All about Labor Day

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_Day_%28United_States%29

Indiana Ice Slideshow

Just testing a slide insert

pulling my hair out

About three days of pulling my hair out I am giving in and just realizing there is a hardware major malfunction in the design of the Compaq F500. The WiFi drivers were upgraded with what I hope was the correct ones as Compaq does not even list the F500 on there Web page. (I'd try to get out of it too!) It came with a total mess of trial (share ware) loaded on it and after removing all of it the best I could, Icons and bits and pieces remained scattered about the registry. A reg cleaner was used and this made other problems appear. After the restore for about the 3rd time I just loaded a virgin copy of Vista. This seemed to do the best fix so far, but the WiFi is still slow connecting if at all. Sometimes you must re-boot 3 times to get it to see the network. I did find if you hard wire it to the router with CAT-5 it works without a flaw. So if you do not have a wireless access point or wireless router you would fair very well with this computer. I wanted to up the RAM from 1 Gig to 2 Gig but found the machine only has two slots and they are filled with 2 separate 512K boards. This means you would have to remove and discard them replacing them with 2 one Gig cards (strips) at a cost of over $280.00. This is half the cost of the machine, therefor, out of the question. Alot of my little ad on programs that I have come to use everyday will not run under the Vista OS. The file system is very hard to look at, and I could keep going on but you have heard many times before about the quirks of Vista, believe me they are true. I did some research on loading XP on this machine and found there was a driver nightmare. Sound, video, nic, and probable much more. You must stick with Vista, Bill has gotcha again. To end, I have done all I can do, I am just going to try to live with it. It seems I have took a step back instead of forward by getting a newer computer. It's for sale at a discount price.

Nightmare marches on

I just bout a a new Compaq notebook with Vista Home Premium, It has an AMD dual core proceser that runs at 1.7 Ghz. It has 1 Gig of memory. By the specks it should be a rocket compared to my old HP 4900, but its not. Why ? I'm trying to figure it out. Vista is somewhat the same as far as the user is concerned but the file system and deep down in the guts is much different. It is going to take some time to understand just what Bill was thinking about when he coded Vista. I find the built in wireless (WiFi) works much poorer and takes a lot of head scratching to connect. I find that it takes as long as five minutes to connect to my network from a cold boot-up even after it was configured to it. I'm going to put another 1 Gig. of memory in it and see if this helps to speed up the process. I do like the wide screen and light weight and the touch pad is very smooth. It took me 4 hours to un-install all the junk & trial ware that came installed on it. I crashed the OS completely in the process but I restored it from the 2 DVD disks I made then repeated the un-install process without a problem the 2nd time. Most all the big computer sales companies are too cheap now to provide the Windows OS on CD or DVDs. I bet it saves them at least 50 cents per machine. Make sure you burn the OS to dvd after you buy a new machine, believe me you're going to need them. I'm going to try a few things on this computer to get it going to the way I think it should be running. I'll keep you posted as the nightmare marches on...........jackDemaree.

New Camera

I have just installed a new camera atop my Ham radio tower. It produces a very high resolution image and has extremely good night vision. It will be aimed at State Rd. 129 and South Main street through out the day till near sunset, Stratton - Karsteter Funeral Home is centered in the frame, then moved to Benham Rd. and South State Rd. 129, this move is because of sun angles. You can see the image at:
http://webcam.wb9otx.com/cam/
Scroll down the page till you see the two side by side photos. The new camera view is in the right frame. I wish to thank all of the nice emails and guest book entries received from all the people that were from Versailles, but now living afar. I'm glad I can give you a small view of your home town. By the way, leave a note in the guestbook as people love to read them........ Jack

World Sunlight Map

Watch the sun rise and set all over the world on this real-time, computer-generated illustration of the earth's patterns of sunlight and darkness. The clouds are updated every 3 hours with current weather satellite imagery.
http://www.die.net/earth/

get off the crack

My phone has been ringing off the hook with people wanting to know about email Spoofs and Phishing. Here is a page that covers eBay and PayPal spoofs. These are the most common but there are loads more. Read this:
http://h1.ripway.com/pi_r_square/nospoof/index.html
A lady called just awhile ago to tell me she received an email telling she had just bought a camera from eBay and the payment was in question via PayPal. She tells me she has no eBay account and no PayPal account. My reply was hit the delete button. If you do not have an account how can you confirm your user name and password. Ebay, PayPal, or any other will "never never ever" ask for your password. Don't fall for these phishing trips and spoofs. Out of my 100 plus emails I receive each day at least 5 are spoofs, some are real good ones and I have to laugh to think that someone would revel this information to a company or widow in Liberia Africa who wants me to transfer money from her dead husband's bank account. Get real, and get off the crack, just hit delete !

Troy Hooton Versailles Video

On a hot 90 degree plus day I stayed in and let the air conditioner blow watching the Nascar race and making a video that I have been wanting to produce for a few months. I'm not a cry baby but I want you to know when you view this video that it took 10 solid hours to get it so you could watch it. I made a few mistakes as I went along that I won't make on the next. You do learn from your mistakes. This project started with Troy Hooton's movie camera. It was color and this was rare in the early fifties, he was ahead of his time a little. In time the movie film was transferred to VHS by a company in Columbus Indiana. DVD players were not yet in every home. A few years passed and I was hired to convert the VHS tapes to DVD. I loved the movie so much that if I was allowed to keep a copy there would be no charge. Sense then I have made several copies of my master for friends. I now have digitized it for computers and uploaded segments to You Tube. I only took five minutes worth from the nearly one hour original for You Tube. I wish you could see the complete movie. Shoot you can, just stop by my home and I'll pop her in the player for you. In the mean time the You Tube version will have to do. You should have broadband to view it, but if you don't, next time at a friend's house that has broadband punch it up and watch it from there. Only five minutes of video but I'm sure you will like it. See it here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0Y5uAsj0CQ
See all my videos at:
http://wb9otx.com/youtube/
Please share these links with others.

St. Paul Church at Olean, Indiana

One of my geek friends, Lydia Gardner, has almost finished creating a very nice page for the St. Paul Church at Olean, Indiana. Please view it from:
http://www.stpaulolean.com

Are any intruders on you WiFi Network

Think your home or small office wireless network is safe? Do you have any idea whether there are any intruders on it? This free program is a great way to find out. It's a bit technical for novices, but will do no harm if you decide to use it as a learning tool.

Run RogueScanner on a PC attached to your network via Ethernet. (The program won't work in Windows Vista, so you'll need Windows XP.) When you run it, it immediately does a network scan, finding the wireless and wired devices attached to it. For each device, it lists the unique MAC address (a kind of serial number), the IP address, the manufacturer if it can figure it out and model number if it can find that. It also tells you what kind of device it is, such as a router, printer, PC, and so on. And it will also flag any suspect devices it finds.

Just compare the information it finds to what you know of your network. If there are any wireless devices connected that you don't know about, you may have an intruder. Get RogueScanner here: http://www.networkchemistry.com/products/roguescanner.php

From the PC Guru newsletter

This is also a quick way to gather all your IP addresses in your network.

A trip to Tanzania

My Wife's friend Wanda just returned from a trip to Tanzania. She has posted all the excitement to her blog. There are some very nice photos also. Read the Blog at:
http://wanda-mylife.blogspot.com/

Yep them were the days

http://www.bentbay.dk/in_oldDays.html

Ham Radio vertical antennas

It has been said that a vertical antenna radiates equally poor in all directions. I have found this to be somewhat true, but I have a full size 1/4 wave 40 meter vertical that will work the far East or Pacific if you want to stay up late enough. If you want your vertical to work greater distances you must get the angle of radiation lower to the horizon. To do this you need radials and lots of them. 120 would be perfect but with the price of copper wire I would shoot for 60. You don't see many verticals with 60 radials because the wire is costly and you have to keep them out of the lawn mowers reach. I dug mine in with shovel and ax. It was much work and I don't think I would do it now with my age. A better way is to have it done by a underground dog fence installer. He has a machine that will do the job in no time at all and the rates are very low. An installer that will cover Southeast Indiana is: Invisible Fence with the phone of 812-539-3647

Broadband speed test

Everyone that is on DSL, cable, or satellite are always interested in their download speed. Am I getting what I'm paying the big bucks for is always the question. I have found a site that does a very good job for this information. Unlike most speed test pages there is no restrictions or no questions ask such as your email or sign up. Try it to see if your ISP is delivering what you are paying for. I find that my wireless network to my laptop is 2/3rds slower than my hard wired system. Can you beat my speed ?
http://www.speedtest.net/

How to beat carnival games

When I was very young my Mom took me to the Pumpkin Show as we call it. It is an annual street fair held at Versailles, In. The town square is littered with rides and games. I had a dollar just about to burn a hole in my pocket. I had rode some rides and now before heading home I told my Mother I wanted a teddy bear. I spotted some nice big panda bears in one game booth that I thought I would love to win. My Mother said you would never win one but its your dollar. The barker encouraged me to play and would not hand me the baseball till he gathered a crowd to watch. He handed me the ball, I tossed it and the big cat fell off the stand. I won ! Now he went into the speal that if this little kid could win all of you can to. Well I don't know if he could control the winner or not but I took the teddy bear home with me. I have been fascinated with street fair games ever sense and have tried to understand the art of the scams. By the way I still have a picture of me and the teddybear. If you want some inside information on how to win at these games (may be) look at this page.
http://vt.essortment.com/beatcarnivalga_rayx.htm

Ripley Computer Service

A new page has just been added to my collection. It features all of the companies that I have for sponsors. It has a modern new look about it. I think you will like it. See it at:
http://ripleycounty.net/rcs
There is also a link from:
http://ripleycounty.net

Versailles Legion Memorial Day 2007

I have uploaded a video slide show to YouTube. It features Memorial Day services of 2007 start to finish of the day's events.. Please watch, then rate the video. Broadband works best, but if on dial-up, pause it for a minute or so to buffer the download, then click play.
The YouTube URL is:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=PGy64jazWrY
See all my videos at:
http://wb9otx.com/youtube

codecs are not cameras

Streaming video on the web is created in many different formats including DivX, XviD and AC3. In order to view these streams you need special decoders, called codecs.

The best free collection of third party codecs comes from http://xcodecpack.net/downloads.html and not only does it incorporate into Windows Media Player, it includes a copy of Media Player Classic. It will play nearly anything without the overhead of the full-blown WiMP.

From the GuruNews

For Geeks Only

I find that I am very weird and do things that most people don't. Ever so often I do find a person that wants to do as I do but ithis is rare. You see I love 50 & 60's music, this is what I listened to when I was a teenager and younger.
I built many crystal radio sets and one and two tube sets when I was about 12. I collected every broken radio that people put out for trash. Some I fixed most were cut up for parts. The first transistor radio I ever seen was shown to me in about 1954. An engineer for G.E. had a prototype, it was AM only with no speaker, only an earphone. This was before FM became popular so most radios did not have it. Radios then were measured in the number of transistors, 4, 6, or 8. Six was the standard and this was way before they had ICs. Small was what everyone wanted back then, but by the time I was 18 or so bigger was better. Boom Boxes were the thing when I was in the army. I remember this very well as I had a big boom box resting on an open window sill in my army billets, when I returned from the shower It was gone (stolen). I worked for Townsend Tree service one Summer and the spray truck I drove had no radio. I tied a portable radio onto the westcoast mirror for my listing pleaser. The same was done when I worked for UPS, but it had to be hidden, NO Radios Allowed. Now I listen to digital satellite radio. I have it on a special boom box they call a roadie, also I can pipe XM radio into my sound system for home listing. I also have it on my Direc-TV system. This I record eight hours at a time on DVD were it can be played on a computer or DVD set-top player. I also convert the DVD audio to MP3 format so it can be played on a very small digital MP3 player. Sorry I got carried away, now I'm going to tell you what I was thinking about when I started out with this. I use a program called "Total Video Converter" to convert the video file to MP3. Ever so often a sensible priced program comes along that will do exactly what you want it to do. This program will set you back about $40.00 but it is well worth the price. If you are into You Tube or for that matter any type of video this is almost a must have program. You can plug your cam corder into the DVD recorder then change the DVD video into about any format such as AVI for You Tube or DivX to save space on your computer's hard drive. I guess most reading this blog will not need this program, but I find in a year or so you may. I seem to run a little ahead I think. Keep it in mind for the future if not needed now. You can read all about it here:
http://www.effectmatrix.com/total-video-converter/index.htm
This is shareware, so you can try it for free then if you like what it does you can get the credit card out.

See you on the Green Keys

Many years ago in my early Ham Radio days teletype was a very popular mode. We called this mode RTTY or the green keys. I had an ASR-28 machine that weighed more than I did. Very noisy, greasy, and took up a lot of room but that was a part of the hobby that these new no code kids will never experience. Now Hams use computers and sound cards to transmit in many digital modes, but RTTY is still one of them. Enough history, I get carried away sometimes. A big part of RTTY was sending photos made up from keyboard characters such as #@&(. I'm sure some government workers spent countless hours making these images to send to each other. I never had the talent to do this, but I can tell you I loved to have one sent to me. Now you can create one of the same in about a snap of the fingers. Pick out a nice photo stored on your computer then go to:
http://photo2text.com/
The outcome will look just as it did when the fan fold paper rolled out of my ASR-28 machine about 30 years ago.

View from about 5 foot away.