New Computers

I have a budget of $6,000 to build 2 new computers for myself. I’ve paid for my new computers and am now waiting for them to be built and delivered.

In my living room I will set up a media centre with a large hard drive to hold all my music, television recordings, photos, games and movies. With a large screen for display this will be my main source of entertainment.

I’ll also have a laptop for web browsing, writing and general computing but the laptop will be able to access the media centre via my wireless network to stream movies, music, etc. I most likely will also want to play games on the laptop.

I already have a wireless router and network set up in my house. I also have a Logitech Z-5500 5.1 Dolby Digital speaker system with digital S/PDIF connection.

With your assistence I also want to develop a wireless mesh network in Naracoorte. The requirements of such a network should also play into the hardware requirements of my new computers.

To work out the specifics of my new computers I have used the following websites:

• Free Software Foundation’s list of Hardware Devices
• P2P Foundation’s list of open hardware
• Pioneer Computer’s DreamBook that I modelled my laptop specifications on
• Ubuntu’s Free Software Laptop wiki page
• Better Access Media Centres Australia’s Specifications
• Mythbuntu’s Recomended Hardware
• OzMyth’s Hardware Guide
• MythTV’s Hardware prerequisites
• Ubuntu Documentation’s list of Wireless Cards Supported
• Air-Stream Wireless’s How-To Guides

Laptop MSI GX630/AMDZM80/4G/320GB/V-HPr

Processor

• AMD Turion X2 Ultra ZM-80 Dual Core 2.1 GHz

Display

• 15.4 inch
• WXGA
• ACV (Amazing Crystal Vision)

Graphics Card

• NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT
• 512Mb DDR3 VRAM

Memory

• 4 GB (2×2 GB)
• DDR2 667

Hard Drive

• 320 GB SATA
• 5,400 rpm

Optical Drive

• DVD Super Multi

Extra

• VIDIA MCP77
• 4-in-1 Card Reader (SD/MMC/MS/MS Pro)
• Built-in Gigabit Ethernet LAN & Modem Module
• Built-in 802.11 b/g WLAN (will add either 802.11n internal card or Netgear WN511 Cardbus Adapter)
• Bluetooth V2.0+EDR
• Graphics Card Output (15-pin, D-Sub) x1
• USB 2.0 ports x3
• Mic-In port x1
• Headphone Output x1
• Modem port x1
• LAN port x1
• PCI Express Card x1
• eSATA x1
• HDMI x1
• Li-Ion 6 cells
• Targus carry bag
• integrated 2.0 Megapixel webcam

Operating System

• Ubuntu Linux
  

Media Centre

Processor

• AMD Athlon 64 Quad Phenom 9950 2.6 GHz 4MB cache AM2 CPU

Display

• Dell 27 inch LCD monitor

Graphics Card

• Asus EN9600GT/HTDI/512MB

Memory

• Kingston 2GB DDR2 800MHz x2

Hard Drive

• Seagate 1 Tb Barracuda ST31000340AS 32MB cache

Optical Drive

• Pioneer BDC-502BK Blue-Ray player

Case

• Antec Fusion Remote Max HTPC

Extra

• Asus M3N-H/HGMI GF8300 AM2+ GBL HD Audio Firewire, S/PDIF, PCI x3, PCI-E16 x1, PCI-E x1
• Netgear WN311B RangeMax Wireless-N PCI Adapter
• Belkin Bluetooth USB Adapter v2.0 (100m range) (mounted internally)
• Fusion DFUDVI-130 Dual 4 tuner card
• Antec EarthWatts 650W PSU

Operating System

• Mythbuntu Linux
  
• … but should be able to run gNewSense Linux without proprietry drivers

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Shell Oil Safety Alert!

Here’s some reasons why we don’t allow cell phones in operating areas, propylene oxide handling and storage area, propane, gas and diesel refueling areas.

The Shell Oil Company recently issued a warning after three incidents in which mobile phones (cell phones) ignited fumes during fueling operations

In the first case, the phone was placed on the car’s trunk lid during fueling; it rang and the ensuing fire destroyed the car and the gasoline pump.

In the second, an individual suffered severe burns to their face when fumes ignited as they answered a call while refueling their car!

And in the third, an individual suffered burns to the thigh and groin as fumes ignited when the phone, which was in their pocket, rang while they were fueling their car.

You should know that: Mobile Phones can ignite fuel or fumes

Mobile phones that light up when switched on or when they ring release enough energy to provide a spark for ignition

Mobile phones should not be used in filling stations, or when fueling lawn mowers, boat, etc.

Mobile phones should not be used, or should be turned off, around other materials that generate flammable or explosive fumes or dust, (I.e., solvents, chemicals, gases, grain dust, etc…)

TO sum it up, here are the Four Rules for Safe Refueling:
1) Turn off engine
2) Don’t smoke
3) Don’t use your cell phone – leave it inside the vehicle or turn it 0ff
4) Don’t re-enter your vehicle during fueling.

Bob Renkes of Petroleum Equipment Institute is working on a campaign to try and make people aware of fires as a result of ‘static electricity’ at gas pumps. His company has researched 150 cases of these fires.

His results were very surprising:
1) Out of 150 cases, almost all of them were women.
2) Almost all cases involved the person getting back in their vehicle while the nozzle was still pumping gas. When finished, they went back to pull the nozzle out and the fire started, as a result of static.
3) Most had on rubber-soled shoes.
4) Most men never get back in their vehicle until completely finished. This is why they are seldom involved in these types of fires.
5) Don’t ever use cell phones when pumping gas
6) It is the vapors that come out of the gas that cause the fire, when connected with static charges.
7) There were 29 fires where the vehicle was re-entered and the nozzle was touched during refueling from a variety of makes and models. Some resulted in extensive damage to the vehicle, to the station, and to the customer.
8) Seventeen fires occurred before, during or immediately after the gas cap was removed and before fueling began..

Mr. Renkes stresses to NEVER get back into your vehicle while filling it with gas.
If you absolutely HAVE to get in your vehicle while the gas is pumping, make sure you get out, close the door TOUCHING THE METAL, before you ever pull the nozzle out. This way the static from your body will be discharged before you ever remove the nozzle.

As I mentioned earlier, The Petroleum Equipment Institute, along with several other companies now, are really trying to make the public aware of this danger.

I ask you to please send this information to ALL your family and friends, especially those who have kids in the car with them while pumping gas. If this were to happen to them, they may not be able to get the children out in time. Thanks for passing this along

Pray for ice-cream

Last week, I took my grand-children to a restaurant.

My six-year-old grandson asked if he could say grace.

As we bowed our heads he said, “God is good, God is great.
Thank you for the food, and I would even thank you more if Nana gets us ice cream for dessert.
And liberty and justice for all! Amen!”

Along with the laughter from the other customers nearby, I heard a woman remark,
“That’s what’s wrong with this country.
Kids today don’t even know how to pray.
Asking God for ice cream!
Why, I never!”

Hearing this, my grand-son burst into tears and asked me, “Did I do it wrong? Is God mad at me?”

As I held him and assured him that he had done a terrific job, and God was certainly not mad at him, an elderly gentleman approached the table.

He winked at my grandson and said,
“I happen to know that God thought that was a great prayer.”

“Really?” my grandson asked.

“Cross my heart,” the man replied.

Then, in a theatrical whisper, he added
(indicating the woman whose remark had started this whole thing),
“Too bad she never asks God for ice cream. A little ice cream is good for the soul sometimes..”

Naturally, I bought my grand-children ice cream at the end of the meal.
My grandson stared at his for a moment, and then did something I will remember the rest of my life.

He picked up his sundae and, without a word, walked over and placed it in front of the woman. With a big smile he told her,
“Here, this is for you. Ice cream is good for the soul sometimes; and my soul is good already.”

I just joined brandsExclusive, here is an invite so you can join too.

I just joined brandsExclusive, here is an invite so you can join too..

Bad Day at the Office

By: Author Unknown

Next time you think you have had a bad day at work, think about this guy. Tom is a commercial saturation diver for a diving company out of Louisiana and performs underwater repairs on offshore drilling rigs. Below is an email he sent to his sister.
Hi Sue,
Just another note from your bottom dwelling brother.
Last week I had a bad day at the office. I know you’ve been feeling down lately at work, so I thought I would share my dilemma with you to make you realize it’s not so bad after all.

Before I can tell you what happened to me, I first must bore you with a few technicalities of my job. As you know my office lies at the bottom of the sea. I wear a suit to the office. It’s a wetsuit.

This time of year the water is quite cool. So what we do to keep warm is this: We have a diesel powered industrial water heater. This $20,000 monster sucks the water out of the sea. It heats it to a delightful temp. It then pumps it down to the diver through a garden hose, which is taped to the air hose.

Now this sounds like a good plan, and I’ve used it several times with no complaints. What I do, when I get to the bottom and start working, is I take the hose and stuff it down the back of my neck. This floods my whole suit with warm water. It’s like working in a Jacuzzi. Everything was going well until all of a sudden, my bottom started to itch. So, of course, I scratched it.

This only made things worse. Within a few seconds my bottom started to burn. I pulled the hose out from my back, but the damage was done. In agony I realized what had happened.
The hot water machine had sucked up a jellyfish and pumped it into my suit. This is even worse than the poison ivy you once had under a cast. Now I had that hose down my back. I don’t have any hair on my back, so the jellyfish couldn’t get stuck to my back. My bottom was not as fortunate.

When I scratched what I thought was an itch, I was actually grinding the jellyfish into my bottom. I informed the dive supervisor of my dilemma over the communicator. His instructions were unclear due to the fact that he along with 5 other divers were laughing hysterically. Needless to say I aborted the dive.

I was instructed to make 3 agonizing in-water decompression stops totalling 35 minutes before I could come to the surface for my dry chamber decompression. I got to the surface wearing nothing but my brass helmet. My suit and gear were tied to the bell. When I got on board the medic, with tears of laughter running down his face, handed me a tube of cream and told me to shove it “up my butt” when I get in the chamber. The cream put the fire out.

I later found out that this could easily have been prevented if the suction hose was placed on the leeward side of the ship.

Anyway, the next time you have a bad day at the office, think of me. Think about how much worse your day would be if this were to happen to you. I hope you have no bad days at the office. But if you do, I hope this will make them more tolerable.

Take care, and I hope to hear from you soon.

Love you,
Tom

Giving Up Too Soon

By: Author Unknown

A man meets a guru in the road. The man asks the guru, “Which way is success?”

The berobed, bearded sage speaks not, but points to a place off in the distance.

The man, thrilled by the prospect of quick and easy success, rushes off in the appropriate direction. Suddenly, there comes a loud “SPLAT.” Eventually, the man limps back, tattered and stunned, assuming he must have misinterpreted the message. He repeats his question to the guru, who again points silently in the same direction.

The man obediently walks off once more. This time the splat is deafening, and when the man crawls back, he is bloody, broken, tattered, and irate. “I asked you which way is success,” he screams at the guru. “I followed the direction you indicated. And all I got was splatted! No more of this pointing! Talk!”

Only then does the guru speak, and what he says is this:
“Success IS that way. Just a little PAST splat.”

Violence begets violence

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it. Through violence you may murder the liar, but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. Through violence you may murder the hater, but you do not murder hate. In fact, violence merely increases hate. So it goes. Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.
ATTRIBUTION: MARTIN LUTHER KING, JR., Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community?, pp. 62–63 (1967).

Flood Fightback twibbon

Brung Up Proper

WE WAS BRUNG UP PROPER!!
CONGRATULATIONS TO ALL MY FRIENDS WHO WERE BORN IN THE 1930′s 1940′s, 50′s, 60′s and early 70′s !
First, we survived being born to mothers who smoked and/or drank while they carried us and lived in houses made of asbestos.

They took aspirin, ate blue cheese, raw egg products, loads of bacon and processed meat, tuna from a can, and didn’t get tested for diabetes or cervical cancer.

Then after that trauma, our baby cots were covered with bright coloured lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, doors or cabinets and when we rode our bikes, we had no helmets or shoes, not to mention, the risks we took hitchhiking.

As children, we would ride in cars with no seat belts or air bags.

We drank water from the garden hose and NOT from a bottle.

Take away food was limited to fish and chips, no pizza shops, McDonald’s , KFC, Subway or Nandos.

Even though all the shops closed at 6.00pm and didn’t open on the weekends, somehow we didn’t starve to death!

We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle and NO ONE actually died from this.

We could collect old drink bottles and cash them in at the corner store and buy  Toffees, Gobstoppers, Bubble Gum and some bangers to blow up frogs with.

We ate cakes, biscuits, white bread and real butter and drank soft drinks with sugar in it, but we weren’t overweight because……..

WE WERE ALWAYS OUTSIDE PLAYING!!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.

No one was able to reach us all day. And we were O.K.

We would spend hours building our go-carts out of old prams and then ride down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes. We built tree houses and cubbys and played in river beds with matchbox cars.

We did not have Playstations, Nintendo Wii , X-boxes, no video games at all, no SKY channels , no video/dvd  films,  no mobile phones, no personal computers, no Internet or Internet chat rooms……….WE HAD FRIENDS and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth and there were no Lawsuits from these accidents.

Only girls had pierced ears!

We ate worms and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.

You could only buy Easter Eggs and Hot Cross Buns at Easter time…

We were given air guns and shanghais  for our 10th birthdays,

We rode bikes or walked to a friend’s house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just yelled for them!
Mum didn’t have to go to work to help dad make ends meet!

FOOTY and CRICKET had tryouts and not everyone made the team. Those who didn’t had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!! Getting into the team was based on MERIT 

Our teachers used to hit us with canes and gym shoes and bully’s always ruled the playground at school.

The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of.
They actually sided with the law!

Our parents didn’t invent stupid names for their kids like ‘Kiora’ and ‘Blade’ and ‘Ridge’ and ‘Vanilla’

We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned HOW TO
DEAL WITH IT ALL !
And YOU are one of them!
CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids, before the lawyers and the government regulated our lives for our own good.

And while you are at it, forward it to your kids so they will know how brave their parents were.

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Freedom

Your cell phone is in your pocket.

He clutches the cross hanging on his chain next to his dog tags.
He knows he may not see some of his buddies again.

You walk down the beach, staring
at all the pretty girls.
He patrols the streets, searching
for insurgents and terrorists.
He’s told he will be held over an

extra 2 months.

You call your girlfriend and set a
date for tonight.
He waits for the mail to see if there
is a letter from home.

You hug and kiss your girlfriend,
like you do everyday.
He holds his letter close and smells
his love’s perfume.

You roll your eyes as a baby cries.
He gets a letter with pictures of his
new child, and wonders if they’ll ever meet.

You criticize your government, and
say that war never solves anything.
He sees the innocent tortured and
killed by their own people and
remembers why he is fighting.

You hear the jokes about the war, and make fun of men like him.
He hears the gunfire, bombs and
screams of the wounded.

You see only what the media wants
you to see.
He sees the broken bodies lying
around him.

You are asked to do some thing by
your parents. You don’t.
He does exactly what he is told even
if it puts his life in danger.

You stay at home and watch TV.
He takes whatever time he is given
to call, write home, sleep, and eat.

You crawl into your soft bed, with
down pillows, and get comfortable.
He tries to sleep but gets woken by mortars and helicopters all night long.

If you support your troops, send this
to 13 people.

REMEMBER our Troops, and do not
forget them LATER
Lest we forget

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