VolatileChar

I don't know what happened here, but I was watching Windows 2008 (Longhorn) processor demo (available through http://forums.winxpcentral.com/showthread.php?t=21625) in full screen mode (F11) in IE7. After sometime, when I tried to exit out of full screen, I noticed that the system had become very slow (I mean, very very very very slow). Now, for all the carp out there about Vista being slow, it has been pretty fast for me and I have had no problems.

I brought my spacebar gadgets forward to see what was going on. Straightaway I noticed that I had only 90 MB of free memory (out of 2 GB!). I fired up Task Manager (well, fired up is the wrong phrase to use... it took more than a couple of minutes for the Task Manager window to come up!). And what do I see there?

That's right. What you see there is Internet Explorer (iexplore.exe) consuming 1.3 GB of RAM! I don't know what caused it to happen. I tried the same thing again, but it worked fine the second time.

I had Gmail, Google Reader and the two links I noted above open in the browser window.

The wireless card stopped working on my HP DV6040US laptop about a month ago. It happened quite suddenly. Whatever the wireless switch position, the wireless LED would remain red instead of turning blue when wireless was ON. On top of that, the wireless adapter was no longer detected by the operating system (Windows Vista, XP and Linux).

I searched online and saw many reports with similar problems, with no solution other than sending the laptop to HP for repairs. In my case, that wasn't the best option since I purchased the laptop in the US and I am now back in India. The laptop is still under warranty. So, today, I finally decided to contact HP online chat support.

I got through to a person named 'Billy' (Bill Gates? Naa ;) he doesn't work for HP!). I described the problem, provided the laptop serial number and model number. He then asked me to try the following.

1) Enter BIOS setup and restore defaults.

2) Do a BIOS reset by opening up the memory cover of the laptop and disconnecting the BIOS/RTC battery for 5 minutes. (The laptop must be disconnected from mains and the laptop battery should be removed before performing this procedure).

(1) didn't help. But (2) worked!

After I reset the BIOS and put everything back together, I entered BIOS setup, set the correct date & time, re-started the laptop and booted into Windows Vista. This time, when I switched on wireless, the LED turned blue! And it connected to my wireless network perfectly!

Thinking back, it seems to me that this problem started right around the time I upgraded the BIOS to F.28. HP should clearly do a better job of the BIOS upgrade!

Here is a link to the HP support manual for dv6000 series laptop with instructions on how to open any part of the laptop.

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c01035677/c01035677.pdf

Thanks to the HP support rep, I was able to get the wireless working on my laptop again.

Update: Well, the problem recurred after the next reboot. I contacted HP support again and they weren't of much help this time other than saying that I restore the laptop using the HP restore DVDs. That wasn't an option in my case (I don't like their craplets... I always do a clean install). But, I decided to download and install Windows Vista specific chipset and VGA drivers for the notebook from the HP support web site. And, the wireless is working again! I have rebooted a couple of times and the wireless keeps coming back up... so, hopefully this is a permanent fix. I am surprised that this is a chipset/VGA driver issue because the drivers I previously had were from Windows Update and they are the latest WHQL drivers!

Wow... an iPod with cover flow!

http://www.apple.com/iphone/ads/ad1/small.html

Wow... you can read emails and surf the web too!

http://www.apple.com/iphone/ads/ad2/small.html

You can watch movies too... cool! And this is how you enter text?

http://www.apple.com/iphone/ads/ad3/small.html

You are kidding me, right? This is the iPhone... there MUST be some SUPER, AMAZING way to enter text! THERE MUST BE!!!

You lost me there. You have use two hands to do anything on the iPhone. How (im)practical is that?

Eat your own words Pat! Schumi is the master and he showed it. And you, having worked with him before, doubted his ability to perform under pressure? Eat your own words, again

http://www.itv-f1.com/News_Article.aspx?PO_ID=37542

Go Schumi, Go! Just 2 more races!!

--Dileepa

I am running the latest build available on Microsoft Connect (5728) and it's really looking good for Windows Vista. Not too many problems (though I can't get the Media Center to work properly - can't even get through the configuration!). The bundled applications work well. And, Windows Vista is significantly more responsive (= faster) than Windows XP.

Windows Vista doesn't recognize all the hardware on my laptop, but I can install most of the Windows XP drivers and get the all clear in Device Manager (i.e no unrecognized hardware). One strange thing is that the sound card driver that Vista installs doesn't have microphone as a recording device! But, I can fix this by installing the XP driver.

BTW, I bought a new laptop about a month ago; a HP dv6040us multimedia notebook. It's good, although I have had problems with the microphone - lots of noise!. But the noise problem is almost non-existent on Windows Vista using the same XP drivers! Another strange thing (not so strange, actually) is that the noise is non-existent when I switch off the WiFi on XP!. So, can't seem to figure out what's going on...

Here's the laptop spec sheet:

http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=339895&Pn=Pavilion_dv6040us_Notebook#ts

--Dileepa

At least, according to this email I received to my Yahoo! account :)

(In case anyone reading this didn't get it, it's spam. So, please don't follow any instructions down below. Read at your own risk!!!!)

Quote...

A LETTER FROM SALIF IBRAHIM .PLAESE COMPLY IF U ARE INTERESTED...

salif ibrahim <salifibrah10@hotmail.com>

FROM THE DESK OF DR.SALIF IBRAHIM
ACCOUNTS & AUDIT DEPERTMENT,
BANK OF AFRICA (BOA)
OUAGADOUGOU, BURKINA FASO.
                                ATTN: URGENT DEAR FRIEND
I am the head of Accounts and Audit Department of Bank Of Africa,  
Ouagadougou.It is my utmost pleasure to send you this confidential message.
In my search for a reliable business partner overseas, i got your  contact
in the internet and was impressed with your profile hence my interest in
doing business with you.In my department we discovered an abandoned sum of
$18.3m US dollars (Eighteen  million, three hundred thousand US dollars) .In
an account that belongs to one of our foreign customer who died along with
his entire family on Monday,31 may, 2000 in a plane crash out side paris.
Please visit this site that is one of the evidence the directors brought in
other to swallow the money at the end
oftheday,http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/859479.stm
Since we got information about his death, we have been expecting his next of
kin to come over and claim his money because we cannot release it unless  
somebody applies for it as next of kin or relation to the deceased as  
indicated in our banking guidelines but unfortunately we learnt that all his
supposed next of kin or relation died alongside with him at the plane crash
leaving nobody behind for the claim.
It is therefore upon this discovery that I and other officials in my
department now decided to make this business proposal to you and release the
money to you as the next of kin or relation to the deceased for safety and
subsequent disbursement since nobody is coming for it and we don't want this
  money to go into the Bank treasury as unclaimed Bill.
The Banking law and guideline here stipulates that if such money remained  
Unclaimed after seven years, the money will be transferred into the Bank
treasury as unclaimed fund.
The request of foreigner as next of kin in this business is occasioned by
the fact that the customer was a foreigner and a Burkinabe cannot stand as
next of kin to a foreigner.
We agree that 30 % of this money will be for you as foreign partner, in
respect to the provision of a foreign account, 5 % will be set aside for
expenses incurred during the business and 65 % would be for me and my
colleagues.
There after I and my colleagues will visit your country for disbursement
according to the percentages indicated.
Therefore to enable the immediate transfer of this fund to you as arranged,
you must apply first to the bank as relations or next of kin of the deceased
indicating your bank name, your bank account number, your private telephone
and fax number for easy and effective communication and location where in
the money will be remitted .
Upon receipt of your reply, I will send to you by fax or email the text of
the application. I will not fail to bring to your notice that this
transaction is hitch free and that you should not entertain any atom of fear
as all required arrangements have been made for the transfer.
I expect that you contact me as soon as you receive this mail  or If you
which me to contact  you via your  telephone or fax or po box I will do that
as well.
You can also contact me via my alternative email address
(salifibrah@yahoo.fr)
Yours faithfully,
DR.SALIF IBRAHIM
Accounts & Audit Department ,
BANK OF AFRICA (BOA)

I use both IE7 B3 and Firefox 2 Beta (BonEcho) to surf the web. I used to use Firefox more than IE. Since Windows Live Mail wouldn't work with BonEcho, I started using IE more.

Today after I downloaded the nightly build, I thought I would try something to get Windows Live Mail to work with BonEcho. It's a pretty simple change and it worked! All I had to do was change the user agent string (this is the string that identifies what browser it is).

Here is what you have to change:

Open BonEcho

1. Type 'about:config' (without quotes) into the location bar (address bar) and press enter.
2. Type 'firefox' (without quotes) in the Filter field.
3. Double-click on 'general.useragent.extra.firefox' Preference Name.
4. Change 'BonEcho' to 'Firefox'
5. Close the page.

That's it! All done. Log on to Windows Live Mail and it works like a charm :)

BTW, Windows Live Writer is the best new application I have seen in some time. It's just so well done & refined for a beta product, I can't believe that it's a beta product!

--Dileepa

I just noticed that if you search for Yahoo or Google on MSN Search, just before the first result, you get a search bar asking you to try MSN Search.

Pretty nifty way to promote MSN Search, eh? But then, what kind of a person searches for Google or Yahoo on MSN Search? A fool like me, I guess :)

--Dileepa

A very impressive application. More so for the professional bloggers.

Although everyone is talking about this new application/service in the Windows Live family, what no one has noticed (or has cared to report) is that this is the first Windows Live branded application built using Microsoft .NET development platform.

Windows Live Writer blog:

http://WindowsLiveWriter.spaces.live.com

Download link:

Writer.msi

(This blog post published using Windows Live Writer.)

--Dileepa

CNN IBN is the hot new destination for the latest news from India. At least, that’s what they would like you to believe. What most readers don’t notice, or don’t care even if they notice, is the kind of mistakes their articles contain and the frequency of mistakes.

In the past two weeks, I have seen three articles where important points have been wrongly reported. The first article was an interview with Brandon Routh, the guy who plays Superman in the new movie Superman Returns. The article, get this, quoted him as saying “…So we were able to really practice a lot of that stuff so it looked smooth. Plus, we had the ability to have Common Gateway Interface (CGI), and these amazing computer artists came in and helped with that and there was great team effort too.” He would have probably said CGI and these guys foolishly expanded it to Common Gateway Interface AND attributed it to him – how about that! I put up a comment for that article pointing out their mistake, but the comment didn’t show up at all. But the mistake was mysteriously corrected.

Now, today, in two articles about the failure of the GSLV launch vehicle, they repeatedly pointed out that INSAT belonged to the Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) series of satellites. I again put up a comment in one of the articles pointing out the mistake. Again the comment did not appear – the article was corrected. But you can still see the mistake in the second article.

First article (the main article):

http://www.ibnlive.com/news/insat-4c-launch-unsuccessful/15143-3.html

Second article:

http://www.ibnlive.com/slideshow/view_slide_show.php?id=62

This from a media outlet claiming the highest percentage of viewership. Come on! What are the editors getting paid for? Are there any editors at all?