Zixar

I can't remember the consensus the last time we dreamcasted "TWI: The Motionless Picture", but I seem to recall Gene Hackman being discussed as a VPW candidate.

W-Not: Yes, the scene where you see her driving away was all in her head. I was kind of disappointed in the finale. They set it up to be a big showdown, and it just fizzled. Maybe I'll think differently after seeing it again.

I want to know where you found a writable CD that can hold 1GB of data... :)-->(700 x 1.44 = 1,008.)

No disrespect to LiftedUp intended, but I like to look at it this way, instead. Rascal is perfectly capable of painting an entire house by herself, so she certainly doesn't NEED my help. Sometimes, though, it makes a job a helluva lot easier when your friends care enough to grab a brush anyway. ;)-->I've never even met the woman, but I consider her a very dear friend solely on what we've talked about online. Perceptions can be deceiving, of course, but since perceptions are what we create in our own minds, most of the blame for any inaccuracy in them lies on US instead of the other person. I can see how some people might read what Rascal writes on this subject and form the perception that she's being hysterical or irrational. Personally, I don't believe that perception for a second. From my personal viewpoint, Rascal's got more guts than a chitlin-packing plant. Any emphatic language she uses stems more from a steely-eyed determination not to let the same bastards browbeat another woman into placing anything else before a child ever again. She has consistently and unflinchingly owned her responsibility in the matter, despite the personal sorrow involved in talking about it, solely so that no one else is in the least bit deluded into thinking TWI was some sort of mildly-strict denomination instead of a dictatorial cult. She wasn't counseled by suggestion and advice, she was ordered, period. Oh, sure, she had a "choice"--do what they said, or throw away her whole life at that point. Some choice! How anyone can dare to belittle her for what she chose galls me to the core. Now it is possible that my perception of her is not 100% accurate either, I'm aware of that. But I do know that I trust my perception of her more than I trust my perceptions of 90% of the people on this site. So much so, in fact, that I do not hesitate for a nanosecond to stand up for her. She's got courage, determination, compassion, and a stainless-steel spine. She does not deny her pain & sorrow, but she isn't ruled by it, either. A lot of us could learn from her example.

Garth: Not necessarily. Currently, dual layer DVDs use a variant of the "+R" format. Some older DVD players have trouble with the +R format. My older Toshiba model would read DVD-R just fine, but would not read DVD+R, DVD-RW, or DVD+RW. My new Toshiba reads all four. My Xbox reads all four. My Playstation2 only reads +R and -R, but not +RW or -RW. For the most part, if your DVD player was made in the last 2 years, you're good for the common formats. If it's older, -R has the highest compatibility. That's the beauty of dual-format burners--you find the media that your player will read, then burn your stuff to that format.

"If you're not Corps, don't even talk to me."--LCM, main stage, ROA '85 Best advice I ever took.

Look at that temperature graph again. The extreme is only half a degree Celsius. Since Galileo invented the thermometer in 1593 (and it didn't come into widespread use until Fahrenheit invented the mercury thermometer in the early 1700s), two-thirds of that graph is little more than conjecture. Even though based on some scientific measurement of some sort, I'm sure, nothing short of physical thermometer readings could possibly be that accurate over the span of +/- half a degree. Penn & Teller demonstrated that today's environmental lobby has been co-opted for political purposes rather than scientific ones. They interviewed one of the founders of Greenpeace who has severed ties with them because of their move away from conservation and towards politics, as well as Dr. Bjorn Lomborg, another Greenpeace member who wrote a telling book called The Skeptical Environmentalist. The upshot is that the data that so much of the global-warming hysteria is based on is not at all conclusive. In the 70s, scientists looking at the same data concluded we were headed towards another Ice Age! Greenpeace and most other "green" organizations are no longer crusaders for nature so much as they are anti-corporate/ anti-globalization/ anti-government fanatics. P&T point out that there's nothing inherently wrong with being anti-government or anti-big-business--they are, themselves--but to use environmental BS as some sort of "scientific" basis for that stance is fotally tucked. They went to an Earth rally in Washington DC and got hundreds of people to sign a petition to ban dihydrogen monoxide (water), after telling them it's used in nuclear power plants and plastics manufacture and how it was now being found in large quantities in our lakes and rivers! They pointed out that while the environment is everyone's concern, the vast majority of the people at the rally were upper-middle-class whites, more concerned with joining a crowd instead of rational examination of what they were rallying for. They showed many shots of posters condemning Exxon, Mobil, and the government, yet when the producers asked for a chosen spokesperson from one of the sponsoring groups, the person they put up was completely clueless on the environment, as was another spokesperson for one of the "wildlife funds" spouting off how thousands of species are going extinct every year--despite there being NO scientific evidence to support that claim. Ridiculous. As for the CO2 levels, the Earth beats us all hollow for generating its own CO2. Note how the big swings go back thousands of years, but the industrial age has only been around for about 200--hardly catastrophic. Remember also the big flap about chlorofluorocarbons destroying the ozone layer? Turns out that mankind may not really be to blame for that one after all. When Mount Pinatubo erupted several years ago, it blew more CFCs into the atmosphere in one shot than the entire population's hairspray and air conditioners did in a year, and Pinatubo wasn't even an unusually large volcano. Since volcanoes have been erupting since the dawn of the planet, and since they've had billions of years to completely destroy the ozone if it was going to happen, it looks like Man's contribution of CFCs wasn't even a drop in the proverbial bucket. Most of this stuff can also be influenced by the fact that our Sun is a slightly-variable star. It fluctuates over an eleven-year cycle, but it's not exactly uniform. 1998 was the warmest year on record, but a) we haven't been keeping records all that long, and, b) that was six years ago--temperatures have been dropping since. There's just not enough real, hard data to make a conclusion one way or the other. But that doesn't stop the wackos from proclaiming gloom and doom is nigh. The key is to make sure you've got a solid foundation before you start jumping up and down.

I never had any problems with my external writer. Usually a software update will correct the problem if a program is too old to recognize it. Nero was bad about that. Best Buy has the new Sony Dual-Layer (8.5GB) writers on sale this week for $199. Don't know if it's worth it to jump on this quite yet...

dmiller: Except that you don't really "pick" a fiddle, do you? :D--> If you bow it, it's a fiddle. If you pick it, it's a fretless mandolin. ;)-->

P-Mosh: It isn't. Penn & Teller devoted one of the episodes of P&T:BS! to Environmental Hysteria and hit the global warming myth pretty hard. It's on the Season 1 DVD, available now.

Garth: Due to how certain bits of the Athlon CPUs work better than the same bits of the P4, the "2600" is fairly accurate. Even though it's running at a lower clock rate, certain calculations are more efficient in the Athlon, so they complete faster. If the software is written to take advantage of the new P4s' HyperThreading (like Adobe Premiere) then a P4 will beat an Athlon. In general, 95% of all software isn't P4-HT optimized, so the Athlon remains the better bang for the buck. (IMHO)

Gettysburg is the better film, by a good margin.

Regedit? NO! The stuff on the right is EVERYTHING on your computer! You can't just delete everything on the right, you'll wipe out your whole PC.

Gettysburg was 4hr 15m, G&G about 3hr 30m.

To get an idea of the prices, expect to spend: $100 or so on an integrated mobo $100 or so on 512MB of memory $60 to $300 on a CPU, (although the P4EE is right at a thousand bucks!) $50-$100 on a case with a minimum 400-watt power supply (more is better) $20 for a DVD-ROM drive, a little more if you want a CD-writer $80-$200 for a hard drive, depending on size. For example, here's a good price/performance parts list: CPU - Athlon 64 3000+ $223 MoBo - Chaintech VNF3-250 $80 RAM - 2x256MB DDR400 - $80 Graphics Card - ATI Radeon 9600XT 256MB - $159 Case - Mwave Z88 - $43 Hard Drive - Maxtor 160GB SerialATA - $140 DVD-Writer - NEC ND-2500A 8x DVD+/-RW - $78 That's about $800 and change for a good solid system. For the bare minimum: CPU/Mobo/RAM Bundle - Athlon XP 2000+ /Abit NF7 mobo/256MB $167 Case - Mwave CX-2358 $20 CDROM - Samsung 52x $18 Hard Drive - Western Digital 40GB $53 Total about $260.

Actually, though, what I'd do is build a hot new PC for Windows and use your current one for Linux. My Linux server is only running on a Pentium 1 at 133MHz with 80MB of RAM, but it does what I need it to do. If money's no object, and you want to push the bleeding edge (hi, John! :D--> ) then you can build a Monster for about $3,000. (Pentium 4 Extreme Edition, Serial ATA drives, High-end graphics card, laser-cut case) If you're looking for the best price/performance balance, you can build one that's equal to 90% of the Monster for 33% of its price. (Athlon 64, IDE drives, 2nd-tier GFX card) If you're looking for a rock-bottom no-frills DIY project, you can still get out under $500, maybe even under $300, although that's a challenge. (Athlon XP, integrated sound/GFX on mobo) The cool thing is that most of the work to build these computers is the same. It's VERY easy nowadays. The mobo attaches to the case with a half-dozen screws. (10 minutes) The power supply attaches to the mobo with one cable that can only go in one way. (5 minutes, 6 if you hook up the fan sensor and P4 12v cable) The CPU only fits in the socket one way, and the heatsink/thermal paste is usually already applied. (10 minutes, mostly to get the clamp on the heatsink to lock down to the CPU socket) The memory will only fit in its slots one way, too. (5 minutes, mostly looking at the manual to see which slot to fill first) Hook up your CD-ROM and Hard drives to the power and IDE cable and put the cables into the mobo's IDE sockets (again, only one way) (10 minutes to fiddle with the little screws) If you have add-on graphics or sound cards, install them now. (10 minutes) If your mobo and case have front USB/FireWire connectors, hook them up now. (5 minutes) Attach monitor, keyboard, and mouse. (5 minutes) Your computer is built. Flick the switch and (hopefully) shout in your best maniacal voice, "IT'S ALIVE!!!!" After it runs through the initial power-on test, shut it down and close the case. Turn it back on, pop the operating system CD in the drive and install whichever you've picked. Linux, XP, whatever. Congratulations! NOW you're a true computer geek! :)-->

Tom: Geek-shorthand for "motherboard". ;)-->

Toooommmm....Tooooommmm....Come over to the geeeek siiiiide! ....You waaaannnt dual operating systems! ....You waaaannnt cold-cathode lights shining out of your case! ....You waaaannnt to laugh at all the people who don't get the kewl jokes in User Friendly, Red vs. Blue, and All Your Base Are Belong To Us! (cough) Ahem. Geez, must be developing bronchitis. Anyway, just go on over to mwave.com or newegg.com and start grabbing parts. You need a mobo, a CPU, some memory, a case, a CD-ROM, and a harddrive. Doesn't have to be fancy to run a little Linux box! You can have the thing together in an hour if you know what you're doing, in three hours if you're a total idiot. Just get a mobo with integrated video, sound and Ethernet, and get a 2-computer KVM switch and you can share your keyboard, monitor, and mouse.

Herbie: Many drives (Maxtor for certain) come with software that will let you copy an existing drive over to the bigger one automatically. Tom: Unless you're a real geek, I wouldn't fool with switching operating systems. If you're just dying to try Linux, buy a new box and install it on its own machine. It's quite nice nowadays, but it doesn't have a tenth of the programs that Windoze does. Best to keep two computers so you can run whichever program you have on the machine it needs.

rascal: It's a way of sharing your internet connection without having to run a cable to your laptop. Also, several hotels and restaurants are starting to add wireless equipment so that travelers can connect to the net through their access points. It won't help you if you're broken down by the side of the road, but it will let you take your laptop outside to play! (I use mine at my telescope in the backyard sometimes.)

Tom: If all your ports are invisible, then hackers can't even SEE your machine, let alone hack into it through an open port. If the port's not visible, you can't connect to it. It doesn't mean you're immune to viruses, but it does mean you're immune to direct hacking/port scans. Keep your antivirus software up to date and make sure it scans all incoming files and email, and you should be ok.

Garth: 1) Yes, but if the 512MB you already have is installed as 2 sticks of 256MB each, then you're already taking advantage of the twin memory access. If it's only 1 stick, adding a second will not only double your RAM but increase your memory speed, too. 2) No, but HyperThreading is somewhat of a misnomer. Unless you run a lot of Adobe Premiere video editing, you won't even notice you don't have it. The P4s with HT are still only single CPUs, no matter what they might fool the OS into believing.

Got the theatrical edition DVD yesterday and watched it again. It's every bit as good as the first time I saw it. Movies rarely affect me emotionally, but I caught myself almost choking up at the same four scenes. Can't wait for the EE DVD, but this one will hold me for a few months! :D-->

You can if you want to, but it won't make much difference on a Centrino. If you had one of the Athlon chips, it would make a big difference, as it has two memory pipelines.

Well, I dunno the Official Mafia Line O' F__kin' Succession or nuttin', but if Tony gets whacked, wouldn't Janice inherit? :D-->