h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

~ a faint "Tally-ho" is heard outside of the Atelier followed by a girlish giggle ~

I dunno FG. I have met some real fruitcakes in my life.... One of them still lives in Montana.

*watches as a spiked heel flies over marv's head*

I would suggest a clean install, i.e. a full version of Windows XP. Also, for some reason, a lot of Xp users cant' shut down their boxes (i'm one of them)- it just repeatedly restarts- so I'd look into that as well.

And I have 680 mb of ram in my machine and it runs fine- all memory is recognized.

The restart problem means there's a driver missing or improperly installed. I've had that for months while I've been trying to figure out what isn't there.

Here's the real butt-pain: no less than 6 question marks (error indicators) in the device manager, pertaining to the various parts of the ATI card -- video in, video out, etc. etc. -- but Win can't tell you which device is which when you try to manually install the missing components!

That being the case, I am most leery of XP. There are several websites which collect reports from users about what apps and drivers will run and which ones don't, and it is very scary.

The problem is over my head, really. I'm going to have to take the box to Roswell.

*goes to the window to see what's happening out front*

My internet has been down. I had a smart jack "possibly" corrupted by a power bump that wasn't caught by my UPS which "may" have a low battery. Anyway, the ESF wouldn't pass. And there was a problem with the loop in Springfield. Or maybe just half of the loop. (I don't have a clue what any of that means.)

I didn't get a chance to say goodby to Floradora.

I'm on Netscape, using XP on a PC. Am thinking of getting a Mac for home, but have never used one and am not sure if I'd like it.

I could use and .

Well, I am still undecided as to the proper tactic for an upgrade as of yet. I am leaning toward W2K but that will limit my gaming.


On a good note Phoenix (a stripped down Mozilla) has been behaiving well all day. With any luck it will become my default browser soon.

[BB]

On the XP front

3 months ago I switched my 18 month old Pentium 4 from ME which it was supplied with, to XP purely to be able to edit large video files from my camera.

It took about 4 weeks to track down working drivers for all my gadgets and gismos, but since then it has worked fine

My advice (for what little it's worth)
Don't upgrade unless you have checked the availability of drivers for all your bits beforehand.

Don't upgrade unless you have a decent speed connection, the number of upgrades is still to high to do via a modem.

http://www.tootsie-roll.com/history.html

I can't imagine using an OS that doesn't have drivers for the motherboard. Did you say motherboard, Lil? Just call me a Mac-hugger.

Marv, I can't see that mountain today either, probably all the smog and rain and the fact that I'm 2000 miles away.

<-- staring at the fruitcake

*pulls her little bean bag up to the fire*

I think I overdid it today . I'm feeling poorly.

d'E, think about a mountain that rises about 1000' from teh surface of the water and is about 10 linear miles from you
Then think about the smog being so bad that you cannot see said mountain from your desk window...


Amy, you should rest a bit, would you like a ?

*hands amy a cup of and a biscuit*

I'm going through all my CDs and condensing them onto DVD-Rs. Has anyone else done this? I was just wondering how reliable the DVD burns are- the CDs are damn expensive and I don't feel like ruining one with a buffer-underrun error or somesuch.

Sporky, I look at it sort of like putting vinyl on tape...one's sort of replacable, the other, not so much. Buy blanks in bulk, that's all I gotta say.

Marv, I don't know. I have a lot of problems in XP when I bounce from one thing to another too fast. Also, it tends to reset itself to defaults when I'm not looking. Which is why I am seriously considering a G4. Although can you get a two button mouse for a Mac? I like that a lot, that right click.

And like Lil, I found that what drivers XP accepts and what it doesn't is rather arbitrary. It will take the drivers for Illustrator, but not for PageMaker, and PageMaker is the latest version, and Illustrator is from 2 years ago. It's sort of random...before you switch to XP, make sure your drivers are the latest, and check with MS for the list of incompatibles. My modem wasn't recognized at all, even with new drivers. Had to get a whole new one put in.

Although it is YEARS beyond 98 and ME as far as stability goes, I will say that.

Would someone please make me a smiley for Excedrin? H

*lopsided and rummaging behind the Atelier furniture for her other spiked heel*

*Carmel hops in, then onto the couch where she collapses onto a cusion.*

Dear me, I haven't given you my Thumbnail? Oh, my, I do hate to be a bother, and after Mr. the Grate gave me such a nice welcome! Here goes...

Carmel is a 10 inch soft toy, or, as she prefers, stuffie. Please do not call her a "plushie" as that is something rude that she doesn't understand. She serves as writing partner and worry toy to Mac, with whom she has written 4 Live Action Games. Her heroes are Bunny Rabbit (from the Captain Kangaroo Show) Greg the Bunny, and Pipsy Mouse (from Diddy Kong Racing).

Will that serve? Mac says he can edit it down to 4 fours if that becomes necessary.

Eh - I could try, Hypatia - if you explain to me what Excedrin is *(probably familiar with it but with a different brand name in Sweden*

*heads off towards one of the guest rooms with a beginning cold*

Marv -

I have 2 120GB drives and a 40GB on a P4 2.5GHz with 512MB RAM. ATI 9700 Pro and SB Audigy. I plan on a 4GB partition for XP, and the 40GB drive with Linux. All the rest of the storage will be available to both OSs, including 80GB of MP3s.

My plan is to run Apache and Tomcat on Linux and when I am completely familiar with it, depracate XP to just games.

Should be much fun Can't wait!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Courtesy

That's "4 words" Carmel. "Carmel is a bunny." Sums it up nicely.

Hey, can anyone explain to me why Red Dog believes Carmel and I look like the artist's models for "American Gothic"?

Ah - found a site explaining what Excedrin is - but it doesn't seem to be very nice stuff - those liver damage warnings sound familiar...

http://www.excedrin.com/8_product_info/8-4_quick_spear.html

Lil -

Might I petition to be a salonista?

Courtesy