Back from the Dead

Sorry for the lack of posts, but with the holiday season, things have been hectic around here. Sophia officially died last month, and I replaced her with a brand new Compaq Presario C714NR. Her name is Ruri Ruri (or just Ruri for short). She has a Pentium Dual-Core processor, 2 GB of RAM (came with 1 GB), Intel integrated graphics (which surprised me in how good they actually are), DVD Burner, Vista Home Premium (which also surprised me in how well it works, but more on that in a bit), 15.4" widescreen, blah, blah, blah. We'll get the big question out of the way right now: No, I have not put Ubuntu on her yet. I will, but I just haven't gotten that far yet. Vista is running surprisingly well, and with the hectic world of the holidays, I haven't taken the time to partition and install Ubuntu. That being said, Ruri will dual-boot; Vista runs so well that I don't feel the need (or even a slight urge) to get rid of it.

Thoughts on Vista

What are my thoughts? Have I run into any of the horror stories? Does it really turn your peripherals into flesh-eating zombies that try to rip your face off? The surprising thing is that it runs great for me. Ruri was a little sluggish on the boot and during gaming (though still WAY faster than Sophia was) out of the box, but that was due to only having 1 GB of RAM. So there is credence to that claim; I really wouldn't suggest running it with less than 2 GB. I popped in a couple of 1 GB sticks within a week (they were on sale at Best Buy for $30 a pop). Other than that, I have no complaints. While it's a RAM hog (sits at roughly 55% of RAM usage on average), it doesn't seem to eat much of the processor; I hover around 10% of usage with iTunes, Outlook, Sidebar, and Pidgin running in the background. I like it better than XP as far as the interface goes. I have always loved the Aero look. I think the blur is way cool (I'm ADD, so pretty things tend to hold my attention!), and it runs smooth. I am in love with the new Start menu system; having a scrollable box with all your programs as opposed to columns of lists is wonderful! And you can just type the name of the program (or file) you're looking for for instant access. The Sidebar is pretty cool, though hardly original. I wish it had as many options as Google Sidebar, but I don't like that Google emblazons it's name twice, so I'm not using it. At any rate, it has everything that I need (weather, calendar, slideshow, etc).

Gaming

I haven't put a lot of games on here yet, but those that I have worked well. The highest end game I've tried is Call of Duty 4, and it's only a little slow with visuals set high. I ramped them down a bit and it runs fine. That game is insane, by the way. I've played and beat the demo about 4 times and I still love it. It's definitely on my list of games to get. Star Wars: Empire at War runs smoothly at full resolution and visuals. WoW? I don't play it (I know I'd get addicted, and I don't need that), so I can't comment there.

Applications

Aside from actually running smoothly, the biggest surprise for me is how fast applications load. Office 2007 apps load as if they're just a part of the system, and even large apps like Photoshop CS3 load within seconds. Now, all of this has to be taken with a grain of salt as I'm coming off of a 4 year old laptop to a brand new one. I went from single to dual-core and doubled my RAM. (That being said, I did have a desktop with a 2.5 GHz Athalon and a G-Force FX card a few years ago, so I do have a bit of a basis of comparison.) Vista is actually known for slowing down everything, but with 2 GB of RAM, it's not noticible. Everything loads fast, and I have yet to run into anything that isn't fully loaded within 10 seconds. Sophia was having a great day if she loaded anything in 10 seconds in XP or Ubuntu. lol

Peripherals

I have yet to plug something into Ruri that Vista can't imediately identify and load. At any given moment, I have my Maxtor OneTouch 120 GB external hard drive, WACOM tablet, Targus Bluetooth USB adapter, Logitech LX710 cordless keyboard and mouse, HP F340 printer/scanner/copier, and usually my Archos 404 and Sansa Connect all plugged in. No issues at all.

Conclusions

All in all, I actually like Vista. I had expected bad performance, BSODs, and freeze ups, but I have yet to run into any of those. I'm fairly certain that this is because of running a Dual-Core laptop that was built specifically for Vista, so I don't necessarily recommend it to those with older machines. I have yet to run into any software compatibility issues, but I know there are a lot out there, so do your research if you're considering a switch. For example, my Dad is about to replace his computer, but some of his essential software isn't Vista-compatible yet, so I'm going to have to wipe it and put XP Pro on it for him. Do the research and find out if everything you need works with Vista. For me, it works and I love it. Not as much as Ubuntu, but I like it better than any other version of Windows.

eyeOS: A Web Operating System

I was reminded today of an article I had read a while back about a browser-based operating system called eyeOS. The basic idea is that you can log into your eyeOS account and have access to your files from wherever you are. At first thought, it sounds like a file host , but it's so much more. It's actually an operating system, complete with programs, folders, a desktop, etc. You can either use the international server, or host your own. I installed it (with a quick install of Apache and PHP) on my laptop and I'm up and running. What I haven't figured out yet is how to use my documents, music, pictures, etc on my hard drive without copying all those files into the eyeOS directory structure. But once I have that nailed down, I will be able to log into my laptop from wherever I am and have access to all my files.

The idea is not necessarily new; all these functions can be done using various other gateways. There are plenty of remote desktop solutions, but this being browser-based (and Flash-based inside of that), it's fast, uses no more processor or memory than a web page, and doesn't require any kind of installation for a client. Even the server install only took about 10 minutes (and that's because I had to install Apache and PHP and forward port 80) and a tiny amount of space (the install file is less than 7 megabytes). To top it off, it's free and open source. There is huge potential in this, especially in the world of Web 2.0.

The Wonderful World of Windows...

So, for various reasons, I've been living in Windows for the past week. It's a dog to start up and shut down, but once in, it runs okay. It's nothing compared to Ubuntu, but for the previous stated various reasons, I've needed some Windows only programs to work with. WINE can run a few of them in Linux, but not all, so I just booted into my Windows partition. It's been nice to kill some time playing games too. It made me realize that as much as I'd like to kill Windows for good, I really can't. GIMP is great, but it really doesn't compare with Photoshop CS3 for the really advanced stuff, and OpenOffice just doesn't cut it compared to Office 2007. I wish wholeheartedly that I could get these to run in Linux, but, alas, they can't (yet). Until someone works enough with WINE, I'm effectively stuck with Windows. And having a 40 GB hard drive split into two 20 GB partitions just plain hurts. I'm almost out of room on both; for gaming, I have to finish a game and uninstall it before I can install another one. I talked in an earlier post of just virtualizing Windows, but with a 4 year old, mediocre-at-the-time, single core processor, it's not a good option. And it'd still eat a big chunk of the hard drive. The only advantage would be not having to reboot continually. So for now, Microsoft has me by the proverbial e-balls.

Raising Davy Jones' Locker

My replacement hard drive finally came two days ago. I pulled all of my music off of Omoikane and I'm pleased with the results overall. I'm not in as bad of shape as I thought, musicwise. The headache now has been eliminating duplicates, renaming and retagging wrong files, figuring out what I'm missing, etc. Sounds like fun, huh?

Dude, Where's My Warranty Replacement?

Yeah, definitely going to virtualize XP for the few programs I need once my replacement hard drive gets here. I logged into XP (for the first time in a couple of weeks) and I was disgusted by its "speed". My god, it took literally 15 minutes to finish booting, logging in, and starting up! Then OneCare wanted to run a tune up (canceled that), wanted to start a back up (canceled that), and then show me a log (which took even more time). I love OneCare, don't get me wrong. It's a great all-in-one suite for protecting the computer, but it hit me with all of that at once! And honestly, that was only because I hadn't logged in in so long. Regardless, in comparison with Ubuntu, it drags. Once I get the drive, I'll pull what I need off of the Mac and then back up what I need out of Windows. Wipe that partition, expand my Linux partition to fill it, then install XP and the few programs I need through VirtualBox. Yes, it will be slower, but I won't have to restart the computer and wait for it to boot.

Back on the hard drive front, I put in my order for my warranty replacement not last Thursday, but the Thursday night before that; yeah, almost two weeks ago. Not only that, I paid for two day shipping. Let me run that down for you again: I ordered it over a week and a half ago, paid for two day shipping, and I'm still waiting for it. They took until last Friday (that's a week from the time of order) to send it out, so two day with UPS doesn't cover the weekend. So it should have shown up yesterday. It was on the truck for delivery at 6:53 AM yesterday. Yeah, still not here. Seagate is getting a nasty e-mail about all this. The UPS issue isn't their fault, but it shouldn't take a week to send out a paid, rushed order for something they have to replace anyway. This is ridiculous.

iTunes for Linux?

I read tonight that someone was having an issue with iTunes (as I've read many times), but I figured I'd give it a go. So I installed the Windows version through WINE and PRESTO it worked! Well, not flawlessly. I get two errors on startup (one about iPod connectivity, the other about burning CDs) along with a very temporary black screen. And no CoverFlow, and, the killer for me, no iTMS connection at all. I can't authorize my computer for the tracks I already have from iTMS. BUT, this is a step in the right direction, and this is with no tweaking. This suggests two things to me:

1) Perhaps with the availability of iTunes Plus tracks (with no DRM), perhaps Apple is loosening the reigns on iTunes a bit?

2) With some tweaking, iTMS connectivity doesn't seem outside of the realm of possibility.

But this again begs me to ask, "Apple, why not make a Linux compatible version of iTunes?" What bad could come from expanding compatibility and opening up to a small, but growing, group of users? With Dell and others shipping computers with Ubuntu preinstalled, usage of Linux is rising. Certainly it would not be bad in the PR department. It might even atone a bit for the whole locking-iPods-from-working-with-anything-other-than-iTunes (read: Linux users) fiasco. Showing some support for the open source community might even make up a bit for locking down the iPhone and iPod touch.

It's actually a suspicion that I've felt ever since the locking of the newer iPods; locking them to iTunes, Steve obviously knew that Linux users would be left in the dark. This made no sense to me unless there was a Linux version of iTunes in development. And lets be frank here; with the surprise move to Intel, Steve showed us that Apple is constantly playing with alternate technologies in development. So is it farfetched that Apple would be considering, or even developing, something that would increase its market reach? I don't think so, and to me, the signs point toward this, not away. I don't feel that Apple is shunning Linux users the way people initially thought. And yeah, I could be wrong (God knows I am all the time!), but why not?

My Ubuntu Experience Recap

I have to say, in all my years of working with computers (got my first one at age 5, built my first at 12, several computer related jobs, so on and so forth), I have never come across a community such as the Ubuntu one. Even when I forayed into Red Hat and SUSE, the support wasn't like this. Perhaps it's because this is a more "consumer oriented" Linux distro, perhaps it's due to the rise in use of Linux in general. Perhaps it's just a sign of the times.

I've become a fairly active member on the official Ubuntu forums now through my modding of my system to be as close to a Mac as possible (and it's pretty damn close). I found ways that worked for me that weren't necessarily posted and posted my bits to help people. You know, pretty much the way a message board is supposed to work. But these people have helped learn more about the terminal than I ever expected to learn, and I found out it's fun. I have yet to screw anything up because there's so much information out there if I just look hard enough. I've hacked the GTK+ system to put my application menus in the top menu bar via a Gnome panel applet (just like a Mac), and then I further hacked that to add to the effect (removed the underlines from the first letter of each menu, removed the drop down arrow, etc). I've changed transparencies of individual things. I've reworked the AWN dock to look as identical to the Leopard dock as possible. Inserted icons, modified fonts, the list goes on and on. And you'd think that somewhere down the line, I'd screw something up. But I haven't. Ubuntu runs flawlessly; much, MUCH faster than XP, and I'm finding new functionalities every day.

I've got Internet Explorer installed for school (though Opera has worked fine so far), and I can install Photoshop CS2 if I need to (though GIMP is pretty good). Can I game? Theoretically, I can. Half-Life 2 (and any game based off of it's engine) can run if installed right through WINE, and multimedia is actually better through Ubuntu. There's no iTunes (yet), but for the albums that I have paid for through iTunes, I can either burn out to CD and reimport as MP3, or I can pull the torrent file for (technically, as I've paid for it already, I can do that legally). I've learned all of this through a combination of playing around and through easy research. I've become a contributor to the Mac4Lin transformation pack and the MacMenu applet. I'm helping debug minor things on LaunchPad. And best of all, my 4 year old laptop, which was mediocre at that time, runs Ubuntu, Compiz Fusion, AWN, and anything that I've thrown at it fast and flawlessly. I don't find myself yearning for an upgrade (other than a monitor) so I can do the latest thing like I always feel with Windows. I don't feel like I'm left behind because of crappy support for my old integrated graphics, or my less-than-par processor.

I only wish for 3 points of compatibility: IE7 for school (I HATE 6's interface), Office 2007 (I really got used to the interface and find the "older" style of OpenOffice annoying now), and iTunes (I've always liked the simpler interface for organizing my music). At some point, someone will figure out the first two, and I really think Apple could do a lot of great PR for itself by supporting at least Ubuntu (as it's now being packaged OEM with computers), if not all of Linux. But then you get into the whole cracking their DRM thing. Granted, with the rising availability of iTunes Plus tracks (with no DRM at all), that may eventually be a non issue. At any rate, I find myself not even thinking of logging into XP at all. I probably won't ever get rid of XP completely; I'm sure the second I wipe it from my system, I'll need it for something. lol But I have scaled back it's partition to a minimum so Ubuntu has more room to breathe.

Were it not for the support of other users and developers on a personal level (I've only read maybe one or two FAQs rather than actually asking someone), I probably wouldn't feel this way. Windows XP is by far more compatible with comercial software, but in almost every instance, there is an open source analogue that I can use to replace it. There's a few programs that are just better commercial (that is the power of a large budget and dev team), but nothing that is a complete deal-breaker. Ever since I started using Ubuntu a few months ago (and that was really just to curiously play around), I've used Windows less and less. In fact, I'm toying with the idea of wiping XP, using the entire hard drive for Ubuntu, and virtualizing XP back in through VMWare for the couple of programs I might need. It's not difficult, so we'll see.

So what's my point? That I like the people and support that come along with Ubuntu? Yes, very much so. But there's also a plug: Give it a try. Got a CD burner? Who doesn't? Download it and burn it to CD. You don't even have to install it to try it! Just reboot with it in your CD-ROM and play around a bit. It can run off the CD so you can "try before you buy" (although, it's free, so there is no "buy", just install). Got extra hard drive space? Create another partition (way easier than it sounds) and install it to dual boot. You might just find out that you like it. To try Mac OS X, you gotta buy an Apple. To try Vista, you gotta buy the upgrade (and then deal with all the headaches that come with it). To try Ubuntu, you have to burn a CD. If you don't like it, you're out the pocket change the CD cost. No biggie. ~_^

RIP Davy Jone's Locker: An Obituary

So it died for good last night. After two weeks of battling with bad sectors, my external hard drive finally kicked it. I lost all of my music and videos that weren't on my MP3 player or PMP. That boils down to I was only to save about half a gig of my dance music, most of my movie score music, and only the movies that were important enough to me to have on my PMP all the time. ;_; Luckily, I had transferred all my pictures and documents to main hard drive last week when I realized this was probably going to happen. But I lost about 30 gigs of music and 80 gigs worth of video. Only about half of that music is on Omoikane (the Mac) and none of the video. At least the hard drive is under warranty, so I'll get a replacement in a few days, but I still have to rebuild from the rubble.

What happened is my cat sat on the "Next" key two weeks ago while my music player was open and we were gone, repeatedly hitting the hard drive and burned out sectors. It's actual physical defects now, and I can't even mount it at this point. I'm not sure if overheating warped it or the heads scratched it, but it's gone. At least I've had two weeks to prepare for this and come to terms with it. I'm just glad it's under warranty (yay for registering it when I pulled it out a few months ago!) I hadn't updated you guys that I was wrong about the drive to save you from more of these techy posts. lol

So with the passing of my external 120 gig hard drive, I would like to say a few words:

Davy Jones' Locker, you served me well in the past. You dutifully stored my media without complaint and even held torrents and other downloads in escrow while they transfered. You backed up my documents and through several system wipes, you were there for me, offering all I needed to get back to work. You were a good friend until that fateful day two weeks ago when I left my music player up. I had just moved you and Sophia next to the window and ran out to the store to pick up some CAT5. I was only gone a half hour, but the damage was done. One of the cats sat on the keyboard and held down the "Next" key for an untold amount of time, repeatedly skipping songs, running up to 10 songs at a time due to the crossfader settings. This either overheated you or scratched your surface, I'm not sure witch, but it was a mortal wound. A mortal wound that slowly spread until at 1 AM last night, you finally failed to mount. Over the past few weeks, you put up with repeated checkdisk scans, an attempted defragmentation, and various other forms of attempted fixes, all to no avail. May you rest in piece my friend. There will never be another drive like you. Well, except the identical replacement drive that I will name "Davy Jones' Locker" too.

NOT Cool.

I could kill the Siamese cat. We moved to computers out of the bedroom and into the ex-dining room (I say that because we've lined it with tables and desks to create a studio center for Jill's artwork). I put my laptop next to the window, 'cause, believe it or not, I like the sunlight and stuff. Anyway, I set it all up yesterday and after Scott picked up the kids, we ran to Wal-Mart for about a half an hour. I left Winamp up, but not running, and while we were gone, the damn cat sat on my keyboard; more specifically, the media keys. That not only played music, but she sat on the "next" key. This told Winamp to play a new song about every tenth of a second. Through ALL of my music. 30+ Gigs of it. With crossfading (this meant about 10 songs playing at any given time to accommodate my crossfading settings of 1 second). Now my external hard drive (where I store EVERYTHING; all my music, videos, pictures, and documents) is shot. Windows can't read it (I/O errors), but Acronis Disk Director can. Best $50 I ever spent on software; it's literally saved this laptop 4 times. I've been running a check on it since last night, and it's only 6% through the actual file clusters (it has 111 Gigs to sort through). It's found a bunch of errors and fixed them, but I won't know how bad the full damage is until it's done. That could be days from now. >_<>

Trillian Astra

Hell yeah! I just got accepted to the alpha program for Trillian Astra after months of waiting! "But Chris", you may ask, "Trillian runs on Windows, and you're using Linux." Well, I reinstalled XP Pro on half of my hard drive the other day (which is why it's ironic I was accepted today). I realized that I do need Photoshop to do certain things that I just can't do the same in GIMP, and having actual Office is always a plus for compatability. Not to mention, with Windowblinds 6, I can finally get the "Vista" look I wanted, blur and all, with XP. XP being more stable than Vista, I can also game again (I never did finish Half-Life 2). Not to mention, I plan on starting classes soon, and I'm more than sure that Ubuntu is not supported. Better to be fully compatible if possible, right? And I have the room to dual boot; all my documents, pictures, music, and videos are on my external hard drive. In fact, I have both OS's Document folders pointing the same folder, so everything is shared and synced.

And on the topic of Ubuntu, I also upgraded it to 7.10 (Gutsy Gibbon) Tribe 4 (what they call their beta); it runs way better for me than 7.04 (Fiesty Fawn), and I can even use Compiz Fusion (REALLY cool desktop graphics effects) due to my lappy's graphics card finally being supported fully. And I can go on and on about Ubuntu Linux and how much I love it, but you've already read that crap. lol

But yeah, I split my 40 GB hard drive into two 20 GB partitions, Ubuntu Linux on one, Windows XP Pro on the other, share the documents, pictures, music, and videos between both, and everything is running great.

Back to Trillian Astra (the reason I actually started this post; can you tell how ADD I am?), it can be run on Mac OS X or Linux through it's flash based website. It's limited at the time, but the potential is cool.