I wonder if this affects all Dell 17" laptops with dual core processor.
I'm going to check this with a digital voltmeter from any screw I can find on the unit to ground, in this case, my kitchen sink faucet. So, I should get some decent voltage here? For the test, the charger will be plugged in, of course. Step two, should the owner of the unit I test report the flaw to Dell, and ask for some sort of replacement? We are going to diagram just what screw(s) is/are "hot" and how many volts. The reason this has not caused a problem is that one would have to hold onto the laptop and touch a hot point, and also be touching a good ground, something that probably won't happen. But, the unit is a hazard if this is true. I'll explain all this to the owner, before running the test. (might not want to test) External screws, etc. should not have dangerous voltage present / to ground.
The test box will be in my shop tomorrow, and I'll have the opportunity to run the test.
Glad to hear that the current 2.x stuff is not affected. I'm using FF 2.0.0.1 now, in my knoppix remaster (see screenshots below), and have other things I need to be doing with the remaster than upgrading FF. I do, however, jump on it and upgrade the browsers whenever they have new versions out. With Firefox, I put 9 RSS feeds on the toolbar by default, and for it's home page, I use a local version of this one, but with a slide-out ~/ menu setup, for browsing the/ramdisk. I notice that Netscape 9 for linux may be released in a couple of months. I'll try it out. Since I usually run my knoppix remaster with a 1 or 2 GB "persistent home" partition, I can easily download it and have it up and running in a few minutes, and can keep it around for a while to see how it does compared to Flock, Firefox and Opera. If it has anything to offer, and is not loaded up with AOL stuff, I might put it in the CD. I still use Netscape 4 on a Macintosh Quadra 660AV, and it seems to do a better job with the web pages than icab 2.99. That version is free, with no time limit, since it is for older Mac systems. Downloads quickly and installs automatically, however. Just a little disappointed in how many of the web pages look, so I tend to stick with Netscape.
I replaced as many incandescent bulbs as possible in my house with these new lights. Sure, there are some left, but I'll go to the store and come back with more! You get used to them quickly, they do have a short hesitation before lighting up, and some require a warm up of a few minutes to reach full light. Most don't. I have one outside in the carport that comes on instantly, but it is an old style florescent, in a circle-shaped package. It really is instant, no problem. On one, you get about 35 watts of light (incandescent) for 7.5 watts. That one cost more, but I love it. Only problem is paying for all the new lights. Most people want a replacement bulb for one that has burned out, the cheapest they can get. The 7.5 wall bulb aforementioned was about $7.00. I hope it lasts forever... The sooner you replace those incandescent bulbs, the more you save. Can't use them on a dimmer controlled circuit, or one with an infared motion detector sensor. Probably not a good idea to replace the incandescents in the refrigerator, mine has several, in freezer also. You can try that, but some compact florescents are dimmer when cold. Here is a good link for information on the new bulbs, and how they can save money. Get to the store, however, to find the less expensive bulbs in 4-packs, etc. That isle will have a lot of interested shoppers, so be forewarned.
There may be plenty of Slashdotters that have done this: I have two separate installations of XP on one Dell 4600, the first one fowled up when the antivirus software somehow became hopelessly corrupted, essentially ruining the installation. So, I got another hard drive, and set up another Windows XP installation. I purchased a different antivirus program. Then, after a while (several months), I went back, and formatted the original partition, and started over there too, with another XP installation. I left the Dell restoration partitions alone, of course. At no time did I have to call Microsoft. Now, will Vista permit me to do something like the above? Office Depot sells Vista Home Premium for $160.00, upgrade, and I would not want to have to go purchase that when doing a repair. The new computers they have for sale today are very attractively priced, with Vista preinstalled. If one "subtracts" $160.00 (cost of Vista HP) from the price of the new boxes, then it begins to at least "look" good, even though it is just smoke and mirrors, in that no one is going to have XP to upgrade here, unless they bought an XP box lately, before the $9.95 upgrade to Vista program got started. (bear with me here) I'll go along with it, and feel good about my purchase of a new computer with Vista preinstalled, as I look over at the Vista upgrade boxes, and their high price tags. "I'm getting a steal", I say to myself. (Here I am playing the part of an average customer) I am well aware that Vista is never going to be as easily re-installed, repeatedly, as MSDOS, Windows 3.1, Window 95 or Windows 98, all of which I have, and have installed many many times. MSDOS just last week. With the kind of money that Microsoft gets for Vista, we should be able to have at least 10 installs, or something to show for our money.
How in the world can it be that Vista will differ from XP in that it won't "go bad" on the user, and require a reinstall? I never thought my Dell 4600 would require such repair, but it did, through no fault of mine.
The first time someone gets bit by this, Linux is going to be worth looking into. (see my screenshots below)
Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time, mostly for bullshit you don't need or want.
I am running my Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, and with Firefox 2.0.0.1, "top" reports my AMD K6-2 is running at 98.4% idle. Let's see what happens when I open GIMP also, with 12 images. I put the size filter on at 500 KB or greater, some images are about 1.5 MB. Now I have "top" showing 98.0% idle. I have 256 MB of RAM, and a generous swap partition, now showing 79624K used.
All I can say is that the new computers that can run Vista, with the reported 30% idle useage are going to be powerhouses, can't wait to get ahold of one, with a dual-core processor, and 2 GB of RAM. My Remaster should be much easier on the hardware.
But, here are the problems, scenarios and challenges that I may face trying to run my 2.4 kernel Knoppix Remaster on these newer machines (Designed for Vista):
1. Won't have drivers for the wireless card on laptops. Especially Dell's with Intel wireless. 2. Have no way to just boot my linux directly from the hard drive, without the CD, as I do with Windows 95-98
and MSDOS computers, using a MSDOS menu, and some loadlin batch files. 3. Can I partition the Windows Vista hard drive with QTParted, and not upset the Vista file system?
I have done that with XP, then only item is XP will want to run "checkdisk" (it that it?) when I reboot into Windows XP after repartitioning. 4. May not be able to get the graphics card to run better than 1024x768, but for me that's OK. (Don't want the text to be so small) 5. Can just do the "toram" knoppix cheatcode on the 1 and 2 GB machines, after booting from the Rapidweather Remaster CD. 6. Security? I have the Guarddog firewall, switched on by default, with dns, http, https, ftp, pop3 and smtp.
Also, all three web browsers run in "control scripts" that delete any ~/.flock, ~/.opera or ~/.mozilla when the browser is closed. (Privacy).
(some time later...) Now, I just closed GIMP, and all the images that were open, and I have "top" showing that the processor is 98.7% idle.
I do hate to see Vista have so many problems, a lot of buyers are going to go home with a new PC with Vista this next week. The Office Depot flyer this week is loaded with lots of Vista PC choices. They sell the Home Premium upgrade for $160.00 and some of the machines sell for $480.00 (toshiba laptop) after the $150.00 mail in rebate. (one rebate, apparently) So, essentially, you get a laptop for $320.00 with preinstalled Vista HP, since you don't have to buy the Vista upgrade for $160.00. (bear with me here).
Yes, I've seen a lot of mention of Ubuntu lately, and I have tried older versions, so today, I downloaded Ubuntu 6.10. Running it as a live cd as a test. I could not get "X" to come up on two machines, admittedly older boxes, but I was "encouraged" by the "386" in the.iso name, rather that "686". Ubuntu uses a "progress bar" similar to what XP has, and on one machine, the progress bar moved for a couple of minutes, then the screen went blank, and I waited for "X" to come up. No deal. The machine, a dual pentium pro 200 mmx with 256 MB of RAM, can run Red Hat Linux 9. The other box, a HP 6330 with a 400 MHZ AMD K6-2 processor, and 128 MB of RAM started Ubuntu, but after a minute or so, the progress bar "froze", and that was that. Apparently I need to run Ubuntu 6.10 on a P4 HT, (I have one) with a GB of RAM, and a 128 MB ATI graphics card. I did try the "low graphics safe mode" to see if that helped, it didn't. Not that I am being critical of a mention here of Ubuntu, but I did want to throw my cards on the table for all to see. Neither one of those boxes would run XP, of course, but I expected to at least get something to show up. I did have bad luck installing FC 6 on the P4 HT (dual boot) also, so I am batting zero on the Gnome interface distros.
the symbolic file link I love 'em. Use them as much as I can to reduce the size of the default items in/ramdisk for my livecd linux (screenshots below). More room, then, when Firefox 2.0.0.1 is started, with it's ~/.mozilla. That said, when Firefox is closed, I remove the ~/.mozilla (everything) to reclaim/ramdisk space, and for privacy/security reasons. The "files" that the symbolic link points to are "read only" since they are in the CD, and cannot be changed themselves, but can be deleted and replaced with something else in the/ramdisk. As a result of using these links for/ramdisk, my default/ramdisk is only one quarter of the size of the default one in Damn Small Linux, for instance.
I do recommend using a livecd linux to see how it goes. Detecting your hardware, coming up with a decent "X", sound, network, and so forth. Installing linux to the hard drive is not a safe option for those who do not know how to do this, here I recommend trying it on a spare machine. Spare machines are hard to come up with, since XP, and now Vista are more or less married to the machine. Who would want to experiment with your nicely set up XP box? I tried FC6 dual boot with XP and had to give up, took hours to restore XP, since I did hose the ntldr. Did use my livecd linux to look around in the filesystem and see what I needed to do with the Dell restore CD. On my older PC's I do use Windows 98, or preferrably MSDOS 6.21 to do a poor man's install of my live cd linux with some loadlin batch files, and a MSDOS menu to select. On boxes with small monitors, I have an additional choice, 800x600, instead of 1024x768. I use QTParted to partition the drive, and usually put the main filesystem knoppix folder in a 1 GB partition, have a swap partition, and put a 1 GB "persistent home directory" image in the Windows or DOS partition. So, with XP, or Vista, I would just run the livecd linux with the "toram" knoppix cheatcode boot option, that would work well on boxes with a GB of RAM. I notice in today's paper, Office Depot and others have tons of new Vista laptops and desktops for sale, in their flyer. A lot have only 512 MB of RAM, that might result in a "slow" Vista, I suppose.
While working in the California desert in the 1960's, I was told that the Navaho Indians had "peyote cookies" that they could carry with them on the job site, away from the reservation. I never saw the cookies, my friend just pointed to the Indian workers, and said that they had them. The Indians looked normal to me, none of them were doing anything strange at the time. Perhaps some of them had the peyote cookies, but not all of them, I don't know. Here is a link with some info on what peyote has, and does for people.
I suppose Walmart wants a stable 100% OS to run their system on, and Microsoft wants Walmart to only stock Windows boxes in the retail stores. They have some linux boxes on their website for sale, but probably don't want to try and sell those in a store. Somebody is likely to pick one up, buy it, then bring it back with a lot of questions before Walmart has to give them a refund. That says something about the customers, and linux also. So called Linux boxes as they exist today don't belong in a retail environment where buyers looking for a "computer" are going to put them in the shopping basket and head to checkout. No secret that Microsoft knows that, and has to "dumb down" their operating system by keeping it "closed source" in order to successfully sell it to every Tom, Dick and Harry. It's dumb, in that getting "X" to run is no problem. Imagine a help desk at Walmart "XF86Config Help, 10AM to 2PM". or "Sound Help, 4PM to 10PM" Without Windows, that's what Walmart would face.
(The above discussion has totally ignored the Viruses and Trojans that beset Windows, but hey, Walmart ignores them too!)
Last time I remember it snowing here with large flakes that had some discernible pattern to them was nearly 40 years ago. The snowflakes were big, nearly 2.5 - 3 inches in diameter, and fell slowly from the sky. Impossible to hold onto a few of them and see if any matched. Didn't try, really.
I have not used my Quadra 660AV lately, the battery died, and I am too lazy to get a new one. I don't remember anything about Appletalk, perhaps the version of the Mac OS I had was too old. I'll have to fix the machine, boot it up, and hunt around. Mainly, I used the voices in the Quadra, as I have said before here, that is a big timewaster, but fun.
I just looked at the online Weekly World News, and got lost trying to find the "Hillary Names Bigfoot As Her Running Mate" story. Guess I'll have to subscribe.
I'm not sure, but I have noticed the same thing when comparing Debian 2.2 to some of the later Linux distros that use a 2.6 kernel. The older kernels use less RAM to start up, probably because they have fewer features, drivers, etc.
I have stayed with the 2.4 kernel in my knoppix remaster, because a lot of my older computers would get really slow with a 2.6 kernel. Undoubtedly, Vista has a "heavy" kernel. Mossberg said some machines would run very slow using some of the features that Vista has. Yes, I do have a subscription to the WSJ, and read (most of it) Mossbergs column early today.
Apparently Microsoft does not have that much control over how much RAM and what processor speed (dual-core, etc.) that the manufacturers computers will be using when they put Vista on them. As soon as the Christmas buying season was over, the story about needing a dual-core and a gig of ram surfaced, probably leaving a lot of buyers stuck with something less. Just because they get an upgrade coupon for $9.95 shipping and handling to Vista would lead these hapless buyers to think that their computer is OK, but it's not, according to the Post_Christmas announcement.
I know of a case where XP was preloaded on boxes offered at Walmart stores, with only 128 MB of RAM, and they were reported to be very slow. Combine that with Dial-Up, and you get an unhappy XP user.
Microsoft winds up in league with greedy merchants, trying to offer something that it is not, to buyers that are wanting to pay bottom dollar for their new computer. "You get what you pay for", sure, but there is some deception here to my way of thinking.
I use both Windows 98 and MSDOS 6.21 to boot my Knoppix remaster from the hard drive. I don't use both on the same computer, If I installed Windows 98 for some reason that now escapes me, then I use Windows 98 "dos" with a set of loadlin batch files and a menu to boot up from the hd.
If I want to avoid Windows on a box that I am just going to run my remaster, or perhaps RHL 9 (dual boot), then I just install MSDOS, and put all the necessary loadlin and menu files in place, and I am good to go.
I always have MSDOS edit in the menu that comes up from autoexec.bat, so I can take care of any problems with the batch files, or if there are some changes to be made.
I like to use both Windows and Linux operating systems on the same box, but I suppose all that will go by the wayside one day when Vista comes standard on all boxes. Won't be installing it on everything like I do now with '98 or msdos. I usually get donated boxes, or ones that "won't boot", or are obsolete when the owner or business gets all new computers. So, I get Windows preinstalled, but I can install Win 3.1, Win 95 and 98 myself if necessary.
I have figured out how to have two complete installations of Windows XP on the same computer, dual boot with the ntldr screen. Sure takes care of the problem of other user's desktop icons showing up on everyones desktop, when only one installation of XP is on the box, and a few "user" accounts are set up. If you don't like AOL, then you get your own clean installation, with no aol.
About the Macintosh computers, I have had lots of fun with my Quadra, and the voices. Big time-waster.
With my Knoppix remaster, I do like to have all three web browsers in the LiveCD, Firefox, Opera and Flock, and I keep them up to date. I have some screenshots below, some are not entirely up to date, however, but I am sure you will enjoy the girls in the wallpapers. My Wallpaper Control Center in the remaster has a set of buttons to download and install wallpapers from my server. One click, that's all. I have redone all these with GIMP, here is a sample. The idea is that I'll change the wallpapers on the server from time to time, they are not in the liveCD, just the software to "install" them in the running linux system.
I just wanted to point out that there are lots of us out there that enjoy and use both Linux and Windows. I'm sorry to read all the bad press about the zombie Windows Computers, (it's true, sadly). We would not have all these relatively cheap PC's to run Linux on, if it were not for Bill Gates getting Windows preinstalled on almost all boxes from the beginning. (regardless of how). I would not want to see the end of Microsoft because of virus problems, but would welcome a more secure Microsoft Linux OS preinstalled to the degree that we have Microsoft Windows today.
I have Opera 9.10 in my Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, a live cd linux. In addition, I run the browser inside of a "control script" that allows the user to recover if the browser crashes, this being in addition to the normal Opera setup for that purpose. If one closes the browser, the script asks, using a dialog box, if the user wanted to close the browser, yes or no, and if no, then the ~/.opera directory is retained in/ramdisk, and the user gets a dialog box to restart the browser (later, if desired), with the current ~/.opera.
I like Opera, and have it preconfigured with 12 RSS newsfeeds. I trust Opera to do the right thing when it comes to security, although I have added some security of my own. Mostly this was done for those that do some online banking, and want to close the browser when finished, but keep the linux system up and running, perhaps for days. Opera is supposed to be a little lighter to run than Firefox or Flock (especially Flock), so I like to have it in the CD. I have Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.1, and Flock 0.7.9.1, all set up the same way, although Flock does not have any RSS feeds of my own built in. Do some banking, then switch browsers, closing one.
Once the user decides to finally close Opera, then the entire ~/.opera directory is deleted from/ramdisk. Starting Opera once again gets a default ~/.opera placed in/ramdisk, that I have customized.
In addition to all of that, one can run any of the web browsers without any of my preconfigured ~/.mozilla, ~/.opera, or ~/.flock, using the menu. Then you get the default configuration, according to the web browser makers setup. Change it to suit yourself, keep that config if you run a "persistent home directory" (OEM knoppix)
Until I can walk into Office Depot, Compusa, or Best Buy and find two computer sections, those with Windows, and those with Linux, there is no competition.
If it's not in the store, it is not competition.
And, any computer sold to the general public needs to be able to boot up to a desktop by just pressing the power button. No complicated questions, just a desktop, with all applications, including the all-important web browser(s), available with a click of the mouse.
Also, the price needs to be down there, no other isles full of machines hundreds of dollars cheaper. They go for the price first, and the features next.
Apple has that reversed, so are shut out of lots of sales.
Having been to California, and seen for myself, quite of bit of it is mountains, and high desert. I can't imagine how much the sea would have to rise to swallow up all of that. And, if it did, now much of the rest of the world would be left. Someone needs to draw a map of what sea levels it would take to cover 50% of California, and what coastlines would be worldwide as a result. Also, would there be enough ice at the poles to melt and provide the water for the sea level at the 50% of California point. Other item would be a population-displacement figure worldwide at the 50% of California point, and whether or not these people would actually be able to relocate to a habital place, and would they need constant food/drinking water/shelter supply by those not displaced, and if that supply effort is possible, or not. Al Gore's slide show on GW says 100's of millions displaced at a 20 ft sea-rise level, question is, would 20 ft rise cover 50% of California. Could California stand a 50% water coverage if only that population is involved, not others from outside California. Would an event such as this with a minimum of 10 years to occur allow California's population to readjust, or would it take more time to get sufficient infastructure in place to support the 35 million (or so) Californians in their new, reduced land area? Perhaps a substantial number of Californians would migrate to Utah, Oregon, etc. as they have done recently to avoid high cost of living. Would those States be "safe" from rising sea levels, or not.
Sure, they are rich, but can they create something like one of the many flavors of Linux? No fair outsourcing that to India, they have to do it themselves.
If they cannot create anything, then the next thing that comes their way is:
You can try a live cd linux, that runs off the cdrom drive and motherboard memory. Mine, Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, is designed to run well on older computers, that originally had Windows 98 on them. You can keep Windows 98, and run the live cd to try it out. I have a rather lengthy Getting Started Guide here, and screenshots of the linux system are below in my signature. An application is included to partition the Windows 98 hard drive, to provide a swap area, to improve performance. There's more to it, I do routinely run from the hard drive, with a "poor man's install", where the entire/knoppix filesystem is copied to a hard drive partition, and you run the linux system from there. My computer: I have an AMD K6-2 processor running at about 400 mhz, and 256 MB of memory on the motherboard. That's all that is needed, so we have a way of using rather old computers to run the linux system, but not too old. The minimum is 128 MB of RAM, with a 200 MHZ processor. Once you have your hands on the CD, you may copy it and run it on all of the school's computers. The linux system is primarily designed to run the three major web browsers, with broadband. I have Mozilla Firefox, Flock, and Opera. Main drawbacks with a live cd linux is that all of the hardware may not be detected correctly, in my case I could not use a Gigabite NIC card, had to go with a less-expensive 10/100 card. With a live cd linux, you are limited in what programs and applications that can be added, very limited. It is almost like the filesystem is "set in stone". That's good in a way, the users cannot alter or foul up the linux installation to the degree that Windows can be tampered with. I do use a loadlin batch file setup, and use Windows 98 "DOS" to make a menu that appears when the computer is turned on, so the user can select from Windows 98 or Linux. The CD is no longer needed, and in fact, the CDROM drive can be removed from the computer, once the system is set up. These batch files can be altered so Windows is not a choice, only the administrator would know how to get past the menu and boot the Windows installation. Technically, a live cd linux can "see" the Windows partition, and harm can be done to the system if anyone figures out how to get into the Windows area and start deleting or altering files. No viruses can enter the linux filesystem, so if it is used to surf the web, the school can save on "antivirus" software. There is a free UNIX virus scanner that can be downloaded and installed in the linux filesystem, that can scan the entire hard drive. I have used it, but most of my computers are rather clean of viruses, so I have yet to find anything. Once various hard drive partitions are set up, one can be for a "persistent home directory" that will allow downloaded files to be retained on the hard drive for use from day to day. Examples are pdf files, or other documents obtained from web sites. For instance, if you find a nice article on a particular science topic on a web site, it's possible to save the entire page, locally, and return to it later. Usually one just "selects all" in a web page full of useful information, and saves it to a file, using the included "emelFM" file manager and SciTE editor. I do that all the time, usually with something like confirmation e-mails on online bill pay. Lots of possibilities once one gets used to working with linux.
Best thing about a live cd linux remains that it is (or can be) "temporary", and when the computer is turned off, it's gone. Your Windows installation remains, untouched.
Dell computer is an example of a PC vendor that preloads Windows.
Once that is done, it is up to Dell to provide (and they have decided that they will) the customer with sufficent restoration media/partitions to allow (and they do) a complete reinstall of Windows, should the original become unusable in the eyes of the customer. There has been some talk, for instance, about the Dell notebook Inspiron E1505 shipping with too much software, and bogging the machine down, even with 2GB of RAM, and the Intel Dual core processor. I have personally deleted and then set back up the/dev/hda2 partition on one of these, to ntfs, and then used the Dell restoration CD to access the restoration partitions, and bring Windows back up. I say that, because most of the drivers are not in the restoration partitions, and I had to obtain them from the Dell support site, which works very well. Did that on another computer, saved the various driver files to a memory stick, to transfer to the Inspiron. I could not get on the internet with the restored XP as it was set up using the provided Dell restoration CD. Such items as the R114079.exe, the Intel chipset software, and the R113310.exe, for the Broadcom 440x 10/100 integrated controller. There were many others, and Dell does provide most of them. I did use a Kanotix livecd to give me a list of the hardware, I did not know, for instance, that my graphics card was a Radeon Mobility X1400, did find that driver on Dell support. I got the wireless driver from Intel, and that works fine. Point is, Microsoft did perhaps "force" Dell to install XP, but it was the customer's choice to have me nuke the partition, and start over, and Dell's responsibility to assist me in that. The Dell restoration CD did not completely, (not even 30%) put XP back as it was. Apparently has something to do with all of the various hardware configs on the Inspiron, not all the same, and the restoration partitions being rather generic. This does not entirely reflect on Microsoft, but more on Dell. The average computer owner could not manage to do all that's required to set the partition back up in a proper fashion, so the machine will run much better than it did when shipped. The owner did comment that the machine is now very satisfactory, and he is pleased. I did save all of the downloaded drivers and utilities (flash the bios to latest version, upgrade the restoration partitions, etc.) so this procedure could be repeated if desired. An added note, I did use QTParted to do some of the work, I'm allowed to "name" a partition there, the Dell restoration CD did not. OEM restoration partitions are named, so I wanted mine named also. As always, in the end, Microsoft does allow PC's to be shipped with all of the hardware working, something that is not happening in some versions of Linux. For instance, does the sound work? Wireless card? Old problem, but offtopic.
Ham operators are allowed 1kw in transmitter power, the antenna is either up on the roof, or outside strung between trees or poles. I ran 35 watts in the '50's, and my transmitter's signal could reach Pakistan. Popular broadcast frequencies included the 20 meter ham band, lots of high powered transmitters were there. Older band was 40 meters, surplus aircraft receivers could be had for a few bucks to cover that band. The 40 meter band was about 7 mhz, the 20 meter band was 14 mhz. There were others. Lots of technically-minded people exposed to these frequencies, and no big revelations so far as to all of them getting sick, cancer, etc. from that. As a matter of fact, the Titanic had a state-of-the-art spark gap transmitter, broadcasting that SOS, but only a few could listen back then. All ships since then have powerful transmitters, the passengers are more likely to get sick from viruses, food-bourn illnesses than radiation from the ship's transmitter.
I thought one has a choice in Firefox preferences, one is to allow the browser to "download" a list of "known phishing sites" to use. The other is to allow Google to check each site the user goes to. In my livecd linux, I preset most of the preferences, and do not just provide the default Firefox setup.
(See Screenshots, below) I decided to not use the "downloaded" list, since it was large, and probably going to get bigger. That list would then be part of my ~/.mozilla, in/ramdisk in a livecd linux. I did not want that, I'm trying to have a livecd linux that runs well on 128 MB boxes, of 400 MHZ or so. The only way around that is to have the user set up a "persistent home directory" on a hard drive partition, I often use 1 GB or so, then the/ramdisk as shown by "df" remains 540 out of 199324 on a 256 MB box, the "persistent home" gets everything, downloads, added applications such as f-prot, etc. Having a user set up a "persistent home" is not going to happen in most cases, tech types will do that, but those who just plop the CD in the drive and are lucky enough to have a broadband connection to surf with, won't do that, or set up a swap partition. I do have a swap partition creation notice/application come up at boot time for those with 128 MB and no swap detected. Most shy away from that, even though it is harmless enough on typical older Windows 98 boxes, and would make the livecd linux run much better from then on.
I do hope the phishing detector isn't needed for the users, even though IE and Firefox decided it was time. Every time I see a phishing site, I can tell by the misspelled words. Some are pretty obvious. Didn't want to preset the Google check preference, either, some might object.
knoppix will work on the Dell Dimension E521, no problems. I googled as suggested, and within minutes found that out. Seems Dell is determined to make non-standard PC's. I have a Dell 4600, run my knoppix remaster all the time, but I did have to add a second hard drive to run it off/dev/hda6 in a "poor man's install", where the/knoppix folder, (in my case is 492 MB) is copied to the hard drive partition of your choice the first time you boot the CD.
Use the knoppix cheatcode "tohd=/dev/hda6).
Dell's OEM hard drive is identified as hde, which was probably done to prevent something like knoppix from running from a partitioned hde. So, the reason for the second drive, in my case a 200 GB.
-- Rapidweather
Bill Gates is a hero too. Without the easy-to-use Windows (I'm talking Windows 3.1 here), preinstalled on millions of computers, we would not have all these boxes to run Linux on. The key is the lowest common denominator, turn the box on and it boots to a colorful desktop with Solitare, Notepad, and Paint. Out the door it goes, money in the merchants pocket as the excited owner drives off.
Thank you, Bill Gates for my PS-1 with Windows 3.1 preinstalled. I bought it for $5.00 at a thrift store when the original owner tired of it, quickly, I might add. I stayed up all night putting Red Hat Linux 6 on it, with a 25 mhz bus, it did take that long.
Linus would not be a hero if there were no easily-affordable Windows computers out there. Only Main Frames, I suppose, programmed with colored wires in the back. No one knows if the program works until the next morning.
Now, with the Intel Dual Core boxes hitting the streets, I wonder if my livecd linux will run on one. May not have a driver in the kernel for the wifi setup, but who knows. I'd rather swap ethernet cards than recompile the kernel to put a driver in there. Anyway, I do have something to work with, thanks to Bill Gates.
(Side note to Bill himself, who reads all on Slashdot: I'd appreciate a copy of Vista when you have time...)
Slashdot Mirror
I wonder if this affects all Dell 17" laptops with dual core processor.
I'm going to check this with a digital voltmeter from any screw I can find on the unit to ground, in this case, my kitchen sink faucet. So, I should get some decent voltage here? For the test, the charger will be plugged in, of course.
Step two, should the owner of the unit I test report the flaw to Dell, and ask for some sort of replacement?
We are going to diagram just what screw(s) is/are "hot" and how many volts.
The reason this has not caused a problem is that one would have to hold onto the laptop and touch a hot point, and also be touching a good ground, something that probably won't happen. But, the unit is a hazard if this is true. I'll explain all this to the owner, before running the test. (might not want to test)
External screws, etc. should not have dangerous voltage present / to ground.
The test box will be in my shop tomorrow, and I'll have the opportunity to run the test.
Rapidweather
Glad to hear that the current 2.x stuff is not affected. I'm using FF 2.0.0.1 now, in my knoppix remaster (see screenshots below), and have other things I need to be doing with the remaster than upgrading FF. I do, however, jump on it and upgrade the browsers whenever they have new versions out. With Firefox, I put 9 RSS feeds on the toolbar by default, and for it's home page, I use a local version of this one, but with a slide-out ~/ menu setup, for browsing the /ramdisk.
I notice that Netscape 9 for linux may be released in a couple of months. I'll try it out. Since I usually run my knoppix remaster with a 1 or 2 GB "persistent home" partition, I can easily download it and have it up and running in a few minutes, and can keep it around for a while to see how it does compared to Flock, Firefox and Opera. If it has anything to offer, and is not loaded up with AOL stuff, I might put it in the CD. I still use Netscape 4 on a Macintosh Quadra 660AV, and it seems to do a better job with the web pages than icab 2.99.
That version is free, with no time limit, since it is for older Mac systems. Downloads quickly and installs automatically, however. Just a little disappointed in how many of the web pages look, so I tend to stick with Netscape.
Rapidweather
I replaced as many incandescent bulbs as possible in my house with these new lights.
Sure, there are some left, but I'll go to the store and come back with more!
You get used to them quickly, they do have a short hesitation before lighting up, and some require a warm up of a few minutes to reach full light. Most don't.
I have one outside in the carport that comes on instantly, but it is an old style florescent, in a circle-shaped package. It really is instant, no problem.
On one, you get about 35 watts of light (incandescent) for 7.5 watts. That one cost more, but I love it.
Only problem is paying for all the new lights. Most people want a replacement bulb for one that has burned out, the cheapest they can get. The 7.5 wall bulb aforementioned was about $7.00. I hope it lasts forever...
The sooner you replace those incandescent bulbs, the more you save. Can't use them on a dimmer controlled circuit, or one with an infared motion detector sensor. Probably not a good idea to replace the incandescents in the refrigerator, mine has several, in freezer also. You can try that, but some compact florescents are dimmer when cold.
Here is a good link for information on the new bulbs, and how they can save money.
Get to the store, however, to find the less expensive bulbs in 4-packs, etc.
That isle will have a lot of interested shoppers, so be forewarned.
Rapidweather
There may be plenty of Slashdotters that have done this:
I have two separate installations of XP on one Dell 4600, the first one fowled up when the antivirus software somehow became hopelessly corrupted, essentially ruining the installation. So, I got another hard drive, and set up another Windows XP installation. I purchased a different antivirus program. Then, after a while (several months), I went back, and formatted the original partition, and started over there too, with another XP installation. I left the Dell restoration partitions alone, of course.
At no time did I have to call Microsoft.
Now, will Vista permit me to do something like the above? Office Depot sells Vista Home Premium for $160.00, upgrade, and I would not want to have to go purchase that when doing a repair.
The new computers they have for sale today are very attractively priced, with Vista preinstalled.
If one "subtracts" $160.00 (cost of Vista HP) from the price of the new boxes, then it begins to at least "look" good, even though it is just smoke and mirrors, in that no one is going to have XP to upgrade here, unless they bought an XP box lately, before the $9.95 upgrade to Vista program got started. (bear with me here)
I'll go along with it, and feel good about my purchase of a new computer with Vista preinstalled, as I look over at the Vista upgrade boxes, and their high price tags. "I'm getting a steal", I say to myself.
(Here I am playing the part of an average customer)
I am well aware that Vista is never going to be as easily re-installed, repeatedly, as MSDOS, Windows 3.1, Window 95 or Windows 98, all of which I have, and have installed many many times.
MSDOS just last week.
With the kind of money that Microsoft gets for Vista, we should be able to have at least 10 installs, or something to show for our money.
How in the world can it be that Vista will differ from XP in that it won't "go bad" on the user, and require a reinstall? I never thought my Dell 4600 would require such repair, but it did, through no fault of mine.
The first time someone gets bit by this, Linux is going to be worth looking into. (see my screenshots below)
Rapidweather
Vista will still peg your processor at around 30% most of the time, mostly for bullshit you don't need or want.
I am running my Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, and with Firefox 2.0.0.1, "top" reports my AMD K6-2 is running at 98.4% idle. Let's see what happens when I open GIMP also, with 12 images. I put the size filter on at 500 KB or greater, some images are about 1.5 MB. Now I have "top" showing 98.0% idle.
I have 256 MB of RAM, and a generous swap partition, now showing 79624K used.
All I can say is that the new computers that can run Vista, with the reported 30% idle useage are going to be powerhouses, can't wait to get ahold of one, with a dual-core processor, and 2 GB of RAM. My Remaster should
be much easier on the hardware.
But, here are the problems, scenarios and challenges that I may face trying to run my 2.4 kernel Knoppix Remaster
on these newer machines (Designed for Vista):
1. Won't have drivers for the wireless card on laptops. Especially Dell's with Intel wireless.
2. Have no way to just boot my linux directly from the hard drive, without the CD, as I do with Windows 95-98
and MSDOS computers, using a MSDOS menu, and some loadlin batch files.
3. Can I partition the Windows Vista hard drive with QTParted, and not upset the Vista file system?
I have done that with XP, then only item is XP will want to run "checkdisk" (it that it?) when I reboot into Windows XP after repartitioning.
4. May not be able to get the graphics card to run better than 1024x768, but for me that's OK. (Don't want the
text to be so small)
5. Can just do the "toram" knoppix cheatcode on the 1 and 2 GB machines, after booting from the Rapidweather Remaster CD.
6. Security? I have the Guarddog firewall, switched on by default, with dns, http, https, ftp, pop3 and smtp.
Also, all three web browsers run in "control scripts" that delete any ~/.flock, ~/.opera or ~/.mozilla when the browser is closed. (Privacy).
(some time later...)
Now, I just closed GIMP, and all the images that were open, and I have "top" showing that the processor is 98.7% idle.
-- Rapidweather
I do hate to see Vista have so many problems, a lot of buyers are going to go home with a new PC with Vista this next week. The Office Depot flyer this week is loaded with lots of Vista PC choices. They sell the Home Premium upgrade for $160.00 and some of the machines sell for $480.00 (toshiba laptop) after the $150.00 mail in rebate. (one rebate, apparently) So, essentially, you get a laptop for $320.00 with preinstalled Vista HP, since you don't have to buy the Vista upgrade for $160.00. (bear with me here).
.iso name, rather that "686".
Yes, I've seen a lot of mention of Ubuntu lately, and I have tried older versions, so today, I downloaded Ubuntu 6.10. Running it as a live cd as a test.
I could not get "X" to come up on two machines, admittedly older boxes, but I was "encouraged" by the "386" in the
Ubuntu uses a "progress bar" similar to what XP has, and on one machine, the progress bar moved for a couple of minutes, then the screen went blank, and I waited for "X" to come up. No deal.
The machine, a dual pentium pro 200 mmx with 256 MB of RAM, can run Red Hat Linux 9.
The other box, a HP 6330 with a 400 MHZ AMD K6-2 processor, and 128 MB of RAM started Ubuntu, but after a minute or so, the progress bar "froze", and that was that.
Apparently I need to run Ubuntu 6.10 on a P4 HT, (I have one) with a GB of RAM, and a 128 MB ATI graphics card.
I did try the "low graphics safe mode" to see if that helped, it didn't.
Not that I am being critical of a mention here of Ubuntu, but I did want to throw my cards on the table for all to see. Neither one of those boxes would run XP, of course, but I expected to at least get something to show up.
I did have bad luck installing FC 6 on the P4 HT (dual boot) also, so I am batting zero on the Gnome interface distros.
-- Rapidweather
the symbolic file link /ramdisk for my livecd linux (screenshots below). More room, then, when Firefox 2.0.0.1 is started, with it's ~/.mozilla. That said, when Firefox is closed, I remove the ~/.mozilla (everything) to reclaim /ramdisk space, and for privacy/security reasons. /ramdisk. /ramdisk, my default /ramdisk is only one quarter of the size of the default one in Damn Small Linux, for instance.
I love 'em. Use them as much as I can to reduce the size of the default items in
The "files" that the symbolic link points to are "read only" since they are in the CD, and cannot be changed themselves, but can be deleted and replaced with something else in the
As a result of using these links for
--Rapidweather
I do recommend using a livecd linux to see how it goes. Detecting your hardware, coming up with a decent "X", sound, network, and so forth.
Installing linux to the hard drive is not a safe option for those who do not know how to do this, here I recommend trying it on a spare machine. Spare machines are hard to come up with, since XP, and now Vista are more or less married to the machine. Who would want to experiment with your nicely set up XP box?
I tried FC6 dual boot with XP and had to give up, took hours to restore XP, since I did hose the ntldr. Did use my livecd linux to look around in the filesystem and see what I needed to do with the Dell restore CD.
On my older PC's I do use Windows 98, or preferrably MSDOS 6.21 to do a poor man's install of my live cd linux with some loadlin batch files, and a MSDOS menu to select.
On boxes with small monitors, I have an additional choice, 800x600, instead of 1024x768. I use QTParted to partition the drive, and usually put the main filesystem knoppix folder in a 1 GB partition, have a swap partition, and put a 1 GB "persistent home directory" image in the Windows or DOS partition.
So, with XP, or Vista, I would just run the livecd linux with the "toram" knoppix cheatcode boot option, that would work well on boxes with a GB of RAM.
I notice in today's paper, Office Depot and others have tons of new Vista laptops and desktops for sale, in their flyer. A lot have only 512 MB of RAM, that might result in a "slow" Vista, I suppose.
-- Rapidweather
While working in the California desert in the 1960's, I was told that the Navaho Indians had "peyote cookies" that they could carry with them on the job site, away from the reservation. I never saw the cookies, my friend just pointed to the Indian workers, and said that they had them. The Indians looked normal to me, none of them were doing anything strange at the time. Perhaps some of them had the peyote cookies, but not all of them, I don't know.
Here is a link with some info on what peyote has, and does for people.
I suppose Walmart wants a stable 100% OS to run their system on, and Microsoft wants Walmart to only stock Windows boxes in the retail stores. They have some linux boxes on their website for sale, but probably don't want to try and sell those in a store. Somebody is likely to pick one up, buy it, then bring it back with a lot of questions before Walmart has to give them a refund. That says something about the customers, and linux also. So called Linux boxes as they exist today don't belong in a retail environment where buyers looking for a "computer" are going to put them in the shopping basket and head to checkout.
No secret that Microsoft knows that, and has to "dumb down" their operating system by keeping it "closed source" in order to successfully sell it to every Tom, Dick and Harry. It's dumb, in that getting "X" to run is no problem.
Imagine a help desk at Walmart "XF86Config Help, 10AM to 2PM". or "Sound Help, 4PM to 10PM"
Without Windows, that's what Walmart would face.
(The above discussion has totally ignored the Viruses and Trojans that beset Windows, but hey, Walmart ignores them too!)
Last time I remember it snowing here with large flakes that had some discernible pattern to them was nearly 40 years ago.
The snowflakes were big, nearly 2.5 - 3 inches in diameter, and fell slowly from the sky.
Impossible to hold onto a few of them and see if any matched. Didn't try, really.
I have not used my Quadra 660AV lately, the battery died, and I am too lazy to get a new one.
I don't remember anything about Appletalk, perhaps the version of the Mac OS I had was too old.
I'll have to fix the machine, boot it up, and hunt around.
Mainly, I used the voices in the Quadra, as I have said before here, that is a big timewaster, but fun.
I just looked at the online Weekly World News, and got lost trying to find the "Hillary Names Bigfoot As Her Running Mate" story. Guess I'll have to subscribe.
I'm not sure, but I have noticed the same thing when comparing Debian 2.2 to some of the later Linux distros that use a 2.6 kernel. The older kernels use less RAM to start up, probably because they have fewer features, drivers, etc.
I have stayed with the 2.4 kernel in my knoppix remaster, because a lot of my older computers would get really slow with a 2.6 kernel.
Undoubtedly, Vista has a "heavy" kernel.
Mossberg said some machines would run very slow using some of the features that Vista has. Yes, I do have a subscription to the WSJ, and read (most of it) Mossbergs column early today.
Apparently Microsoft does not have that much control over how much RAM and what processor speed (dual-core, etc.) that the manufacturers computers will be using when they put Vista on them.
As soon as the Christmas buying season was over, the story about needing a dual-core and a gig of ram surfaced, probably leaving a lot of buyers stuck with something less.
Just because they get an upgrade coupon for $9.95 shipping and handling to Vista would lead these hapless buyers to think that their computer is OK, but it's not, according to the Post_Christmas announcement.
I know of a case where XP was preloaded on boxes offered at Walmart stores, with only 128 MB of RAM, and they were reported to be very slow. Combine that with Dial-Up, and you get an unhappy XP user.
Microsoft winds up in league with greedy merchants, trying to offer something that it is not, to buyers that are wanting to pay bottom dollar for their new computer. "You get what you pay for", sure, but there is some deception here to my way of thinking.
I use both Windows 98 and MSDOS 6.21 to boot my Knoppix remaster from the hard drive.
I don't use both on the same computer, If I installed Windows 98 for some reason that now escapes me, then I use
Windows 98 "dos" with a set of loadlin batch files and a menu to boot up from the hd.
If I want to avoid Windows on a box that I am just going to run my remaster, or perhaps RHL 9 (dual boot), then I just install MSDOS, and put all the necessary loadlin and menu files in place, and I am good to go.
I always have MSDOS edit in the menu that comes up from autoexec.bat, so I can take care of any problems with the batch files, or if there are some changes to be made.
I like to use both Windows and Linux operating systems on the same box, but I suppose all that will go by the wayside one day when Vista comes standard on all boxes. Won't be installing it on everything like I do now with '98 or msdos.
I usually get donated boxes, or ones that "won't boot", or are obsolete when the owner or business gets all new computers. So, I get Windows preinstalled, but I can install Win 3.1, Win 95 and 98 myself if necessary.
I have figured out how to have two complete installations of Windows XP on the same computer, dual boot with the ntldr screen. Sure takes care of the problem of other user's desktop icons showing up on everyones desktop, when only one installation of XP is on the box, and a few "user" accounts are set up. If you don't like AOL, then you get your own clean installation, with no aol.
About the Macintosh computers, I have had lots of fun with my Quadra, and the voices. Big time-waster.
With my Knoppix remaster, I do like to have all three web browsers in the LiveCD, Firefox, Opera and Flock, and I keep them up to date. I have some screenshots below, some are not entirely up to date, however, but I am sure you will enjoy the girls in the wallpapers. My Wallpaper Control Center in the remaster has a set of buttons to download and install wallpapers from my server. One click, that's all. I have redone all these with GIMP, here is a sample.
The idea is that I'll change the wallpapers on the server from time to time, they are not in the liveCD, just the software to "install" them in the running linux system.
I just wanted to point out that there are lots of us out there that enjoy and use both Linux and Windows.
I'm sorry to read all the bad press about the zombie Windows Computers, (it's true, sadly).
We would not have all these relatively cheap PC's to run Linux on, if it were not for Bill Gates getting Windows preinstalled on almost all boxes from the beginning. (regardless of how).
I would not want to see the end of Microsoft because of virus problems, but would welcome a more secure Microsoft Linux OS preinstalled to the degree that we have Microsoft Windows today.
I have Opera 9.10 in my Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, a live cd linux. /ramdisk, and the user gets a dialog box to restart the browser (later, if desired), with the current ~/.opera.
/ramdisk. /ramdisk, that I have customized.
In addition, I run the browser inside of a "control script" that allows the user to recover if the browser crashes, this being in addition to the normal Opera setup for that purpose. If one closes the browser, the script asks, using a dialog box, if the user wanted to close the browser, yes or no, and if no, then the ~/.opera directory is retained in
I like Opera, and have it preconfigured with 12 RSS newsfeeds.
I trust Opera to do the right thing when it comes to security, although I have added some security of my own.
Mostly this was done for those that do some online banking, and want to close the browser when finished, but keep the linux system up and running, perhaps for days. Opera is supposed to be a little lighter to run than Firefox or Flock (especially Flock), so I like to have it in the CD.
I have Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.1, and Flock 0.7.9.1, all set up the same way, although Flock does not have any RSS feeds of my own built in. Do some banking, then switch browsers, closing one.
Once the user decides to finally close Opera, then the entire ~/.opera directory is deleted from
Starting Opera once again gets a default ~/.opera placed in
In addition to all of that, one can run any of the web browsers without any of my preconfigured ~/.mozilla, ~/.opera, or ~/.flock, using the menu. Then you get the default configuration, according to the web browser makers setup. Change it to suit yourself, keep that config if you run a "persistent home directory" (OEM knoppix)
-- Rapidweather
Until I can walk into Office Depot, Compusa, or Best Buy and find two computer sections, those with Windows, and those with Linux, there is no competition.
If it's not in the store, it is not competition.
And, any computer sold to the general public needs to be able to boot up to a desktop by just pressing the power button. No complicated questions, just a desktop, with all applications, including the all-important web browser(s), available with a click of the mouse.
Also, the price needs to be down there, no other isles full of machines hundreds of dollars cheaper.
They go for the price first, and the features next.
Apple has that reversed, so are shut out of lots of sales.
Having been to California, and seen for myself, quite of bit of it is mountains, and high desert.
I can't imagine how much the sea would have to rise to swallow up all of that.
And, if it did, now much of the rest of the world would be left.
Someone needs to draw a map of what sea levels it would take to cover 50% of California, and what coastlines would be worldwide as a result. Also, would there be enough ice at the poles to melt and provide the water for the sea level at the 50% of California point.
Other item would be a population-displacement figure worldwide at the 50% of California point, and whether or not these people would actually be able to relocate to a habital place, and would they need constant food/drinking water/shelter supply by those not displaced, and if that supply effort is possible, or not.
Al Gore's slide show on GW says 100's of millions displaced at a 20 ft sea-rise level, question is, would 20 ft rise cover 50% of California.
Could California stand a 50% water coverage if only that population is involved, not others from outside California. Would an event such as this with a minimum of 10 years to occur allow California's population to readjust, or would it take more time to get sufficient infastructure in place to support the 35 million (or so) Californians in their new, reduced land area?
Perhaps a substantial number of Californians would migrate to Utah, Oregon, etc. as they have done recently to avoid high cost of living. Would those States be "safe" from rising sea levels, or not.
No fair outsourcing that to India, they have to do it themselves.
If they cannot create anything, then the next thing that comes their way is:
"A fool and his money are soon parted"
When all the money is gone, that's it.
Creativity and imagination are the real wealth, upon which all new and desirable goods and services depend.
Well, almost, anyway.
You can try a live cd linux, that runs off the cdrom drive and motherboard memory. /knoppix filesystem is copied to a hard drive partition, and you run the linux system from there.
Mine, Rapidweather Remaster of Knoppix Linux, is designed to run well on older computers, that originally had Windows 98 on them. You can keep Windows 98, and run the live cd to try it out. I have a rather lengthy Getting Started Guide here, and screenshots of the linux system are below in my signature.
An application is included to partition the Windows 98 hard drive, to provide a swap area, to improve performance.
There's more to it, I do routinely run from the hard drive, with a "poor man's install", where the entire
My computer: I have an AMD K6-2 processor running at about 400 mhz, and 256 MB of memory on the motherboard. That's all that is needed, so we have a way of using rather old computers to run the linux system, but not too old. The minimum is 128 MB of RAM, with a 200 MHZ processor.
Once you have your hands on the CD, you may copy it and run it on all of the school's computers.
The linux system is primarily designed to run the three major web browsers, with broadband. I have Mozilla Firefox, Flock, and Opera.
Main drawbacks with a live cd linux is that all of the hardware may not be detected correctly, in my case I could not use a Gigabite NIC card, had to go with a less-expensive 10/100 card. With a live cd linux, you are limited in what programs and applications that can be added, very limited. It is almost like the filesystem is "set in stone". That's good in a way, the users cannot alter or foul up the linux installation to the degree that Windows can be tampered with.
I do use a loadlin batch file setup, and use Windows 98 "DOS" to make a menu that appears when the computer is turned on, so the user can select from Windows 98 or Linux. The CD is no longer needed, and in fact, the CDROM drive can be removed from the computer, once the system is set up. These batch files can be altered so Windows is not a choice, only the administrator would know how to get past the menu and boot the Windows installation.
Technically, a live cd linux can "see" the Windows partition, and harm can be done to the system if anyone figures out how to get into the Windows area and start deleting or altering files.
No viruses can enter the linux filesystem, so if it is used to surf the web, the school can save on "antivirus" software. There is a free UNIX virus scanner that can be downloaded and installed in the linux filesystem, that can scan the entire hard drive. I have used it, but most of my computers are rather clean of viruses, so I have yet to find anything.
Once various hard drive partitions are set up, one can be for a "persistent home directory" that will allow downloaded files to be retained on the hard drive for use from day to day. Examples are pdf files, or other documents obtained from web sites. For instance, if you find a nice article on a particular science topic on a web site, it's possible to save the entire page, locally, and return to it later. Usually one just "selects all" in a web page full of useful information, and saves it to a file, using the included "emelFM" file manager and SciTE editor. I do that all the time, usually with something like confirmation e-mails on online bill pay.
Lots of possibilities once one gets used to working with linux.
Best thing about a live cd linux remains that it is (or can be) "temporary", and when the computer is turned off, it's gone. Your Windows installation remains, untouched.
Rapidweather
Dell computer is an example of a PC vendor that preloads Windows.
/dev/hda2 partition on one of these, to ntfs, and then used the Dell restoration CD to access the restoration partitions, and bring Windows back up. I say that, because most of the drivers are not in the restoration partitions, and I had to obtain them from the Dell support site, which works very well. Did that on another computer, saved the various driver files to a memory stick, to transfer to the Inspiron. I could not get on the internet with the restored XP as it was set up using the provided Dell restoration CD. Such items as the R114079.exe, the Intel chipset software, and the R113310.exe, for the Broadcom 440x 10/100 integrated controller. There were many others, and Dell does provide most of them. I did use a Kanotix livecd to give me a list of the hardware, I did not know, for instance, that my graphics card was a Radeon Mobility X1400, did find that driver on Dell support. I got the wireless driver from Intel, and that works fine.
Once that is done, it is up to Dell to provide (and they have decided that they will) the customer with sufficent restoration media/partitions to allow (and they do) a complete reinstall of Windows, should the original become unusable in the eyes of the customer.
There has been some talk, for instance, about the Dell notebook Inspiron E1505 shipping with too much software, and bogging the machine down, even with 2GB of RAM, and the Intel Dual core processor.
I have personally deleted and then set back up the
Point is, Microsoft did perhaps "force" Dell to install XP, but it was the customer's choice to have me nuke the partition, and start over, and Dell's responsibility to assist me in that. The Dell restoration CD did not completely, (not even 30%) put XP back as it was. Apparently has something to do with all of the various hardware configs on the Inspiron, not all the same, and the restoration partitions being rather generic. This does not entirely reflect on Microsoft, but more on Dell.
The average computer owner could not manage to do all that's required to set the partition back up in a proper fashion, so the machine will run much better than it did when shipped.
The owner did comment that the machine is now very satisfactory, and he is pleased.
I did save all of the downloaded drivers and utilities (flash the bios to latest version, upgrade the restoration partitions, etc.) so this procedure could be repeated if desired.
An added note, I did use QTParted to do some of the work, I'm allowed to "name" a partition there, the Dell restoration CD did not. OEM restoration partitions are named, so I wanted mine named also.
As always, in the end, Microsoft does allow PC's to be shipped with all of the hardware working, something that is not happening in some versions of Linux. For instance, does the sound work? Wireless card? Old problem, but offtopic.
Ham operators are allowed 1kw in transmitter power, the antenna is either up on the roof, or outside strung between trees or poles. I ran 35 watts in the '50's, and my transmitter's signal could reach Pakistan.
Popular broadcast frequencies included the 20 meter ham band, lots of high powered transmitters were there. Older band was 40 meters, surplus aircraft receivers could be had for a few bucks to cover that band. The 40 meter band was about 7 mhz, the 20 meter band was 14 mhz. There were others.
Lots of technically-minded people exposed to these frequencies, and no big revelations so far as to all of them getting sick, cancer, etc. from that.
As a matter of fact, the Titanic had a state-of-the-art spark gap transmitter, broadcasting that SOS, but only a few could listen back then. All ships since then have powerful transmitters, the passengers are more likely to get sick from viruses, food-bourn illnesses than radiation from the ship's transmitter.
I thought one has a choice in Firefox preferences, one is to allow the browser to "download" a list of "known phishing sites" to use. The other is to allow Google to check each site the user goes to. /ramdisk in a livecd linux. I did not want that, I'm trying to have a livecd linux that runs well on 128 MB boxes, of 400 MHZ or so. The only way around that is to have the user set up a "persistent home directory" on a hard drive partition, I often use 1 GB or so, then the /ramdisk as shown by "df" remains 540 out of 199324 on a 256 MB box, the "persistent home" gets everything, downloads, added applications such as f-prot, etc.
In my livecd linux, I preset most of the preferences, and do not just provide the default Firefox setup.
(See Screenshots, below)
I decided to not use the "downloaded" list, since it was large, and probably going to get bigger. That list would then be part of my ~/.mozilla, in
Having a user set up a "persistent home" is not going to happen in most cases, tech types will do that, but those who just plop the CD in the drive and are lucky enough to have a broadband connection to surf with, won't do that, or set up a swap partition. I do have a swap partition creation notice/application come up at boot time for those with 128 MB and no swap detected. Most shy away from that, even though it is harmless enough on typical older Windows 98 boxes, and would make the livecd linux run much better from then on.
I do hope the phishing detector isn't needed for the users, even though IE and Firefox decided it was time. Every time I see a phishing site, I can tell by the misspelled words. Some are pretty obvious. Didn't want to preset the Google check preference, either, some might object.
-- Rapidweather
knoppix will work on the Dell Dimension E521, no problems. I googled as suggested, and within minutes found that out. Seems Dell is determined to make non-standard PC's. I have a Dell 4600, run my knoppix remaster all the time, but I did have to add a second hard drive to run it off /dev/hda6 in a "poor man's install", where the /knoppix folder, (in my case is 492 MB) is copied to the hard drive partition of your choice the first time you boot the CD.
Use the knoppix cheatcode "tohd=/dev/hda6).
Dell's OEM hard drive is identified as hde, which was probably done to prevent something like knoppix from running from a partitioned hde. So, the reason for the second drive, in my case a 200 GB.
-- Rapidweather
Bill Gates is a hero too.
Without the easy-to-use Windows (I'm talking Windows 3.1 here), preinstalled on millions of computers, we would not have all these boxes to run Linux on.
The key is the lowest common denominator, turn the box on and it boots to a colorful desktop with Solitare, Notepad, and Paint. Out the door it goes, money in the merchants pocket as the excited owner drives off.
Thank you, Bill Gates for my PS-1 with Windows 3.1 preinstalled. I bought it for $5.00 at a thrift store when the original owner tired of it, quickly, I might add. I stayed up all night putting Red Hat Linux 6 on it, with a 25 mhz bus, it did take that long.
Linus would not be a hero if there were no easily-affordable Windows computers out there. Only Main Frames, I suppose, programmed with colored wires in the back. No one knows if the program works until the next morning.
Now, with the Intel Dual Core boxes hitting the streets, I wonder if my livecd linux will run on one.
May not have a driver in the kernel for the wifi setup, but who knows. I'd rather swap ethernet cards than recompile the kernel to put a driver in there.
Anyway, I do have something to work with, thanks to Bill Gates.
(Side note to Bill himself, who reads all on Slashdot: I'd appreciate a copy of Vista when you have time...)
-- Rapidweather