February 2005

Here are the scores for last nights pub activity.
Firstly let me say that i had an excellent time and it was good to see (nearly) all of you in one place again. Just like the old days (ahhhhh!).

It now appears that Fat Matt Twat was semi concious deciding whether to eat another mayonaise, pepper, streaky strips and olive oil sandwich or to watch another episode of “Queer Eye“. Very poor show. But every cloud has a silver lining - he now owes us all 2 pints and a salty snack each! Or would that be 2 pints of his salty snacks? Only time, some whiskey and a bottle of poppers will tell us the outcome of that question!

The scores are as follows in no real order and i will not score myself of course (just in case i come last).

Chris:
“Like an earthquake in a butchers window” quip = +30
Being the only one to “get out his little gadget” = -10
Overall Score: 20 (just too cool to try harder - nuff said)

Tim:
Extra bonus sympathy points for being sacked in Brighton today = +50
Wearing his red anorak (where was your spotters notepad?) = -10
For not knowing how a PAYG mobile phone works = -10
Overall Score: 30 (ayy what? me ears not working well these days)

Jon:
Leather jacket…… you’re like so 1990s = -20
Bringing yet more free coasters CDs = +30
“Thought you’d been swimming” quip = +10
Overall Score: 20 (”much better when he’s on his own”)

Rick:
Ad-hoc Mandarin swearing lesson = +40
Going to watch “The Dons” = +10
Failing his blood test today (sorry sir… only Stella in there) = -10
Breathing Steak Pizza on everyone = -10
Overall Score: 30 (everyones jolly pissed mate)

Ray:
Getting married tomorrow (congrats?) = +30
Drinking alc-free lager = -10
Loosing an N64 on eBay(?) = -10
Overall Score: 10 (not to be trusted with worldly possessions)

Carl:
Yellow bollock wristband = +20
Overall score: 20 (its worth £22 on eBay!)

Adam:
For believing that computers have “ruined modern life” = +30
Looking blankly at us as we chat about C++, Modula2 and the Internet = -10
For getting a job that involves fighting = +10
Overall score: 30 (he’s not reading this anyway!)

Matt:
Sitting at home and watching Changing Rooms whilst we supped beer = -50
Offering a party = +10
Overall Score: -40 (taking the scumble effect to Canada)

Saw an iPod Shuffle in Selfridges today.

Only just! It was sooooooo small it was nearly lost in the blokes hand who was looking at it!
Very nice… Gonna get me one!

Well…well… well….. look what i spotted next to the train station whilst on my way to London last week:

SUBWAY!!! Yahhhhay!

I just had to go and sample its wares this lunchtime. 6″ Vege Patty. Mmmm!
The service was speedy and efficient (and they did’nt put too much salt and pepper on either!). It is also only just a quick walk up the hill from work or if you are brave you can even play “dodge the parking fine” and leave your car outside for a few minutes. I can see myself getting rather fat sometime soon.

Mac Mini: The Emperor’s New Computer

I just had to blog this review of the Mac Mini by a so called MCSE.
Now i’m not a Mac officionardo by any small stretch of the imagination - hell - i’ve only touched one for more than 2 minutes a few times! But this bloke has got it all wrong-wrong-wrongo! I’m glad i never made MCSE - it obvioulsy means nothing these days!

Quotes:

While the hardware is about roughly equivalent to a Windows PC circa 1995,
what got me interested were Apple’s claims about its size, weight and
footprint.

Hmmm.. 1995… thats when i first started fixing PCs. The birth of Windows 95. The PCs were 486s with 16 or 32mb of ram! Now lets compare that to the MacMini’s 1.25 or 1.42Ghz G4 processor with 256Mb DDR-RAM.

If you believe Apple’s marketing department, the new Mini is “smaller than most packs of gum” and weighs “less than four quarters”. Well, we received our test unit from Apple yesterday, and let me say right off the bat that those claims are a wee bit of an exaggeration.

Well.. if you had been reading the spec of the new iPod Shuffle then you may have read that information….. but not the iMac Mini.

While there is a Mac-style “donnnnggggg” when the Mini is first turned on, during normal operation the unit makes no sound whatsoever. This could make it very difficult for a novice user to know whether or not the computer is on. In fact, it took our techs about fifteen minutes before we realized the unit itself was operating normally and it was the monitor that was not plugged in properly

Ahhh… the old classic! I drove from Milton Keynes to Norwich once to fix that fault! Actually - that was back in 1995 too!

The Mini boots up into a stripped-down operating system which Apple calls OS X, similar to the stripped-down WindowsCE OS found on many handhelds.

Yeahhhss… sure it does… Just cos its got no Start button its stripped down.

There is no Outlook Express for email, but Apple includes a program called Mail, which is like a stripped-down email client.

Duh!

Secondly and possibly even more glaringly, there is no antivirus program shipped with the Mac! In today’s climate of non-stop worms, trojans and viruses, releasing a computer with no virus removal software is irresponsible on the part of Apple

Duh duh! Possibly why someone would buy it in the first place?

My Office 2003 CD would not install, despite claims I had heard from Mac fanboys that OS X is compatible with Office.

Duh duh duh!! You even tried it! Extra points for effort!

Come on! Its cute, its a computer… i want it!!!
This will shortly become a new purchase i feel.
The wife is getting more than a little pissed off with my oversize PC with extra bits and bobs cluttering up the lounge.

What i really want is one of the “Desk lamp” iMacs. At least with this little beauty i could get away with a real “minimal” setup on my computer desk. Wireless keyboard and mouse too… oohhh matron!

MaDdoG Software Flurry for Windows

This is a PC version of the funky OS X mac screensaver called Flurry.

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Found a cool article about the “supposed” 50 most important video games of all time!

The Essential 50 Archives from 1UP.COM

Check it out.

The good guys over at Slyck news are reporting that the latest version of eXeem no longer contains the Cydoor Spyware/Adware component. Although Cydoor sounds less intrusive than before, it can only be proof that pressure from the P2P fan base can have an impact in a good way.

Check the full story here: Slyck News - eXeem Drops Cydoor