Monday, August 27, 2007

New Laptop!

I got a Gateway MT3705 for my birthday. So far I am really pleased with it. It has similar specs to my desktop (which is now over three years old) but was half its price. I have named the laptop Trillian. I am dual-booting Vista and Ubuntu on it. My only complaint so far is that audio isn't working at all under Linux. I found a thread full of people with the same problem - hopefully I will figure out how to get it working soon.

When I returned to my room with my new laptop in hand, I noticed my desktop was making a rattling noise. I narrowed the sound down to being produced by the video card fan. I tried to remove the video card, but the screw holding it in place was stuck. Trying to unscrew it with the tiny screwdriver I had gave me two really bad blisters. I went out, purchased a screwdriver with a better grip, and successfully removed the video card. After spraying the fan with some compressed air I returned it to the desktop. Unfortunately the computer then refused to boot. After running almost continuously for the last three years, my computer breaks down on the same day that I get the new laptop.

After randomly fiddling with the video card I actually got the computer booting again. However the fan has completely stopped, so I don't expect it to last for very long.

Saturday, August 25, 2007

Thursday, August 02, 2007

Fireworks

Last Saturday I went to the Celebration of Light fireworks festival. Definitely the best fireworks I have ever seen. There are four days of fireworks and each show is put on by a different country (Saturday was Canada's turn). I took lots of pictures and a short video.

I am currently taking my second week of vacation and enjoying Pender Island. Work has been going really well and I feel like I have been making some real progress on CIspace. I will be posting new versions of almost all the applets very soon. I have already started making plans for this Christmas vacation - I will be heading to South India.