Today I mostly .....

[spikey dapikey]

Well done you

[spikey dapikey]

Checked my antifreeze levels, good for -18 C, topped up washer fluid, and adjusted the steering box, and what a difference it's made

Thanks to Baxter for the clear photos showing how its done on his website

[rob-o]

Passed the MOT! Had to go back for a re-test because of faded rear lenses (orange bulbs fitted) and I somehow missed a slit in one of the track rod boots but it's all done now.

Phew.

Rob

[Zelandeth]

Pronounced yet another laptop dead. Partner's 5 year old HP Pavillion DV9700 blanked the display yesterday in the middle of an update to iTunes - and never unblanked it again. Ever. Thing still seems to run just fine - but there's no display output on either internal or external monitor (even the POST) aside from what appears to be a very faint interference pattern.

Symptoms seem to match those for a known failure of the GPU on this model. Ho hum. So now we're in the market for a new machine again. Lovely!

15" or thereabouts, >500Gb harddrive, dedicated graphics is a must, BR drive would be nice, and a pricetag that's in three figures would be nice. Probably willing to stretch just into four if it's a machine that's clearly worth it. What we're most interested in though is getting a machine that's reasonably good from a quality standpoint.

Dell, avoiding like the plague, likewise Toshiba. HP/Compaq I'm sorry I am now avoiding. I've had three dead HP machines dropped in my lap aged between 1 and 5 years in the last month. Business grade machine would be nice - but trying to find one with decent graphics (it does get used for gaming from time to time) seems to be a headache, especially at anything like a sane price.

Trying to find decently built consumer grade laptops seems to be a bit of a headache!

[Justin Case]

...and you all hate Apples... no problems here

(Oh, no... what have I started now... - sound of computer and operator slowly moving for safer ground)

but seriously, why hasn't someone around here found the laptop equivalent of the Niva... you know, punches above it's weightclass, cheap, easy to fix and bar the cosmetics lasts forever? Something like a Russian version of the Panasonic Toughbook perhaps?

[happiness stan]

Today as part of an induction to my role I watched a Peri-anal abcess being drained (nice) and someone having their nose cut off (apparently to be replaced with a plastic one being held on via magnets). But thankfully I missed that bit because it will be happening next week, which I was glad to hear because my mind was being boggled quite a lot by that time. I really wanted to ask the surgeon "well how does he smell then?" but I thought he might chuck me out. Oh and today I was told by she who must be obeyed that I wouldn't be getting this for christmas...http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/261140976815? ... 1438.l2649
on the basis that it probably doesn't work and I can't play it.

[happiness stan]

I need it, my life wont be complete without it.
Am I that transparent?

[happiness stan]

Not just techincal but pointlessly obsolete technical

[Zelandeth]

Yay Linux!

Switched to Ubuntu back in 2007 after a very brief, ill fated brush with Vista. Never looked back. Have recently jumped ship to Mint thanks to the idiotic direction that Ubuntu's gone with the Unity interface, and having come to the conclusion that Gnome 3 is near as bad. Mint has stuck with what is essentially a Gnome 2.x based interface that's just been refined and still does what I want it to.

Equally importantly, the latest instalment of Mint seems to be fully compatible with my laptop, which gives me an excuse to ditch Windows on it.

[excossack]

Got a call to go look at a Windows 2000 Elonex Intel based server that had BSOD'd over night.
Powered it up and almost logged in and BSOD.
Rebooted and went into the BIOS to check settings and hung in the BIOS.

Logged a call with the support company, New motherboard/cpu/memory arriving on Monday

[excossack]

Its not a good blast from the past! almost as good as the Tiny or Viglen servers....

[excossack]

All this torque(!) of tuning oil burners makes me want to get my td5 tweaked.

[excossack]

I have a single rear silencer and sounds nice. Not had the need to replace the rear silencer yet when I do , it may end up straight through
t4 ? (volvo?)

[Zelandeth]

Mostly tried to get Linux to play nicely with my laptop - and wasted the whole evening. Whoever decided that this EFI boot nonsense was a good idea needs their head examined.

...Or at least someone needs to write a proper how-to for mortals like me so they can get it to work.

Reckon the original Windows installation had just been set up with a standard MBR partition table rather than the fancy newfangled nonsense. However, it refuses to install to a drive with an MBR partition table for some reason, insisting on the other type (GPT I think it was), which is what seems to have derailed this whole thing.

Seem to have spent the whole evening buried in Google searches and have ended up more confused than I started.

EDIT: Problem solved...Just ditched Windows entirely. Never going to use it on the laptop anyway...have XP set up for dual boot on the desktop for the once or twice a year I do need it anyway.

Don't you just hate it when you actually end up causing yourself a massive amount of hassle by tidying things up that were a bodge in the first place (nevertheless were working perfectly)...and you end up wishing that you hadn't touched it?

[happiness stan]

oooo just down the road from me!! <cough> thats a lot of money, I'll pass.