This is sorta relevant to the topic at hand...
Notice when you goto the mall and you see a sign that says you can have a chance at winning a nice new shiny car parked there. All you have to do is fill out a form with your personal info and drop it in the box. You can find similar setups with other free giveaways. I'm not surprised to see the dropbox full of forms with all kinds of details that marketers love. No one hardly gives a second thought to give away where they live and how much they make just to get a few baubles and trinkets in return.
I hate to say it, but most schools are not interested in anything but the newest technology. They think only the latest bells and whistles are required. That's too bad, because old computers can still do a perfect job.
I don't mind taking it old computers, but I prefer the older, the better.
Midrange PCs can still be fixed up and given away to those in need or who want an extra one.
I will say though, that many places are quite picky when offered free and functioning computers. If it's older than 2 years old, one can't even give it away! I think old Powermacs and Pentium II class computers are still perfectly usable these days.
Yea, I remember having an application stop responding and the system would become essentially unresponsive. Sometimes control+escape would do it if you hit it 100 times. I was told the problem was the single input queue which must mean something important. In any event, the other apps would run just fine, it's just that you couldn't do anything to fix the apparent lockup!
The BEST way to get around this was to install WATCHCAT. If the WPS was unrepsonsive, you could hit a hotkey and get a chance to kill the hung application. Saved me plenty of times! Only problem was that running through a KVM caused problems though.
Actually, OS/2 on an IBM PS/2 was a perfect combination. Installing on my old 9595A server was so easy and didnt need any driver disks or anything. Pretty snappy even on a P60 and 128meg.
heh, this is my favourite topic to discuss...
We don't need no stupid studies on this, as it is so obvious. People talking on the phone and driving are more careless, distracted and make more driving errors and I don't care what anyone else says. I do a lot of driving and when one sees a car drifting, swerving, going too slow, missing their right of way, cutting others off, or generally driving reckless, (IMO) it's almost always someone using their phone. Being a bit ADD, I prefer not to do it and will either not answer or will turn off to talk as I will concentrate on either driving or talking, but not both!
Especially pathetic are those using the PTT mode and holding the phone way out in front of them but high up enough so the driver can see both the phone and the road and/or driving way too slow whilst they look in the mirror for a time to move over to another lane while talking away.
I've always been bemused by the fact that people feel they must be accessable at all times. Imagine 15 years ago? Life went on just fine without phones everywhere. The cartalk guys are right!
I'm sure some sellers make a small profit not by selling junk, but adding excessive shipping and bogus handling charges to make money. Needless to say, I never bid on anything like that. I always make a point to mention in my auctions that I ship fedex ground which is cheaper than usmail, and I don't add in any bullshit shipping charges.
A friend of mine sent me a URL to Sanyo (IIRC) or some company that made home appliances, and on the main page of the items shown, it said each was Y2K compatible. I wonder why they felt that had to be included. Were they that stupid, or was it done to allay customers' fears that potentially anything would just quit working and catch on fire unless it was certified compliant? Or maybe they were just in on the hype or was done as a subtle sarcastic joke. I think I even emailed the company about it. Wish I had copied some of the pages to show later.
I seem to remember reading a magazine that talked about the first Macintosh and upgrading it to a Fat Mac (512k) was ~$500. Using a 512k model or a plus without a hard drive is not that bad, but having a second floppy drive is almost mandatory.
I don't think a computer would have any problems running in a cold environment. The only catch to that is I would not start up a very cold PC due to mechanical issues with the hard drive and such. If the PC in question runs all the time in a cold area without turning off or going into standby, I bet it would work fine. Once it's up and running, there's no problem.
I plan to put an old computer in my garage to use during the winter. I do not forsee any problems except on keeping it in a clean area.
Heh, at least when I was there, it was always secretly mentioned that the PCCO (or at least the consumer group) was always in the red. I'm not surprised in a way to hear this, but is sad to hear the Thinkpad will be made by others. I always like them myself and treasure my obsolete 760XL.
Ah yes, the PS/2 line. Still very easy to work on once you know the basics of them. I like the 95xx series with their IML partitions and you can't beat the autoconfiguration they do.
I still have several 95A servers I play with time to time. OS/2 is a perfect match for them as well. 100% reliable and bulletproof.
Agreed. At work, our servers run win2k and will continue to do so as long as Dell can still preload it. At home, I also use win2k and plan to as long as possible. win2k pro runs fine on my dual P333 system and have server on an Athlon1200. No point in upgrading something that works perfectly.
Everyone lives life so fast that attention to detail does not matter anymore, as in this topic.
At work, pretty much everyone does a good job. On message boards however, I see plenty of messages of what should be a paragraph or two but it's all run together with no periods. I won't even waste me time trying to figure out what the message says. Grammar and punctuation are my pet peeves. Apostrophes and their use in plural words really pisses me off. I've also noticed a trend of making up words by modifying existing ones. Only two examples I can think of right now are monetize and disgracement. I've also seen this on TV as well. The simplest thing that can be done is to simply proofread your message. I have ADHD, and I always go back and reread my message just to make sure my mind didn't outrun my keyboard. It's all about attention to detail. As for me, I don't care who you are, but if I notice significant problems with a writer's text, I'm going to make certain assumptions.
Great topic. I'm replying based on others' suggestions as well.
Lincoln logs were always fun. Even better when smashing houses down with tonka trucks. Still available, but probably not wooden like they used to be.
Erector set is the best toy I think. I had several made by Gilbert when I was a kid. I also had the 3 speed motor which provided great power for cranes and such. I prefer the mid70s stuff since the earlier type is probably not size compatible and I had a late model smaller set, and the plastic panels and thin beams just didn't inspire me at all. I like the stamped metal beams that would rust and the tiny wrench you got the tightening bolts.
Tinkertoys were fun too. Remember making crude gears with the wooden hub and the short (yellow?) sticks?
I always wanted one of those glass bulbs with a vane inside that would spin if you put it near heat or was it light?
I also say a gyroscope was fun. Put it on a string, or try to twist it around whilst spinning. The hardest part was just trying to wind the string good so it would not pull out while getting it up to speed.
Tonka trucks were the best. As a kid, we had over 10 vehicles and 3 tons of sand to play in. I made my brother play demo derby with his dump truck against others, and never really damaged the front of it. I even had a little backhoe that worked. The new trucks are nowhere near as good. They need to be all metal so they can stay outside for years to get a nice worn finish.
Isnt it amazing that none of these toys are electronic? Kids need to get back to toys that run on creativity and imagination.
I had one too, although it wasnt a radio shack one. Mine was in a little wooden box and had a little latch holding the top closed. Same spring terminals though.
Anyone remember the old radio shack electronic kits? These were maybe a 6 inch diameter plastic breadboard, and components you plugged into it and wired up. I don't think soldering was required. I had one that made LEDs blink in sequence and my older brother had one that was a sound detector.
Now that's something I havent seen in a long time! Had one as a kid except I never could get it working. I understood how it worked to some extent, but never found out what the problem was.
While at the state fair, saw a booth set up by some nonprofit group and had some fliers from www.bordc.org
It's a good site that is quite pertinent to this topic and is worth visiting.
I argue about the USA-P act with others, and the frequent questions I get about it is that if people are mostly honest and innocent, why worry? Unfortunately, I think that the general populace will have to lose all their freedoms to appreciate what they have now and what is in jeopardy of being lost. I have heard that one cannot specifically say that the act has identified terrorists because it has not really created anything new, but merely expands existing powers.
Most people are not cognizant of things that happen slowly like the changing of the seasons. All of a sudden, one just finally realises it. It will be the same thing with civil liberties and freedoms.
heh, I used to do that when I did tech support. Having only a 3 sided cubicle, I had to just stack my pop cans on the worktable and against the wall. They would get quite noisy if a few fell down. I finally had to dismantle the wall o cans when a supervisor said to get rid of them.
I remember reading it back in the late 1980s. Page after page of enticing computers and equipment at prices I could not afford! There used to be sections on various models, such as Apple, Atari, and so on. Didnt Don Lancaster write a column in there too? In the back was for sale and wanted sections for computer types listed in alphabetical order most of which are not with us anymore. I enjoyed looking at the Apple// clones and parts available to build your own and I remember a review they had on the Basis-108. There was also lots of BBS numbers to attempt to connect to. I saw some of these old rags in a used bookstore once and wished I bought them just for old times sake.
Will windowsupdate still run? I wonder what would happen installing SP2 on it if some things are missing or disabled. Sounds like a dumb idea.
Then again, I'm sure someone will figure out how to uncripple it, kinda like the Kinko's Office 97 time-limited trial. Some.dll fixed IIRC.
I learned to type way back in hi-skool in 1984. I remember the teacher with the yardstick, ready to whack someone's hands when their wrists were touching the machine. I think I managed 28wpm at the time. I can pretty much type without looking at the keys, but special characters always throw me off, and I have to look and any keyboard I use MUST have the large backspace key! Any others and I just cannot use it.
I never did learn the proper fingering, so different fingers hit various keys depending on what I just felt was best. Since I've always been a good speller, I think it was easy since you have to know proper grammar and punctuation when typing.
I can't stand this shortcut typing style (how ru?) It takes me longer just to interpret it.
I still see exec types still typing with two fingers.
BEAGLE BROTHERS! you have my respect!
I think I removed a few cards while mine was on but never hurt anything. If you plugged in the disk ][ cable backwards, the 74LS125 chip on the analogue board would smoke. In skool, I also removed and inserted disks while the drive light was on, and never corrupted any that way.
Long live the Apple ][
Slashdot Mirror
This is sorta relevant to the topic at hand... Notice when you goto the mall and you see a sign that says you can have a chance at winning a nice new shiny car parked there. All you have to do is fill out a form with your personal info and drop it in the box. You can find similar setups with other free giveaways. I'm not surprised to see the dropbox full of forms with all kinds of details that marketers love. No one hardly gives a second thought to give away where they live and how much they make just to get a few baubles and trinkets in return.
I hate to say it, but most schools are not interested in anything but the newest technology. They think only the latest bells and whistles are required. That's too bad, because old computers can still do a perfect job.
I don't mind taking it old computers, but I prefer the older, the better. Midrange PCs can still be fixed up and given away to those in need or who want an extra one. I will say though, that many places are quite picky when offered free and functioning computers. If it's older than 2 years old, one can't even give it away! I think old Powermacs and Pentium II class computers are still perfectly usable these days.
Yea, I remember having an application stop responding and the system would become essentially unresponsive. Sometimes control+escape would do it if you hit it 100 times. I was told the problem was the single input queue which must mean something important. In any event, the other apps would run just fine, it's just that you couldn't do anything to fix the apparent lockup! The BEST way to get around this was to install WATCHCAT. If the WPS was unrepsonsive, you could hit a hotkey and get a chance to kill the hung application. Saved me plenty of times! Only problem was that running through a KVM caused problems though.
Actually, OS/2 on an IBM PS/2 was a perfect combination. Installing on my old 9595A server was so easy and didnt need any driver disks or anything. Pretty snappy even on a P60 and 128meg.
heh, this is my favourite topic to discuss... We don't need no stupid studies on this, as it is so obvious. People talking on the phone and driving are more careless, distracted and make more driving errors and I don't care what anyone else says. I do a lot of driving and when one sees a car drifting, swerving, going too slow, missing their right of way, cutting others off, or generally driving reckless, (IMO) it's almost always someone using their phone. Being a bit ADD, I prefer not to do it and will either not answer or will turn off to talk as I will concentrate on either driving or talking, but not both! Especially pathetic are those using the PTT mode and holding the phone way out in front of them but high up enough so the driver can see both the phone and the road and/or driving way too slow whilst they look in the mirror for a time to move over to another lane while talking away. I've always been bemused by the fact that people feel they must be accessable at all times. Imagine 15 years ago? Life went on just fine without phones everywhere. The cartalk guys are right!
I'm sure some sellers make a small profit not by selling junk, but adding excessive shipping and bogus handling charges to make money. Needless to say, I never bid on anything like that. I always make a point to mention in my auctions that I ship fedex ground which is cheaper than usmail, and I don't add in any bullshit shipping charges.
heh, I use fcough as my SSID. There's two default linksys SSIDs I've discovered in my neighborhood.
A friend of mine sent me a URL to Sanyo (IIRC) or some company that made home appliances, and on the main page of the items shown, it said each was Y2K compatible. I wonder why they felt that had to be included. Were they that stupid, or was it done to allay customers' fears that potentially anything would just quit working and catch on fire unless it was certified compliant? Or maybe they were just in on the hype or was done as a subtle sarcastic joke. I think I even emailed the company about it. Wish I had copied some of the pages to show later.
I seem to remember reading a magazine that talked about the first Macintosh and upgrading it to a Fat Mac (512k) was ~$500. Using a 512k model or a plus without a hard drive is not that bad, but having a second floppy drive is almost mandatory.
I don't think a computer would have any problems running in a cold environment. The only catch to that is I would not start up a very cold PC due to mechanical issues with the hard drive and such. If the PC in question runs all the time in a cold area without turning off or going into standby, I bet it would work fine. Once it's up and running, there's no problem. I plan to put an old computer in my garage to use during the winter. I do not forsee any problems except on keeping it in a clean area.
Heh, at least when I was there, it was always secretly mentioned that the PCCO (or at least the consumer group) was always in the red. I'm not surprised in a way to hear this, but is sad to hear the Thinkpad will be made by others. I always like them myself and treasure my obsolete 760XL.
Ah yes, the PS/2 line. Still very easy to work on once you know the basics of them. I like the 95xx series with their IML partitions and you can't beat the autoconfiguration they do. I still have several 95A servers I play with time to time. OS/2 is a perfect match for them as well. 100% reliable and bulletproof.
Agreed. At work, our servers run win2k and will continue to do so as long as Dell can still preload it. At home, I also use win2k and plan to as long as possible. win2k pro runs fine on my dual P333 system and have server on an Athlon1200. No point in upgrading something that works perfectly.
Everyone lives life so fast that attention to detail does not matter anymore, as in this topic.
At work, pretty much everyone does a good job. On message boards however, I see plenty of messages of what should be a paragraph or two but it's all run together with no periods. I won't even waste me time trying to figure out what the message says.
Grammar and punctuation are my pet peeves. Apostrophes and their use in plural words really pisses me off.
I've also noticed a trend of making up words by modifying existing ones. Only two examples I can think of right now are monetize and disgracement. I've also seen this on TV as well.
The simplest thing that can be done is to simply proofread your message. I have ADHD, and I always go back and reread my message just to make sure my mind didn't outrun my keyboard. It's all about attention to detail.
As for me, I don't care who you are, but if I notice significant problems with a writer's text, I'm going to make certain assumptions.
Great topic. I'm replying based on others' suggestions as well. Lincoln logs were always fun. Even better when smashing houses down with tonka trucks. Still available, but probably not wooden like they used to be. Erector set is the best toy I think. I had several made by Gilbert when I was a kid. I also had the 3 speed motor which provided great power for cranes and such. I prefer the mid70s stuff since the earlier type is probably not size compatible and I had a late model smaller set, and the plastic panels and thin beams just didn't inspire me at all. I like the stamped metal beams that would rust and the tiny wrench you got the tightening bolts. Tinkertoys were fun too. Remember making crude gears with the wooden hub and the short (yellow?) sticks? I always wanted one of those glass bulbs with a vane inside that would spin if you put it near heat or was it light? I also say a gyroscope was fun. Put it on a string, or try to twist it around whilst spinning. The hardest part was just trying to wind the string good so it would not pull out while getting it up to speed. Tonka trucks were the best. As a kid, we had over 10 vehicles and 3 tons of sand to play in. I made my brother play demo derby with his dump truck against others, and never really damaged the front of it. I even had a little backhoe that worked. The new trucks are nowhere near as good. They need to be all metal so they can stay outside for years to get a nice worn finish. Isnt it amazing that none of these toys are electronic? Kids need to get back to toys that run on creativity and imagination.
I had one too, although it wasnt a radio shack one. Mine was in a little wooden box and had a little latch holding the top closed. Same spring terminals though. Anyone remember the old radio shack electronic kits? These were maybe a 6 inch diameter plastic breadboard, and components you plugged into it and wired up. I don't think soldering was required. I had one that made LEDs blink in sequence and my older brother had one that was a sound detector.
Now that's something I havent seen in a long time! Had one as a kid except I never could get it working. I understood how it worked to some extent, but never found out what the problem was.
While at the state fair, saw a booth set up by some nonprofit group and had some fliers from www.bordc.org It's a good site that is quite pertinent to this topic and is worth visiting. I argue about the USA-P act with others, and the frequent questions I get about it is that if people are mostly honest and innocent, why worry? Unfortunately, I think that the general populace will have to lose all their freedoms to appreciate what they have now and what is in jeopardy of being lost. I have heard that one cannot specifically say that the act has identified terrorists because it has not really created anything new, but merely expands existing powers. Most people are not cognizant of things that happen slowly like the changing of the seasons. All of a sudden, one just finally realises it. It will be the same thing with civil liberties and freedoms.
heh, I used to do that when I did tech support. Having only a 3 sided cubicle, I had to just stack my pop cans on the worktable and against the wall. They would get quite noisy if a few fell down. I finally had to dismantle the wall o cans when a supervisor said to get rid of them.
I remember reading it back in the late 1980s. Page after page of enticing computers and equipment at prices I could not afford! There used to be sections on various models, such as Apple, Atari, and so on. Didnt Don Lancaster write a column in there too? In the back was for sale and wanted sections for computer types listed in alphabetical order most of which are not with us anymore. I enjoyed looking at the Apple // clones and parts available to build your own and I remember a review they had on the Basis-108. There was also lots of BBS numbers to attempt to connect to. I saw some of these old rags in a used bookstore once and wished I bought them just for old times sake.
Will windowsupdate still run? I wonder what would happen installing SP2 on it if some things are missing or disabled. Sounds like a dumb idea. Then again, I'm sure someone will figure out how to uncripple it, kinda like the Kinko's Office 97 time-limited trial. Some .dll fixed IIRC.
I learned to type way back in hi-skool in 1984. I remember the teacher with the yardstick, ready to whack someone's hands when their wrists were touching the machine. I think I managed 28wpm at the time. I can pretty much type without looking at the keys, but special characters always throw me off, and I have to look and any keyboard I use MUST have the large backspace key! Any others and I just cannot use it. I never did learn the proper fingering, so different fingers hit various keys depending on what I just felt was best. Since I've always been a good speller, I think it was easy since you have to know proper grammar and punctuation when typing. I can't stand this shortcut typing style (how ru?) It takes me longer just to interpret it. I still see exec types still typing with two fingers.
BEAGLE BROTHERS! you have my respect! I think I removed a few cards while mine was on but never hurt anything. If you plugged in the disk ][ cable backwards, the 74LS125 chip on the analogue board would smoke. In skool, I also removed and inserted disks while the drive light was on, and never corrupted any that way. Long live the Apple ][
That's a funny story. Yea, those symbol scanners are tough. I've abused them as well and they hold up.