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  1. Mercutio

    Spicebird

    I'm playing with an interesting modification of Thunderbird right now, called Spicebird. It's available for Windows and Linux, and it's sort of a hybrid of the Tbird client I'm used to and Outlook. It has an integrated calendar, RSS/widgets and support for Jabber-based IM, which is handy if you...
  2. Mercutio

    What punishment for illegal abortion...?

    jtr, do you have any idea how idiotic it is to tell people not to have sex?
  3. Mercutio

    Samsung F1 1Tb and 750GB All Defective?

    It's entirely possible that the very large drives could be returning results that the tool would interpret as "out of bounds" on a smaller drive. At any rate, I've seen enough versions of diagnostic tools over the years to know that they need to be updated regularly because they either don't...
  4. Mercutio

    MacBook Air-world's thinnest lappy.

    Sprint's customer service is nightmarish. That I will give you; when they ported my phone number, they didn't port my voice mail. That took about 16 calls and about six hours to correct, including a lot of calls would start with a 20 minute wait on hold followed by "I'll transfer you." and then...
  5. Mercutio

    Samsung F1 1Tb and 750GB All Defective?

    I think this was mentioned in the other thread about the large Samsung drives, but it's entirely likely that Samsung just hasn't gotten around to updating its tools to support the new drives.
  6. Mercutio

    Ant Parasite Turns Host Into Ripe Red Berry

    I thought this one was more generally horrifying.
  7. Mercutio

    Pics of some computer industry gurus

    "You really have to wonder where his beard or mustache is though." Not being able to grow a beard is a professional impediment if you are wanting to be a programmer.
  8. Mercutio

    Money Celebrities Pictures Gallery

    The Julia Roberts one is good for a few nightmares.
  9. Mercutio

    Show Hidden Devices Trick in XP

    It should show things like previous video cards or system chipsets. I find it's most useful to "show hidden devices" on machines that have either had a repair install or were installed from a prepared image.
  10. Mercutio

    Something Random

    There can be no food more awesome than this.
  11. Mercutio

    FairTax

    For what it's worth, American drug companies spend about $30,000,000,000 a year on R&D, and about $90,000,000,000 on marketing... if that tells you anything about their priorities.
  12. Mercutio

    MacBook Air-world's thinnest lappy.

    If you unplugged the drive with a floppy or cassette from its data interface, it'd keep doing whatever you told it, until its read/write buffers were empty. Which, it turned out, could take a while.
  13. Mercutio

    MacBook Air-world's thinnest lappy.

    Yeah, but you could pull the external floppy off a Commodore 64 and it would continue its I/O operations. How cool is THAT?
  14. Mercutio

    End of the World As We Know It

    I think we're probably better off letting recession happen than trying to forestall the inevitable. We - the citizens of the US as well as our law- and policymakers have been collectively moronic about money. We spend what we don't have. We exaggerate to keep the good times going and we really...
  15. Mercutio

    Merc's Useful Tools of the day

    Well, if you have Windows Server you can implement SUS and at least decide what updates you want.
  16. Mercutio

    FairTax

    No. Wrong. Again. We elect people who represent us and who - if they take their dicks out of lobbyists' mouths long enough - can change the rules to suit the will of the people. A government that does not serve its citizens is not going to be in power very long. A corporation that does not...
  17. Mercutio

    Spyware App Updates

    As I recall, one of your former complaints was that you were having to regularly download the updates and that it generally took too long. Apparently a Real Internet Connection has fixed that problem nicely.
  18. Mercutio

    FairTax

    Thank you for that brilliant analysis. How do you then explain functional social welfare programs in places like Sweden or France?
  19. Mercutio

    FairTax

    Absolutely. Corporations are amoral beings that have all the rights of an actual human being in our legal system yet serve no other purpose to enrich the tiny number of people who own enough shares to see meaningful profit in corporate activities. Corporations can act outside the best interests...
  20. Mercutio

    FairTax

    No. Wrong. Completely. We practice medicine for profit. Medicine. The necessary practice of preventing or curing physical and mental ailments. A necessity for human well-being. In terms of its social role, availability of heath care occupies roughly the same place as having functional law...
  21. Mercutio

    The Story Of Stuff

    One of the things that's been pissing me off lately is the way my local grocery stores are packaging meat. Traditionally, I got meat shrinkwrapped on a small styrofoam plate. I was OK with that. Styrofoam lasts a trillion years in a landfill, but on the other hand, it's light and most...
  22. Mercutio

    Something Random

    So I just watched the teaser trailer for the new Star Trek movie. I'm not a trekkie, but it looks pretty cool. To me, though, the coolest thing about it was the little soundbites from John Kennedy and Neil Armstrong, from back in the days when we knew all about our spacemen. We've had some...
  23. Mercutio

    MacBook Air-world's thinnest lappy.

    Sob. One of the things I really wish I could have is integrated Sprint EVDO. Dell has it but Lenovo doesn't. :( I hafta plug my phone into a USB cable like a chump. Also, does anyone say "lappy" out loud, where other people can hear you? How do you deal with the pointing and laughing?
  24. Mercutio

    The Story Of Stuff

    Most of the stuff that I buy is essentially either media (CDs, Comic books, books) that I'll probably never get rid of. When I shop for groceries I buy things in minimal or at least justifiable packaging. I bring my own bags when I shop, thick plastic ones I got at Costco. I know from...
  25. Mercutio

    MAC vs Windows

    I suspect they've been working on it for a while, so I doubt it's a clone. Lenovo generally doesn't have much of that sexy industrial design, but a lot of executive-types like to look for something distinct and different from what their peons have, and I suspect that's the main market for the...
  26. Mercutio

    Need new mobo: Suggestions?

    I know the feeling. I have a set of Kef reference speakers and I put an amplifier and real speakers everyplace I might possibly listen to music, but a decent pair of computer speakers is an amazing step up from the crappy ones that are built into laptops and LCD monitors, or the $10 Cyber...
  27. Mercutio

    Which Boot Loader?

    Setting up a complex boot loading system.
  28. Mercutio

    Need new mobo: Suggestions?

    Better computer speakers already have SPDIF and/or TOSLINK inputs. Buy a $200 pair of Logitechs and you'll be all set. :)
  29. Mercutio

    Which Boot Loader?

    That is entirely too much work when two instances of the same Windows will happily share a drive.
  30. Mercutio

    MAC vs Windows

    I've said it before and I'll say it again: Proper laptops say Thinkpad on them.
  31. Mercutio

    Something Random

    Nearest one is about 20 miles from where I live, though in the western suburbs of Chicago I think zoning laws require one every three blocks.
  32. Mercutio

    Something Random

    I really think that for the most part both I and the world are better off if each of us has as little contact with each other as possible. Fundamentally, I do not believe that a change in environment would result in a change in behavior on my part. I believe that my control over the...
  33. Mercutio

    FairTax

    Well, properly speaking the purpose of government - any government - is to provide a framework for behavior and interactions among its citizens. A government does this through force of law - which primarily exists as a set of rules and regulations for what individuals cannot do. Laws and...
  34. Mercutio

    FairTax

    I could suggest that the outcome might've been different had the Soviet Union not been trying to compete in an arms race with the US. The USSR also never really recovered from World War II; they sent a whole generation of men into a meat grinder against Hitler's troops, wasted another generation...
  35. Mercutio

    Something Random

    I doubt my life would change from moving.
  36. Mercutio

    MAC vs Windows

    Mac laptops really aren't anything special.
  37. Mercutio

    FairTax

    That may very well be true, but there's no reason to conflate this discussion with the possibility of attaching religious values. Since I've had the faithful tell me many times that unless my behavior is governed by their holy book I am by definition amoral, morality is a word I'd sooner avoid...
  38. Mercutio

    HP Executable drivers, aka WTF is wrong with .INF?

    BullshitFEADarchive.exe -nos_ne -nos_o"C:\FEADBullshit" (note the lack of a space between the o and the ") Will extract the archive. That did not fix my problem, though. I sat and installed a 7150 several times on different PCs. It turns out that the installation is layered. The HP printer...
  39. Mercutio

    Request for increase to edit posts!

    If there were classes where we could send Uda so he would write posts more like yours, sechs, I would pay to send him to them.
  40. Mercutio

    Something Random

    I do not like the beach. I like bikinis and women in bikinis but I do not like being outside. Also, it's 14F on the beach right now.
  41. Mercutio

    MacBook Air-world's thinnest lappy.

    Apple wants you to buy a Mighty Mouse!
  42. Mercutio

    Which Boot Loader?

    He needs to install in parallel to get his stuff back... Piyono, you can put both installs on your "C:" partition. That's fine. The problem is when two different versions of Windows are trying to share non-\Windows Windows folders like Program Files or the swap file. Just install the second XP...
  43. Mercutio

    MAC vs Windows

    I think there's a decent minority of Apple users who buy the hardware because of Apple's industrial design. There are PC users who see S*ny PCs the same way (I couldn't believe it either). Apple is successful as a hardware company, though, so I don't think we're in any danger of seeing an...
  44. Mercutio

    Something Random

    You really do not understand how rarely I see women, let alone jiggling ones. I do not go out except to work. I work with some women, yes, but they are my mother's age and do not jiggle, as it were. I do not eat out by myself. I see my ex maybe six times a year. She has small, fake boobs that...
  45. Mercutio

    Move Over, ‘Meerkat Manor’

    1. That's hilarious 2. My understanding is that romance novelists are paid to write stories of a certain length - 40,000 words for $1500 or somesuch. The writer in question probably finished up her story and realized she had some padding to do. 3. What the hell is up with having one whole...
  46. Mercutio

    Show Hidden Devices Trick in XP

    I didn't know I needed to do anything but select "show hidden devices" from the options menu, myself.
  47. Mercutio

    How much "online" storage do you have?

    No one would buy it. I understand it's pretty easy to get involved with that industry if you work in the San Fernando valley, but mostly I think people are far more interested in the fantasy than the reality.
  48. Mercutio

    Something Random

    I learned a wonderful new word today: Mammaquatia - The bobbing or jiggling of a woman's breasts when she walks, dances, or exercises. It is a word that I am going to strive to work into my daily vocabulary. Which would be much easier if I ever got to see women walking, dancing or exercising...
  49. Mercutio

    How much "online" storage do you have?

    Most of what I put on tape was VHS rips. Not just porn (that was about 4TB) but also miscellaneous movie and TV shows, most of which has since been released on DVD. For what it's worth, about 10,000 porn titles are released every year, plus countless thousands of web-only video clips. The...
  50. Mercutio

    HP Executable drivers, aka WTF is wrong with .INF?

    So I have some printers. They are shitty printers. HP 7150s. They are filled with suck and also with lose, but I have several of them and I thought it'd be nice to attach them to a nice, lpr-based print server. Maybe I'll even run out of ink for them before they all die. These printers, instead...
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