would require me moving monitor, mouse and keyboard cables back and forth.
All the previous times I've upgraded, I've simply taken out the hard drives from the old computer and stuck them in the new box, then transfered what I wanted, stuck in the next one, etc.
That worked fine, except of course it didn't install any programs. That's one reason I went with this software was that it says it actually transfers programs whole and that they'll be ready to work... no re-installation.
Anyway, I actually spent like two hours taking both computers down and laying them open and taking out one HD from the old box and getting it all positioned in the new one..... only to find that they've gone to a different system for cables and that I couldn't freaking plug in my old drive!! Arrrgh.
And they had the old ribbon cable available and the old power plug, but it would only reach to within like 1/8 an inch of where it needed to be. JUST shy of being able to work.
I could have tried to disconnect one of the optical drives and hooked the HD in it's place, but I was afraid it would get all messed up and so I just gave up.
Then I had to go back, switch the monitor back and forth and start the transfer again. But it wouldn't work right and I ended up having to switch cables back and forth about 3 times, and during one attempt, the old computer went crashing to the floor pulling cables along with it and dumping a can of pop all over itself. There was actually a puddle of liquid around the freaking power cable on the back of the box!
I tell you... it's so fun.
So now the transfer program lost it's connection, I'd have to go through the struggle to connect all these cables way in back against the wall and get both programs going again, and then hope that they keep running without interuption for another TWO FREAKING DAYS and then my stuff would be transfered.
You have to set up the program on the new computer, switch everything over to the old one, run the program there, start the transfer, then switch everything back to the new one so I can at least work on configuring the thing while the files transfer.
A lot of work and hassle.
But MAN is this thing scary fast. Wow!
I went to Windows Update to bring the new system up to speed and it had literally 43 updates, including IE7
It downloaded and installed ALL of them in less than 5 minutes!
Stuff that use to be heavy lifting for my old system is done in an instant.
But there's so much to figure out. It's the new XP Media Center edition and that's a big bunch of stuff to wade through, and of course I have to go through and try to uninstall all the crap that was bundled with it that I don't want.
And about 28 GB of old files have been transfered, but not the settings and not all the files, so I'm kind of half alive.
Better get back to business and see if I can get this mess straightened out.
OH... I'd bet the farm that my ads don't make much more than yours. I think the revenue from TID probably paid for one of the connecting cables. ha!
TID,
Again, how about the Tennessee racism comment? Are you really saying that if a black person loses, it must be due to racism?
Please explain...
I think a large part of the reason that Harold Ford Jr. is behind is due to ingrained racism, as witnessed by the fact that the RNCC ran an ad accusing Ford of fooling around with.... shudder... white women.
I think it hurt him, it appealed to racist stereotypes, and Ford is behind.
Not too complicated really. Surprised you couldn't figure that out on your own.
It's certainly not that Ford is too liberal, that's for certain.
The RNCC did not run such an ad, come on now!
So, the talk of Obama running for President can't be accurate - racism would not allow for that, would it?
Are you truly sitting there arguing that racism doesn't exist in politics?
What the hell are you thinking?
You think there's not a lot of people who would NEVER vote for a black person even if he was Lincoln in blackface?
Come on.. pull you head out.
Even seasoned political analysts and professionals acknowledge that a black candidate in places like Tennesee have to have about 5 extra margin points to win compared to a white candidate.
I'm not sure why you're being so pissy over this, unless you're actually trying to suggest that racism no longer exists, in which case you're a fool.
And by the way, the Republicans sure the hell DID run an ad like that, which was recently voted the very worst negative ad out of hundreds, so bad that they were forced to pull it.
Are you serious, or just playing dumb?
Dear Dope,
I love your site. One question: How did you become such a Dope?
If you'll tell me that, I'll tell you how I became so Awesome!
Sincerely,
Awesome Goddess
Goddess,
Years of hard work, tenacity, struggle, perserverance, suffering, and a lot of luck.
And a real masochistic streak.
Your turn.
Dope, I never said that racism does not exist, however, do NOT point a finger at Republicans.
Bush has far more blacks in his cabinet than Clinton ever did, ever thought of.
The Republicans have pushed for black Presidential nominees (Powell, now Rice).
So, please, do not play that 'Republican racism' game. It just does not sell anymore - and you live up to the Dope name when you try to sell it...
You've revealed your ignorance and stupidy by trotting out Powell and Rice as somehow proof that the Republicans are no longer the party of racists.
You're willfully ignorant. Look around. What party do racists and bigots support? Yep. Republicans.
What party did a Klan official decide to run with not long ago, yep... Republican.
What party has Trent Lott saying that if old Strom Thumond, who got a black servant pregnant, by the way, who ran on a strict segretationist platform for president, Lott said the country would have "been a whole lot better off" if Thurmund would have won. Lott, need I remind you, is the former Republican Senate Majority leader.
What party's conventions routinely have only a handful of black delegates? Is it the Democrats? Sorry, it's the Republicans who had to import blacks and turn their 2000 convention into a minstrel show of blacks performing for a lily white convention.
Even J.C. Watts, the lone black Republican, quit the party in disgust of the way he was treated.
The Republican party, lest I remind you, is where all the racist Dems ran after the civil rights era, and where they've lived comfortably ever since.
You're too willfully blind to even deal with.
Give it up.
Powell and Rice... Good God what a lame argument.
Is that why Bush was the first president for decades to refuse to address the NAACP?
Are all blacks idiots for having an approval rating for Bush around 1 or 2%? Is that just by accident?
Or is it because they know the score?
Don't even insult me and my readers by trying to suggest that the Republican party does not have a very large and very influential racist constituency.
JC Watts did not quit the Republican Party. You are an idiot - if he quit the Republican Party, he would have remained in office and switched. He chose his family over politics and left Congress.
With your entire ramblings, you seem to point a lot of fingers, yet neglect to discuss the issue that I brought forth - the poor record of Democrats when in power to act on their minority beliefs - shocking that you did this...
Every time you post, it seems as though you feel that if you blather on long enough, the crap that you type will somehow become reasonable.
Watts left because though he was handed a prominent leadership position, he was constantly undercut and not allowed to have any real power. He was being treated like a token, in other words, and it got so bad he quit.
If you're so gullible that you believe the old line about quitting to "spend more time with my family", then you're a fool. Watt's has since had his hand in so many pies on TV and in his business interests (one of which which markets informercials on how to get access to government welfare for companies) I doubt he sees his family more than once a month if that.
I don't blame you for being grumpy. After all, the country is about to kick you and your party in the face. The Republicans have been such miserable failures that even about a billion dollars worth of bought and paid for media and an army of shills and all the lies in the world can't prop up their phony house of cards any longer.
You can call my responses "ramblings", but I think that's just that you can't focus long enough on the unpleasant truth that they contain.
I cited numerous blatant examples, facts, by the way, that point to how the Republican party is the party of racists, and you quibble about J.C. Watts, and throw up Powell and Rice.
Not good. I'd say you lost fair and square. Nothing left to do but criticize my "ramblings", "blather", and "crap", never mind that it's all true, and absolutely disproves your point.
You come on here challenging me to defend a statement I made. I respond, and now you're goofy enough to criticize me for providing too much of a defense, evidently.
Gee, sorry.
I could have gone on much longer. I mean, it's not tough to come up with examples of why, while all Republicans aren't racist, nearly all racists are Republicans.
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