sethcheek.com

I’m not sure if it’s coincidental, but my computer died over the weekend.  It wouldn’t ever post after the storms.  It might have been a power surge.  It might have been a known issue with my motherboard being prone to overheating.  If it was overheating, it’s awfully coincidental that it happened during the storms.

Anyway, I’ve had to replace the mainboard and the memory.  I ordered the Gigabyte EP45-UD3P and 4GB of RAM from a brand I’d never heard of; Mushkin.  I got a deal for ordering them together from NewEgg, plus $30 in total mail-in rebates that I hope I’ll get back.

I’ll have to install Windows 7 clean on it.  (Have you ever tried to switch mainboards on Windows?  It’s gets TICKED.)

So, hopefully I’ll be back up and online later tonight, perhaps even in 64-bit glory.

Seth Tech

My last post’s title is wrong.  Though to be fair, I did qualify what I meant later on in the post, I feel a little silly about it now.

First off, I have an iPhone 3GS, and I really like it so far.  Secondly, I didn’t even pay the discounted retail price for it, so my sentiment about the price not justifying the features still stands.  However, for what I paid for it, it’s definitely worth it.

My dad recently joined the ranks.  When he was deciding what kind of phone to get, I showed him my iPhone, and he seemed genuinely impressed.  He decided to get one.  Then, in looking at pricing, he debated the 3G for $99 or the 3GS for $199.  Then he thought of a third scenario.  He’d get the 3GS, and let me pay the difference, then he’d take my recently replaced 3G with a brand new Apple Care plan on it, and I’d take the new one.

Dad has a 3-week old 3G and I have a 3GS now.  When we separated this morning from the AT&T store, he was confident he could make and answer calls.  After a brief session with some of the apps last week, we now know that Dad wants the Google app, Vlingo and a few others neither of us could remember.

Saturday, I’ll be heading over to his place to get him fully set-up, with Wi-Fi at the house, the apps he wants and an overall comfort level with his phone.

With the enhanced camera and video camera, I’ll try to get some more stuff up on my site more often.  Maybe I’ll put up a cool image gallery or something, instead of the turd of a photo page I have now.

By the way, looking at some site data for my blog, I found that a few dozen people found my site by a goofy joke I’d typed in the last post about the iPhone 3GS+.  This is how rumors get started…

Seth Tech, iPhone

After learning that I was going to be able to get a hold of an OLPC machine, I decided to look into what it can, and cannot, do.  After realizing it needed custom, proprietary hardware to run Windows, I changed directions, and started getting into Linux, and more specifically Ubuntu. 

I’d messed with Ubuntu around 10 years ago, when a vendor sent Sean a kiosk display of free CD’s for the counter of the computer repair shop where we worked. Then, it seemed more of an uber 1337 super-system for Linux fans, maybe bored of Red Hat.  Now, Ubuntu’s installation of apps, GUI and system is incredibly inviting to me, as more of a day-to-day sort of software.

As a die-hard Windows guy (minus my phone), I generally need my Windows desktop to really feel ‘at home’ with my computer.  My games, my desktop ‘gadgets’, Windows Media Center and several other things keep me coming back to the Microsoft mothership. 

But since I was wanting to get more familiar with it so I could be fluent when I get my OLPC, I installed Ubuntu 8.10 (Intrepid Ibex) onto a spare hard drive I had.  I’ve liked it very much so far.  I’m learning how to tweak it to what I want it to be, but in five days, I haven’t had to switch back to Windows… yet.  I’ve been able to do instant messaging, web-browsing & several other things with apps that I can find that are comparable to Windows counterparts.  I know it makes me ‘uncool’ in the tech world, but I DEFINITELY prefer IE to Firefox.  It still gets around fine, but just doesn’t seem as intuitive to me.

Now, going back to a previous topic, my phone, cannot sync to Ubuntu through what I’ve found.  I need it to sync MORE than just songs.  I need apps, contacts, photos and more to sync, and I cannot find a viable option for that, so though my Ubuntu journey has been fun, it may be seeing an early end.

That’s not to say it won’t work for the OLPC.  I think it’ll be ideal there.  I just don’t think I can do it on my main machine.  Perhaps dual-boot?  Who uses Ubuntu out there? 

What apps should I get?

Seth Review, Tech