OK, go for the weirdest situation created by Microsoft to date.
Vista Business (installed on one of my notebooks) works fairly normal. I installed it for the scanning and fax capability that comes with Vista Business. The Microsoft scanning software won't work with my older scanner, but that's OK, as the old scanner software will allow me to scan documents onto my notebook. The only good news here is that the Microsoft Fax software does function. God only knows what scanners will work with the Microsoft Scan software.
I recently bought an HP (made by Asus!) Pavilion with a Quad Core processor. The PC came with Vista Home Premium installed. This version of Vista worked pretty well. I had also recently "upgraded" my daughter's PC from Vista Home Basic to Vista Home Premium. Basically Home Premium seems to work much better than Home Basic.
Now I recently had to "upgrade" my new PC to Vista Ultimate in order to run Virtual PC 2007 for my work. Talk about a step backwards! As opposed to Vista Home Premium, Vista Ultimate takes several minutes after booting up the PC to connect to the Internet. Very annoying. In addition, Ultimate forced me to create a static IP address for this PC as it couldn't seem to handle accepting or working with an automatic IP address from the router. Oddly enough, Vista Home Premium had no problem connecting to the Internet instantly and receiving an automatic IP address.
As one wag put it, "Windows Vista users are the largest beta testing group in the world."
Windows Live OneCare is the spawn of Satan!
One has to wonder if the people behind Windows Live OneCare even have any computer programming experience!
Amongst the many stupid things committed by Windows Live OneCare are:
1. Automatically downloading Internet Explorer 7 onto a notebook that already had IE 7 on it, thus corrupting the registry and knocking the browser back to IE 6! This cannot be undone, believe me!
2. Randomly shutting down Windows Vista to install updates without any warning.
3. After practically any update, Windows Mobile Center is knocked out, thus requiring that one totally reinstall the Windows Mobile Center configuration with the Windows Firewall.
Well, there's more but those are just the high points of this crappy program.
Amongst the many stupid things committed by Windows Live OneCare are:
1. Automatically downloading Internet Explorer 7 onto a notebook that already had IE 7 on it, thus corrupting the registry and knocking the browser back to IE 6! This cannot be undone, believe me!
2. Randomly shutting down Windows Vista to install updates without any warning.
3. After practically any update, Windows Mobile Center is knocked out, thus requiring that one totally reinstall the Windows Mobile Center configuration with the Windows Firewall.
Well, there's more but those are just the high points of this crappy program.
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix movie
Absolutely the worst Harry Potter film to date!
Yes it is as true to the book as filming time could allow
(Running time is 2 hours and 15 minutes)
but it is Very S-L-O-W and BORING!
Wait for it to come out on DVD.
Yes it is as true to the book as filming time could allow
(Running time is 2 hours and 15 minutes)
but it is Very S-L-O-W and BORING!
Wait for it to come out on DVD.
Sicko
Michael Moore's new film, Sicko is his best work to date.
It is an incredible film and every American should see it.
Now I want to move to France, Canada or the UK! (You'll understand after you see the film.)
It is an incredible film and every American should see it.
Now I want to move to France, Canada or the UK! (You'll understand after you see the film.)
Vista reboots without warning
At least once a month on my PC, Vista will reboot without warning!
No dialog box, no warning box, just all of a sudden everything begins to shut down and then Vista reboots. A search on Google and Microsoft's site has turned up nothing that discusses or addresses this behavior.
I could attribute this behavior to Windows Update which as a rule updates on Tuesdays, but today is Saturday, it is 8 in the morning and once again Vista did an auto reboot.
Even stranger is that I had been working on the PC for at least 30 minutes.
Well once again this just serves as an example of the lack of thoughtful design and professional programming practices that should have been in Vista, especially after 7 years of development.
No dialog box, no warning box, just all of a sudden everything begins to shut down and then Vista reboots. A search on Google and Microsoft's site has turned up nothing that discusses or addresses this behavior.
I could attribute this behavior to Windows Update which as a rule updates on Tuesdays, but today is Saturday, it is 8 in the morning and once again Vista did an auto reboot.
Even stranger is that I had been working on the PC for at least 30 minutes.
Well once again this just serves as an example of the lack of thoughtful design and professional programming practices that should have been in Vista, especially after 7 years of development.
BlogHer 2007
COST:
$205.93 for two days of networking with other women bloggers, etc.
LOCATION:
End of the Navy Pier, Chicago.
I may be attending, difficult to predict at this point.
$205.93 for two days of networking with other women bloggers, etc.
LOCATION:
End of the Navy Pier, Chicago.
I may be attending, difficult to predict at this point.
Window Vista and Bluetooth
Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha! Ha!
As of this writing, there are NO (as in ZERO) Windows Vista certified Bluetooth products on the market.
I recently spent the day with a new USB Bluetooth adapter vainly attempting to get it to work with Vista. Hours later after much research it appears that Vista isn't very well behaved with Bluetooth.
I plugged the same USB Bluetooth adapter into an XP PC. Wham! Worked flawlessly!
So what else is broken in this shoddy OS? Did Microsoft outsource the entire Windows Vista project to a bunch of losers from India or what?
As of this writing, there are NO (as in ZERO) Windows Vista certified Bluetooth products on the market.
I recently spent the day with a new USB Bluetooth adapter vainly attempting to get it to work with Vista. Hours later after much research it appears that Vista isn't very well behaved with Bluetooth.
I plugged the same USB Bluetooth adapter into an XP PC. Wham! Worked flawlessly!
So what else is broken in this shoddy OS? Did Microsoft outsource the entire Windows Vista project to a bunch of losers from India or what?
Windows Vista - Wireless Issues
My daughter's Vista PC has a new Linksys adapter in it.
Recently her PC stopped connecting to the Internet!
It shows her as connected, but in reality (as opposed to the fantasy world of Windows Vista) she isn't connected.
We removed and reinstalled the drivers.
Ran a diagnostic on the network card.
Dropped the firewall and anti-virus on the off chance they impeded connectivity.
All the other PCs in the household connect without problem including the other PC that runs Vista.
The daughter wants me to remove Vista and install XP as she needs to be on the Internet.
Seems like a reasonable request to me as it becomes more and more obvious that Vista is the worst OS ever released by Microsoft.
Recently her PC stopped connecting to the Internet!
It shows her as connected, but in reality (as opposed to the fantasy world of Windows Vista) she isn't connected.
We removed and reinstalled the drivers.
Ran a diagnostic on the network card.
Dropped the firewall and anti-virus on the off chance they impeded connectivity.
All the other PCs in the household connect without problem including the other PC that runs Vista.
The daughter wants me to remove Vista and install XP as she needs to be on the Internet.
Seems like a reasonable request to me as it becomes more and more obvious that Vista is the worst OS ever released by Microsoft.
Hotel Internet issues
Man, it seems like every hotel in the US seems to be too cheap to upgrade their routers beyond the "b" standard to supporting "g" or even the "n" specification.
I recently stayed at a Microtel in Tampa which as usual had "b" and amazingly had a T1 line! This is a very small hotel with even fewer guests using the Internet. I gave the hotel manager who was quite interested a mini-speech on the advantage of upgrading to at least "g" and preferably "n". Come on, at least for small hotels, routers are cheap!
The nice thing at the Microtel was that you had wireless in your room, which unfortunately doesn't seem to work well in other hotels.
Currently I am in Chicago and while my hotel offers free wireless internet in the lobby, it is $10 a night in the room and to top it off it's wired in the room, not wireless. No biggie, as I always carry a network wire just for those odd occasions, but I can see if you weren't traveling alone where there could be an issue, as there is only the single Internet port in the room. Maybe people traveling as a couple might be wise to pack along a router just in case.
I sure wish more hotels would upgrade to at least "g" if not "n"!
I recently stayed at a Microtel in Tampa which as usual had "b" and amazingly had a T1 line! This is a very small hotel with even fewer guests using the Internet. I gave the hotel manager who was quite interested a mini-speech on the advantage of upgrading to at least "g" and preferably "n". Come on, at least for small hotels, routers are cheap!
The nice thing at the Microtel was that you had wireless in your room, which unfortunately doesn't seem to work well in other hotels.
Currently I am in Chicago and while my hotel offers free wireless internet in the lobby, it is $10 a night in the room and to top it off it's wired in the room, not wireless. No biggie, as I always carry a network wire just for those odd occasions, but I can see if you weren't traveling alone where there could be an issue, as there is only the single Internet port in the room. Maybe people traveling as a couple might be wise to pack along a router just in case.
I sure wish more hotels would upgrade to at least "g" if not "n"!
Windows Vista - Microphone
I foolishly attempted to try to use my microphone under Vista for the first time.
My microphone worked fine in the past with Windows XP.
No such luck with Vista. Checking the Creative site to see if there were new drivers for my SoundBlaster Live! sound card brought me the news that Creative would not be writing any Vista drivers for this older card.
So, I did a bit of research and bought a Creative Xtremegamer sound card.
The sound is much improved, but attempting to use the microphone (which took a lot of research and fooling around with to enable) is still a no go. At least I can see some movement on the audio bar while attempting to "train" the microphone, but it still isn't usable for gaming, Windows Speech Recognition, navigation or any other function.
Looks like my new research project is to find a decent microphone with some kind of a volume boost.
As usual there is NO HELP on the Microsoft site. Vista still sucks and it is not a product that Microsoft should be proud of.
My microphone worked fine in the past with Windows XP.
No such luck with Vista. Checking the Creative site to see if there were new drivers for my SoundBlaster Live! sound card brought me the news that Creative would not be writing any Vista drivers for this older card.
So, I did a bit of research and bought a Creative Xtremegamer sound card.
The sound is much improved, but attempting to use the microphone (which took a lot of research and fooling around with to enable) is still a no go. At least I can see some movement on the audio bar while attempting to "train" the microphone, but it still isn't usable for gaming, Windows Speech Recognition, navigation or any other function.
Looks like my new research project is to find a decent microphone with some kind of a volume boost.
As usual there is NO HELP on the Microsoft site. Vista still sucks and it is not a product that Microsoft should be proud of.
Smug Microsoft Interviewers
As a computer consultant since the 70's, I have done more interviewing than God.
OK, maybe not that many but average a minimum of 2 a week for 30 years and it comes out to roughly 3000 interviews or so.
I'm pretty good at it and those skills come in handy for public speaking or starting a conversation in a bar.
Anyway in the last six months I have had interviews with at least four different groups at Microsoft. They usually call me every six months or so.
The disturbing trend is that now I get interviewers whose main interest seems to be in letting me know how smart they are.
What got me going on this is that I had yet another one of those interviews with a smug interviewer who started off by asking me what the difference is between BizTalk 2002 and BizTalk 2004. Seeing how I only use the current version which 2006, my unspoken mental reaction was "Who gives a s--t?"
Anyway this interview went on endlessly forcing me to re-evaluate my occupation and wonder exactly how much money one could make driving an ice cream truck.
OK, maybe not that many but average a minimum of 2 a week for 30 years and it comes out to roughly 3000 interviews or so.
I'm pretty good at it and those skills come in handy for public speaking or starting a conversation in a bar.
Anyway in the last six months I have had interviews with at least four different groups at Microsoft. They usually call me every six months or so.
The disturbing trend is that now I get interviewers whose main interest seems to be in letting me know how smart they are.
What got me going on this is that I had yet another one of those interviews with a smug interviewer who started off by asking me what the difference is between BizTalk 2002 and BizTalk 2004. Seeing how I only use the current version which 2006, my unspoken mental reaction was "Who gives a s--t?"
Anyway this interview went on endlessly forcing me to re-evaluate my occupation and wonder exactly how much money one could make driving an ice cream truck.
The Dip by Seth Godin
I'm not a follower or regular reader of Seth Godin, but I saw his new book, The Dip for $12.95 at Borders or for $5 on CD (with Seth himself actually reading which answered my question of how he pronounces his last name).
Seth has a good speaking voice, the material was fairly well organized and for $5, I think I got my money's worth.
It's an interesting piece on knowing when to quit or when to stick with it.
Seth has a good speaking voice, the material was fairly well organized and for $5, I think I got my money's worth.
It's an interesting piece on knowing when to quit or when to stick with it.
Sicko by Michael Moore
Michael Moore's new film, Sicko, about the health insurance industry opens June 29th.
Go see it!
Go see it!
Windows Vista - May 2007
I have spoken with dozens of people who either upgraded to Windows Vista or got it pre-installed on a new PC, since its launch on Jaunuary 29th of this year.
So far everyone I have talked with HATES Windows Vista.
So far everyone I have talked with HATES Windows Vista.
MSN stiffed me for $10,000
Yeah I got a contract to recreate three InfoPath forms for MSN. Seems that MSN blew off their SharePoint servers and had no backups for their InfoPath forms. Considering that these forms are used on a world wide basis as a trouble ticket system, this probably was embarrassing. So rather than admit to anyone within Microsoft as to what had happened, MSN contracted me through a third party to recreate these forms.
Well I finished reconstructing and unit testing the forms yesterday and then received an email from the third party company that I was no longer on the project.
Part of the issue was that MSN would have to let me install the forms on their network (due to a variety of complex issues) and they hadn't figured that into their scope of work.
So, MSN still owes me $10,000 for the forms.
P.S. If anyone out there would like a nice InfoPath-based trouble ticket system, I can develop one for you for a pretty inexpensive amount!
P.P.S. Got $2500 out of them. Better than nothing and cheaper than a lawsuit.
Well I finished reconstructing and unit testing the forms yesterday and then received an email from the third party company that I was no longer on the project.
Part of the issue was that MSN would have to let me install the forms on their network (due to a variety of complex issues) and they hadn't figured that into their scope of work.
So, MSN still owes me $10,000 for the forms.
P.S. If anyone out there would like a nice InfoPath-based trouble ticket system, I can develop one for you for a pretty inexpensive amount!
P.P.S. Got $2500 out of them. Better than nothing and cheaper than a lawsuit.
America is Humpty Dumpty
America is falling down.
I'm writing this post not from a state of depression, but from a point of observation. This is just a knee-jerk rant/reaction to the overwhelming glut of "news" and information. Our borders are no more secure today than they were before 9/11. We have 12 million illegal immigrants who think they should be rewarded with citizenship and all the other privileges of our society because they snuck into our country like a thief in the night. Bill Gates (and other CEOs) wants the H1B visa program to have no limits because "there aren't enough qualified Americans willing to work for $100,000 at year at Microsoft". Faceless corporate America is now the enemy of the people. Pharmaceutical companies want to have vitamins and other supplements removed from over the counter sales to be only available via presciption. The federal government under pressure from companies like Wal-Mart has now bastardized the term "organic" to be practically meaningless relative to the source of food. Monsanto wants the milk labels banned to refer to milk coming from cows that haven't been ingesting Monsanto-modified grains. We have wasted thousands of lives and billions of dollars in Iraq for no meaningful purpose. The country appears to be headed into a third world structure of rich and poor with no middle class. A country of extemes: haves versus have-nots.
Yes, like Humpty Dumpty, America is falling down and all the King's horsemen cannot put it back together again.
It makes one wonder what we can all do together in the present to salvage the future of our lives.
I'm writing this post not from a state of depression, but from a point of observation. This is just a knee-jerk rant/reaction to the overwhelming glut of "news" and information. Our borders are no more secure today than they were before 9/11. We have 12 million illegal immigrants who think they should be rewarded with citizenship and all the other privileges of our society because they snuck into our country like a thief in the night. Bill Gates (and other CEOs) wants the H1B visa program to have no limits because "there aren't enough qualified Americans willing to work for $100,000 at year at Microsoft". Faceless corporate America is now the enemy of the people. Pharmaceutical companies want to have vitamins and other supplements removed from over the counter sales to be only available via presciption. The federal government under pressure from companies like Wal-Mart has now bastardized the term "organic" to be practically meaningless relative to the source of food. Monsanto wants the milk labels banned to refer to milk coming from cows that haven't been ingesting Monsanto-modified grains. We have wasted thousands of lives and billions of dollars in Iraq for no meaningful purpose. The country appears to be headed into a third world structure of rich and poor with no middle class. A country of extemes: haves versus have-nots.
Yes, like Humpty Dumpty, America is falling down and all the King's horsemen cannot put it back together again.
It makes one wonder what we can all do together in the present to salvage the future of our lives.
eMachines (Gateway) rebate programs SUCK!
My daughter bought a new eMachines PC at the start of February. Before the end of February we mailed in her rebate to eMachines. Even though the rebate envelope weighed less than an ounce the dimwits at the U. S. Post Office returned it two weeks later with a sticker on it that read "requires special handling".
So without even opening the envelope so that the retards that handle the eMachines rebates could see the postmark, we put it in a larger envelope along with a letter explaining the rebate was mailed on time but that the Post Office had returned it.
Today almost a month later, we receive an notice from eMachines that the rebate will not be honored since it "wasn't mailed in time". This, despite the fact that they can clearly see that it was mailed "on time".
Our advice? Given a choice between eMachines/Gateway or another manufacturer, go with the other manufacturer.
It is quite obvious that eMachines/Gateway doesn't give a ding dong damn about their customers.
So without even opening the envelope so that the retards that handle the eMachines rebates could see the postmark, we put it in a larger envelope along with a letter explaining the rebate was mailed on time but that the Post Office had returned it.
Today almost a month later, we receive an notice from eMachines that the rebate will not be honored since it "wasn't mailed in time". This, despite the fact that they can clearly see that it was mailed "on time".
Our advice? Given a choice between eMachines/Gateway or another manufacturer, go with the other manufacturer.
It is quite obvious that eMachines/Gateway doesn't give a ding dong damn about their customers.
JetBlue JFK February 14 2007
Yes, I got caught in the JetBlue fiasco at JFK on 2/14/07. JetBlue kept everyone on the hook by continuing to show flights as delayed and rescheduled, until midnight when they announced that all flights were cancelled. They then proceeded to dump all the luggage from all of their aircraft into the luggage area, causing one to search an area the size of a football field through literally thousands of bags to locate their personal luggage.
Here are three photos I took with my phone camera of the mess. The time stamps in the corner of the pictures show military time, so I indeed was looking for my bag at 3:15 in the morning!
JetBlue only offered to let people be on standby (with hundreds of other people) for their already sold out flights, or get a refund or buy a ticket to fly out MONDAY (keep in mind this was on Wednesday night/early Thursday morning). Needless to say, I bought a ticket on Northwest, flew to Minneapolis, then flew Continental to Houston, laid over there a few hours and finally flew Continental to Sacramento arriving in the wee hours on Friday morning.
Then I fell ill and had to be rushed to the emergency room on Saturday, but that's another story.
Windows Vista - Video and missing RAM
Ok, anyone with half a brain knows by now that Windows Vista irregardless of version needs 2 Gigs of RAM to perform at an acceptable level.
I have 2 Gigs in my PC. My daughter bought a new PC with Vista Home Basic pre-installed on it the Sunday after Windows Vista was launched.
Of course it came with only 512M of RAM and the hard disk drive thrashed constantly.
Being Dad, I ordered 2 Gigs of RAM and installed it. Performance was now fine, but unlike my PC with Vista Ultimate which shows that I have 2 Gigs, hers only showed 187.5 Gigs.
Weird? Where did that 128m of RAM go? Ah, I have a video board with 512M of VRAM and her low end PC has an ATI 200 in it which shares system RAM.
Guess what? The video minimum for the Aero look and feel under Windows Vista requires 128m of VRAM. So, even though Windows Vista Home Basic DOES NOT SUPPORT AERO, Vista grabs 128m of system RAM anyway!
Too bad Microsoft can't manage to explain this to consumers.
Or hire some decent programmers.
I have 2 Gigs in my PC. My daughter bought a new PC with Vista Home Basic pre-installed on it the Sunday after Windows Vista was launched.
Of course it came with only 512M of RAM and the hard disk drive thrashed constantly.
Being Dad, I ordered 2 Gigs of RAM and installed it. Performance was now fine, but unlike my PC with Vista Ultimate which shows that I have 2 Gigs, hers only showed 187.5 Gigs.
Weird? Where did that 128m of RAM go? Ah, I have a video board with 512M of VRAM and her low end PC has an ATI 200 in it which shares system RAM.
Guess what? The video minimum for the Aero look and feel under Windows Vista requires 128m of VRAM. So, even though Windows Vista Home Basic DOES NOT SUPPORT AERO, Vista grabs 128m of system RAM anyway!
Too bad Microsoft can't manage to explain this to consumers.
Or hire some decent programmers.
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