Of small interest
Yes, I too would like to have a 3-GHz Mac on my desktop for $899. However, despite the fact that OS X is quite capable of running on an Intel chip, here’s a nicely thought-out editorial on why that won’t happen soon.
And for those on my friends list who still need a PlayStation 2, Deals On The Web has a Sony refurbed PS2 with a subwoofer tossed in for $129. That’s only $30 bucks more than a PS1 if I remember correctly.
Some observations
Well, I’m actually feeling a bit accomplished these days. This weekend, I shook the rust from my joints and did some serious database programming, teaching it how to build (static) webpages for manual upload. Today, I forced our server (which recently graduated from peer-to-peer file sharer to real server) to take an OS upgrade that it supposedly can’t, getting better networking and filesystem performance from it.
Thoughts on a Tuesday morn
My head killeth me. I’ve had a cough for days, and though all the other symptoms of my New Year’s cold are gone, the nagging cough burns in my chest and sets my skull pounding. Concentration today is an interesting challenge.
I think vond and kittenchan should come back to the USA, but that has nothing to do with what’s good for them; I just like having them around 🙂
I’m beginning to understand the attachment Amiga users have to their unsupported, out-of-date machines. I was given an old unused Apple Newton for Xmas, and I’ve become quite fond of it. Not only do I finally have a digital address and date book, but the other day I passed an afternoon with it reading Jules Verne’s “From the Earth to the Moon”, writing a journal entry or two, and playing a version of the old mainframe Star Trek game. Sure, it doesn’t slide invisibly into my hip pocket, but I don’t lose it at the bottom of a bookbag either 🙂
raininva has done an incredible job with the apartment this last week, the living room is unrecognizably nice. We’ve already got two discrete gaming areas worked out. Looks like we’ll be up and running this Friday night – MechWarrior for sure, possibly Settlers of Catan, Chez Geek, Illuminati, or selected PlayStation 2 games as well. If you’d like to come by, we’d love to see you – drop us a note so we’ll be able to estimate a number of warm bodies.
And a special thank you to healerkou – this week, you did something that made me a little happier about a personal project. Too bad I can’t ask you to sign up, but it’s a bit of a drive from your digs to southwest Virginia. BTW, is the last syllable of your screenname pronounced “coo” or “kau”?
The Matrix Has You
From the useless-but-cool department…
You can now watch your movie files in ASCII in the Terminal application of MacOS 10.2!
Here’s some shots from a certain video – each image links to a larger version:
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| Space Rogues logo | Brion (Me) |
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| Extra (ypawtows) and Kat (snidegrrl) |
So I don’t bore everyone: if you want to know how to do this, leave a comment and I’ll reply.
Wonder if my old SE is eligible?
Talk about long-lived hardware… here’s a link to a honest picture of a 1989 Macintosh SE/30 (16MHz, 1 Meg RAM) running Apple’s 21st century OS X operating system on a 9-inch black & white screen!
… okay, so it’s actually an iMac motherboard jammed into an old SE/30 case and hooked to its monitor by some crazy Japanese person. Still kinda cool… like when we were going to hook an LCD screen and battery pack to Ed Philibin’s otherwise self-contained Amiga and make a bulky Amiga “laptop”.
Technology marches on
Thanks to Jaguar, QuickTime 6, and DivX for Mac 5.0 Alpha 3, I can finally watch DivX .avi files now. Time to catch up on those “Chobits” episodes I was loaned!
Catching Up
I’ve actually had a great deal to post in the last week, but I’ve spent most of the week unable to summon the creative juice to sit and really write the entries. I’m feeling a little more in touch with the muse this morning, so hopefully I can catch up a bit on some of the things that have been on my mind.
Today, here at work, I got my first piece of spam from “the widow of a rich African government official who would like my help recovering her funds”. Yeah, “lady”. That’s the one where some people end up broke, and others end up shot. No thanks.
Re-installed Diablo II on my machine twice last night. Cleared the backup files from my boss’s laptop (that’s another story) for space, reinstalled once, got all my old character files off CD, and had it running (almost) happily before I discovered I’d made a major mistake. I won’t go into details, but I had to clear the files and install again. When people bring their machines over tonight, we’ll have to ensure they all the latest patch installed, ’cause that’s the version I have to use to run the game under OS X. I’m looking forward to the game, though character balance may be a bit difficult, since Rain’s favorite char has progressed to level 38, and mine’s up to level 50… and we expect to have at least one complete newbie tonight.
Found out this week that the upcoming OS X 10.2 for my machine, retailing at $130, costs about half that if I’m a student or a civil servant. Hmmm…
“Yum”, the iMac girl
Relating to my post about Macs and B&D, here’s the “dojinshi”-ish graphic that some were asking about:
You can find a nice desktop / wallpaper sized image here, as well as Yum in the fruit flavors.
http://www.polycount.com has a model of her that can be used in Quake 3 and Voyager: Elite Force.
This LiveJournal explains my Macintosh computing preference. Apparently I’m a “bottom” and didn’t even know it.
An expensive morning
Mister Jobs just announced at Macworld NY that Mac OS X 10.2 – “Jaguar” is official, and will be released to the public August 24.
My problem: It will cost $129.
New GeForce or Radeon video card to take advantage of Jaguar’s high-speed graphics rendering will cost $130 – $150… less if I let the eBay mistress raininva find me a good deal.
I’m not even going to talk about the cost of the announced 1 GHz processor upgrade which would more than double the speed of my current machine.
Understand, I’m not whining – these are all “wish list” items, and I’ll manage fine with what I have until I can get them. But I do sometimes wish I indulged in a less expensive hobby. Assuming there are any.
Addendum (12:25pm) Looks like current 10.1.5 users might be able to upgrade to Jaguar for about $19.95. That improves my mood some. 🙂
