Back Yet Again

Another happy return.  Or somesuch...

My apologies for the silence here.  I seem to have become employed again, and am back in the traveling mode.  Long distance travel combined with a lot of work on-site do not a good blog environment make.  But, I'm back now for a very quick update before crashing out.

Being on the road has meant taking up the Macintosh mantle again.  I do most of my heavy duty work lifting with the Macs, as most of the "tools of the trade" are on them. This week, I had my white Macbook with me.  It was my first "new" Mac, and introduced me to Snow Leopard. And it works like a little polycarbonate trooper.

However, it wasn't alone on this trip.  I don't remember if I mentioned it, but I had come across another system to join my Linux fleet, a Sony Vaio VGN-SZ120P/B.  It's a nice little system, with a Core Duo processor at about 1.83 Ghz, a gig of RAM, and a 100 GB hard drive.  Came to me with WinXP, but it's now running MacPup 550, and works phenomenally.  I jokingly call it my "James Bond" computer, as it's close to the models used in Casino Royale.  (As an added bonus, the previous owner apparently had some business dealings in Russia.  The keyboard has a set of aftermarket Cyrillic stickers on them.  Sort of a nice touch...)  It went with me on the road, and handled some email and entertainment duties.  Just for the heck of it.  (I just gave it the gift of some new rubber feet, as its originals had long disappeared.)

While I was on the road, I found (yes) another Thinkpad.  This one a T23, almost literally for pennies.  Nice little Pentium 3 system.  I did manage to get a new main battery for it, and upgrade the RAM from 256 MB to 640 MB.  That was all the anticipated stuff...  Would be nice if the CMOS battery were in good shape.  That was something I foolishly didn't think about.  (One is on order now.)  My only complaint...  I seem to have a problem with laptops and PCMCIA slot covers. I pulled the T23 out of the box, unwrapped it, and the slot cover fell out...

Oh well...

When I upgraded the RAM this evening, WinXP threw a fit, informing me that it had to be "reactivated" because of changes in the computer.  Huh?  So, I took great joy in live booting my Puppy Slacko CD, firing up Gparted, and...  Well, you know...  Running great now.  I swear it actually runs better than the T30 does...

Alas, no wireless.  From the looks of it, it (like my old A31) doesn't have the antenna installed.  And I'm not bothering to install one.  I am a bit worried about the system fan, and may drop it off at the Computer-Shop-Across-the-River tomorrow, as I really don't have time to tear the thing apart.  I have two days off before heading back out on the road.  Probably just needs a good cleaning...

And, I also picked up a copy of Mark Bowden's Worm, about the "Conflicker" outbreak of a few years back.  Bowden's not the greatest writer out there, but I'm hoping it'll at least hold my interest, when I'm not watching UXWBill and VWestlife videos on Youtube...