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  1. Mercutio

    Upgrading Linux is such a pain.

    Coug, if you want package management that works, try Debian or a derivative. apt-get is just about as easy as things come in Linux. Personally, I download and compile sources for most of my stuff, mostly so I get a little bit better idea of how things work than just running rpm -Uvh.
  2. Mercutio

    My day with "never again" products

    Some time ago, I swore to myself that I would never buy a Shuttle mainboard again. I also said I would never buy an ECS board. But just to see what the fuss is all about, I went out and bought myself some new toys this weekend, including a Shuttle AK32L and a pair of ECS K7S5As (and a couple of...
  3. Mercutio

    Whoops, must have been asleep

    I'll be drop-shipping Prof my congratulatory "gift" as soon as NRG gives me a place to mail it. :D
  4. Mercutio

    What do ypu use the insert key for?

    Sometimes I pry it off my keyboards. On my Linux box, where I do most of my wordperfecting, I do need it for copy/paste-ish functions.
  5. Mercutio

    New to me : Omega drivers for various graphic cards.

    I've got a 128MB radeon 9000 pro up and running on my game machine now. I'm not seeing much of a difference on the games I have installed (UT, Mechcommander II and Tropico), except that now Tropico won't start up except in safe mode. :(
  6. Mercutio

    Whoops, must have been asleep

    If I fedex you a Micropolis drive will you beat him with it?
  7. Mercutio

    Which is worse?

    Must've missed it. If you're writing love-poems about asstastic hardware, I think I'd rather not know about it.
  8. Mercutio

    Which is worse?

    Sure I would: The solution to nvidia is a really big hammer. See?
  9. Mercutio

    Which Linux Disto (yet again)

    You;ll be perfectly happy if you've got a decent amount of RAM - 128MB. A Pentium 200 would work fine for most of the rest,
  10. Mercutio

    article by Woody Harrelson; his take on Iraq & war.

    You mean it's not "Waltzing Matilda"!?! :)
  11. Mercutio

    Thermal compound on new heat sinks

    One of my students told me he had a warranty claim on a Tbird 1.33GHz because he returned it with thermal grease on it instead of the pad. If that's the case, I've been buying retail CPUs for no good reason. Did you gold certification course talk about that?
  12. Mercutio

    Keyboard design has not improved since 1981

    Some might argue that the ergonomic keyboard might represent an improvement. Not me, but someone. I can actually remember all the ASCII alt-sequences for Germanic characters, since I had to type papers when I was taking German in college. Other than that, I think that the biggest advance yet...
  13. Mercutio

    Thermal compound on new heat sinks

    It works reasonably well, but I usually scrape it off and use artic silver instead. Pull the heat sink off and look at that pad sometime, though. The black and brown edges around where your CPU goes just don't inspire confidence.
  14. Mercutio

    Which Linux Disto (yet again)

    I'm a Redhat person, but I don't pretend that Linux is right for everyone. I think Lycoris might be a good place for Tannin to place. I've read happy things about Xandros as well. Every distro does some things better than others. I think you'd need a wider sampling than just one distribution to...
  15. Mercutio

    article by Woody Harrelson; his take on Iraq & war.

    The, Cliptin's nick has two "i"s. I don't think I've ever corrected anyone for describing Bill Clinton as "Slick Willy" or "Bubba", nor even particularly taken offense. One's opinion on the subject of presidential politics is personal. The matter should be dropped. The arguing parties aren't...
  16. Mercutio

    P3 1Ghz and HP HP-28S Calc. on eBay (Accepting Other Offers)

    I love my HP48G. I especially like that it has a speaker. I almost got thrown out of a physics class for accidently starting my "eine kleine nachtmusik" program during an exam. ;)
  17. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    The best machines I have - by far - are eight Tbird 1200s on mixed Asus and ECS boards. 128MB RAM, 12x CD-RWs and crappy 40GB U-series drives. They're more than adequate for the tasks they're given (four are mixed in the classrooms, four are dedicated to running the testing applications we...
  18. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    The problem with an Intel board is that I'd be stuck with an Intel chip. Or, more correctly, I don't think my budget could survive a $104 motherboard plus a Celeron CPU. I'm thinking if I only had to do 50 PCs instead of 60, that would make a HUGE difference in what I could purchase. I really...
  19. Mercutio

    Free Virus scanner anyone?

    http://housecall.antivirus.com/start_corp.asp Works well enough for me, and as a bonus doesn't actually install anything on my PCs. f-prot for DOS does a pretty good job, too.
  20. Mercutio

    Another stupid late night idea ...

    Obviously Tea's would be chose by Drunken Bastard. I think I've got PeeWee's picked out, though:
  21. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    I'll admit I'd be happier with Biostar or (and again, I hate to say this) Shuttle than ECS. Honestly, I don't know what to think of their products right now. I've got a distributor telling me their stuff is "decent", in reference to, I think, the K7S5A. I've got Buck and Coug telling me not...
  22. Mercutio

    Enter to win AMD components during their XPP

    Or, um, Gary. We can't all be like adcadet and win something just for showing up. :(
  23. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    And hey, speaking of bad bad experiences with nvidia, one of my dedicated testing workstations has been locking up intermittantly during paid-for exams for several weeks. Needless to say this is not cool. At first I blamed the testing vendor, then went looking for stupid windows problems, but...
  24. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    I thought those issues were with the straight-up 760 chipset, not the newer 761/762. James, I'm going to buy Realteks at this point. If I can make them work with RIS, I'm a happy guy. Buck, would you actually be comfortable maintaining 60 machines with ECS boards in them? Keep in mind that I'm...
  25. Mercutio

    Which is worse?

    OK, I've *GOT* to do better than 3rd place. Top 10 Things to do with a Geforce4: 10. Piss on it. 9. Make sweet love to it 8. Detach GPU from PCB. Use as keychain. 7. Steal from loving idio... owner. Mail back one memory module at a time. 6. Actually use all the bits that come with your Dremel...
  26. Mercutio

    Which is worse?

    Maybe you don't remember the thread titled "P5 133XL has died" in the computers forum some months back?
  27. Mercutio

    article by Woody Harrelson; his take on Iraq & war.

    John McCain has character and leadership traits that I can respect. So did Bob Dole (to a lesser extent). To name a few others on your side of the fence, Orrin Hatch, minus his songwriter's stance on copyright, seems like a decent fellow, as does Arlen Spector. On the other hand, both the...
  28. Mercutio

    WinXP Pro for $50 shipped (no resale), from bensbargains

    Where and for how long?
  29. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    I hate myself for this one but... Shuttle AK32L @ $55 (newegg) is just about as disgustingly cheap as things get. If the 1600+ can fall another $10 or so, this might actually be doable. Of course, RAM prices will probably eat all that... Gads this is awful. How do you stay in business, Tony?
  30. Mercutio

    article by Woody Harrelson; his take on Iraq & war.

    That means a lot coming from someone who lives in DuPage county, IL. ;)
  31. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    Well that certainly would make things easier.
  32. Mercutio

    article by Woody Harrelson; his take on Iraq & war.

    ... and I think that the ability to correctly pronounce the word "nuclear" should be a constitutional requirement of any nation has such armaments. Honestly, The, I don't see what character Mr. Bush has. I really don't. Nothing makes me think he's anything more than the shallow frat boy...
  33. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    I wish I could use Tulip cards. Linksys NICs are dirt cheap, too, but not every Linksys 10/100 card is a Tulip and I don't know any other decent vendors for that one. RIS is Remote Install Service. Using a fully-patched Windows 2000 server, I can use a program called sysprep to remove all the...
  34. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    Our machines are dual boot (Win98/2000 at present, 2000/XP starting next year). Some of the machines have two removable drive cages for "pristine" 98 or 2000 systems, and a few (in crummier cases) have both on the same disk. The majority of instruction involves the "consumer" system, although...
  35. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    I'm not sure about cases. Probably the most economical thing to do is order a couple pallets of my Compucase 6812. I think they run $28 or $29 in bulk, plus freight (I pay $33 each for mine, which I understand is cost). Those are decent. I just bought my first Antec case the other day, though...
  36. Mercutio

    Which is worse?

    My personal online pet peeve (since I just got done having an awful conversation with Amy and I'm in the mood to be nasty to everyone): Loose = the state of not-tightness. Lose = The state of not-winning. And while I'm at it: It's = it is. Its = it possesses. Their = belonging to them...
  37. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    Buck, I really don't care, as long as it's enough for XP to run smoothly.
  38. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    Why the NIC? One of the requirements for 2000's RIS is a short list of network cards, most of which are made by 3Com or Intel. I'm not likely to run across a cache of Compaq or AMD NICs anytime soon, and cheapies like the RealTek or Davicom aren't supported. RIS would be a major, major...
  39. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    VIA's CPUs don't have anything close to "modern" performance and the $600 ars machine is a little bit out of my price range. :( What I'm replacing is a whole bunch of K6-2/500 and P3-500 machines on mix-n-match integrated PC Chips mainboards, all with 64MB RAM (you wouldn't think there would be...
  40. Mercutio

    "Fleet computer challenge"

    I've been asked to come up with replacement PCs for approximately 60 lab computers, on a hardware budget of around $350/machine. My requirements, other than that, are for a brand-name NIC (3com or Intel), smallish cases with 3 5.25" drive bays, fans that are actually quiet (classroom!), CD-ROM...
  41. Mercutio

    Win2k + Novell

    The MS client for MS networks or the MS client for Netware? The MS Client for Netware, it's just a radio button between bindery server and tree/context in the properties of the MS client for Novell (and of course a textbox to enter that value). I think you can also manually specify the...
  42. Mercutio

    New to me : Omega drivers for various graphic cards.

    I'll give them a shot after I get my radeon 9000 installed.
  43. Mercutio

    Win2k + Novell

    IIRC, the Microsoft client won't talk to Netware 5 using TCP/IP. NWLink must be installed and configured for the correct frame type. In addition, the Novell client must specify the correct prefered tree and context in order for a login to work. When all those requirements are fulfilled, he...
  44. Mercutio

    How many computers do you have? and Why?

    Ten, at the moment. A notebook, for carrying around with me. Three machines (linux) that are simply containers for the vast numbers of hard disks that I need. A main Windows 2000 Server machine, where I do most of my surfing, a game machine (win98), an A/V computer (2000) that hasn't been used...
  45. Mercutio

    Which is worse?

    My hatred of nvidia is not blind. It is the result of countless obnoxious experiences with poorly made products.
  46. Mercutio

    Recommendations on good books to read

    My minor degree is in English Lit, and I've never met a Dickens fan. Hugo, yes, and Goethe, even Thomas Hardy, but not Dickens. Bleak House is the only work by Dickens I've read. I have dim recollections of a cast of dozens and an attention to detail that today would be described as obsessive...
  47. Mercutio

    Recommendations on good books to read

    I must not be "everyone". I really dislike Tom Clancy. Even his "best" (Clear and Present Danger and Hunt for Red October) weren't interesting enough for me to finish.
  48. Mercutio

    Microtel SYSMAR710

    Note that it comes with Lindows (linux) - a modem that would work reasonably well with that machine would cost probably 25% as much as the machine is worth.
  49. Mercutio

    World Domination

    Which link? All three seem like they work to me.
  50. Mercutio

    World Domination

    Here is the full, original list, plus a couple hundred more. One might also be interested in the absolutely marvelous joke site at Villian Supply.
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