It’s been a couple of weeks since the last trail log so I figured I’d take this time to update some recent posts. My Windows Home Server fiasco is over. I did lose a couple of old movie files. They were old files that I had originally done for testing and pre-dated my backup regimen so they probably vanished long ago. The Windows Home Server is running fine with the external USB enclosure for two of it’s drives. I’ll have to send the eSATA enclosure back soon but I’m actually [...] Read the rest »
1.5TB Drives at 1TB Drive Prices
I noticed that the Seagate 1.5TB Barracuda drives have hit NewEgg and are priced at $190 with free shipping. That’s less than 13¢/GB. The 1TB Seagate drive is priced at $140 which is 14¢/GB making the new 1.5TB drives a better per gigabyte value. I haven’t bought one but I as shocked to see the new technology at a reasonable price. I realize I have a problem, because while I don’t need the space I want one of these drives. Read the rest »
Drobo Firmware 1.2.4 Released
I’d recently written about my first impressions of the Drobo FW800 and was less than impressed with it’s performance. A comment from Tom at Drobo mentioned that a software update was pending that would resolve the issues. Tonight that update arrived. It’s method of announcing itself was a bit problematic though. I was playing a podcast from the Drobo and copying some files to it when all of a sudden everything froze and the Drobo rebooted itself. After the reboot the message that a new firmware update was available appeared. [...] Read the rest »
Apple Software Updates
I finally got around to applying to recent Apple updates to my iMac. I’ve been queueing them up starting with the iTunes 8 update. Part of the reason is I wanted to limit changes while I was recovering my Windows Home Server. But the main reason was I’ve come to expect problems when applying updates from Apple. So far the problems have been minor. While waiting to apply the updates I’d read about people losing iTunes songs and album art after installing iTunes 8 A common thread for the missing [...] Read the rest »
Backup Paranoia Pays Off
I’ve always been paranoid about backups, a file doesn’t exist unless it was in two places. And then there’s off-site backups which add a third place for important or expensive (time & money) files. Things like RAID and file duplication (in WHS) don’t count as two places. If a RAID or disk controller failed the files could be lost. RAID and file duplication are good against drive failures and allow you to keep working, but they aren’t a replacement for backups. This week I got a object lesson that proved [...] Read the rest »
What’s Wrong With This Picture?
These are the patches I got after I followed Microsoft’s own instructions on How to obtain the latest Microsoft Word Viewer and installed two files – the Word 2003 viewer and the Office 2007 compatibility pack. On the plus side, it’s only 5 months worth of updates. Read the rest »
Microsoft Marketing Powerhouse to Marketing Has-Been
Microsoft announced that they’re cutting Seinfeld out of their ads. Planned it all along. I didn’t say anything about the ads at the time but I thought they were unfairly disparaged at first. I kind of liked them, I chuckled a bit, and figured they were recreating Seinfeld’s sitcom about nothing in an attempt to try to make people feel good about Microsoft. I didn’t expect Seinfeld to pitch Vista directly, but rather promote the Microsoft brand to consumers. Now they say they always planned to dump Seinfeld after two [...] Read the rest »
OS X 10.5.5 Released
Apple has released OS X 10.5.5 today. Apple’s release notes were quite detailed this time. They also released a separate bulletin with the security related updates that are included. I installed the update on my MacBook a little while ago without incident. It was a 136MB download through software update on my Intel MacBook. It’s also available a a standalone download from the Apple download page. The MacBook had already installed the iTunes 8, QuickTime and FronRow updates. At this point I haven’t installed OS X 10.5.5 on any other [...] Read the rest »
Optimizing A Windows Vista Virtual Machine
The Team Fusion blog has an article about optimizing Vista on VMware Fusion 2. Since it’s from the VMware folks it’s titled as VMware specific, but it’s appropriate for any Vista virtual machine. Suggestions include: Disable System Restore Disable Screen Saver Optimize Power Management for Virtual Machine Disable Windows Sidebar Disable Remote Management Run Windows Disk Defragmentation Utilities OPTIONAL: Change to Classic UI Disabling system restore is something I hadn’t considered although I do severely limit the disk space it’s given. I like the option of bein able to roll [...] Read the rest »
The OS Quest Trail Log #33: Potpourri
It’s been a pretty dry couple of month for blog posts so far. But there’s still a few things worth mentioning and rather than a couple small posts I decided to put them all here to make them easier to ignore. WordPress 2.6.2 was released and I upgraded this site. It’s a security release so considered required although the developer blog indicates it’s mainly a concern if open registration is allowed. I decided to upgrade anyway. I have to admit, I’m getting a a bit lazy with these minor upgrades. [...] Read the rest »
