Standard Maintainence

To my great success, the culprit has been cornered in the crime of delaying my Windows 7 install.

As I type to you now, I do so on Windows Explorer through my newly installed Windows 7 Home Premium operating system.

After cleaning my RAM heads and blowing the dust out of their saddles, I reinstalled all 4 sticks and gave Windows 7 a shot.

Same old story, the installation hung at the "Starting Windows" screen of uncertainty.

So I yanked the back 3 out and started over...and then it happened.

Marvelous colors of blue, green, red, and yellow began to appear in the center of my screen, rotating like dancing lights bringing about a fancy artistry foreign to a Windows start-up screen, the dazzling colors manifested into the Windows logo before leading my through the install.

After a few weeks of frustrations, business, and laziness, I finally got Windows 7 installed without any problems, on one 2-gig stick of RAM.

Now something important to remember is this.

You must maintain a strict schedule of standard maintainence for your computing-machine to keep it in proper working order.

That means weekly or monthly tasks that need to be done like clockwork.

Familiarize yourself with your BIOS, every start-up you should make sure all your RAM is recognized by your motherboard (it will tells you how much loads each time you start up), so go in your BIOS, disable quick boot, turn off the logo screens, and check to make sure the parts in your computer are registering.

Use the Windows Tools within Accessories in the Windows Start-up Menu, Programs.

Run disk clean up once a week to purge your computer of unncessary temporary files that build up in bulk if forgotten.

Make sure to disk defragment your computer on a monthly basis, this tool helps consolidate files on your computer, install a lot of stuff, download a lot of stuff, do you constantly move large amounts of files around?  These all slow your computer down as bits are saved (like memories of past residencies) so your computer can remember the life and legacy of each file, shorten that legacy using the defragmentor.

A good dusting bi-monthly will ensure your fickle hardware keeps working will full functionality, don't forget to clean out the fans as well.

Stick to a strict code of standard maintainence and you will catch problems like I did, but much sooner.

Random-access memory loss

After a few days of trouble shooting what should have been a simple upgrade installation of Windows 7, I have come to the conclusion that the errors I've suffered thus far...are not the errors of Microsoft.

I have a hardware issue...not a software issue.

What's the difference?
Hardware are the pieces that comprise your computer, your RAM, your CPU, the power supply, video / audio cards, etc.
Software are programs those parts run and project onto your monitor.

Given their nature, these two different spheres of the computer world are helplessly attached at the hip, when one fails, the other usually follows in step (or is the cause of the first failure).
Hardware have programs themselves, called Device Drivers, that are the protocols allowing the parts to interact with the programs.  When the software has a conflict with the Device Driver, the program will crash, but this is not the problem I've had.

The problem I have experienced this time around, faulty hardware. (With the billions of lines of code and microscopic sizes of some computer parts its only inevitable for problems to arise from anywhere, you try keeping track of that much information without slippage!)

So the solution is this.

The BIOS is a manager of your computer parts and basic mechanical function that can be accessed during start-up, all that white text over black background, those are BIOS processes making sure your parts function properly before booting up into your operating system.
(Above is a picture of the BIOS manager menu)

In my case, I have 8-gigs of RAM, yet my BIOS is only registering a little over 6-gigs.  Since I have 4 2-gig sticks of RAM, one bad stick may be my culprit.

So the plan is to take them all out, clean their contact points, blow some compressed air into your saddles on the motherboard, plug them in and see if they all register again.  When your motherboard stops registering things plugged into it, they are usually just dusty not dead, time to clean.

If this doesn't solve my issue the next step is to remove them all once again.  Then insert each stick individually, one at a time and start up.  With only one stick in the computer, once I plug the bad one in (if there is a bad one) the computer won't start up and I'll know which one to have my computer company replace. (Though I can and have built my own in the past, I have a 3 year warranty for this machine and it feels great)

After I've nab my bad RAM stick, or cleaned them so they all register once again, anchors away for Windows 7!

Technical Difficulties

I discovered a few things about Windows 7 yesterday.

For one, when upgrading (rather than fully installing) the operating system, certain programs I have come accustomed to are no longer compatible, or at least the versions I have.

It all started after I inputted the CD into my drive.  Loaded up the menu, shifted through a few windows worth of stuff until the upgrade actually started.

Upon the first restart the installation required, my computer hung in utter desolation at the "Starting Windows" screen.

A call to Microsoft informed me of the compatibility issues I may be experiencing, which would lead to the install...stalling.

Now that I have the programs I needed to uninstall removed, and the drivers I needed to update completed, we'll see about this "several hours" upgrade process...more to come!

Windows 7 has thick glass.

Finally installing Windows 7 on the machine, chose the upgrade install over a full install that would require me to reformat (completely flush the hard-drive of data).

Here's something new I haven't seen in a Windows install before.
"This upgrade may take several hours..."

We'll see how fast my 8-gigabytes of RAM punches through this Windows install.

Next land-speed record on the horizon? Teams chase quadruple digits

We're at it again America, that great crusade to best our brethren from the British Isles.

But this time, we do so through speed, raw rocket-powered speed.

Richard Noble of guess where, has been developing a rocket with wheels that instead of traveling up into the atmosphere, shall travel parallel with the ground in an attempt to top the current land-speed record (which Noble set at 763 mph in 1997) by breaching 1,000 mph (1609 kph) with his latest machine, the Bloodhound Project built from the ground up.

On our side of the great pond, Ed Shadle and Team North American Eagle have taken a Lockheed F-104 Starfighter (Cold War era fighter pictured above) and converted the interceptor into a drag racer.  So far the former fighter has propelled past 400 mph, a modest climb north to their goal of 800 mph.  The reason, data data data.

For a land vehicle to travel at 800 mph it must do one thing all supersonic jets do, break through the sound barrier.  Granted this doesn't seem to hard right?  But you have to take in the physics of a barrier breach before you break through it, to not could cost you your life.

At subsonic speeds, bodies in motion project sound waves in front of their direction of travel.  These waves force air molecules to move releasing the possibility of pressure building up from too much matter being forced into such small of space.  However, once bodies in motion reach the speed of sound, they catch up to these sound waves.  Once that occurs the pressure within that space builds to a breaking point.  And once the body breaks the speed of sound, the barrier of pressure that had built up erupts with a sonic boom.  This eruption is not simply noise, those waves are physical and tangible, thus under that amount of pressure they could also shake the vehicle apart.

Which is why Shadle and TNAE have taken their time to top the land-speed record by July 4, 2010.

Lots of tests need to be conducted and finalized before they attempt to break the sound barrier.  They must know the Starfighter can hold it's own on the ground, like it did in the air.

For Noble, he's thrown the Bloodhound (shown above) into the wind-tunnel to shake the dog to it's bones.  But the question on each designer's mind is, how will the supersonic interaction with the ground effect the vehicle's underside.  If that sonic boom erupts in a sphere, will the down force push the vehicle upward slightly?  Like a kid doing a bunny-hop jump on his bike?  No one knows, and there is only one way to properly find out, shoot for the moon.  But for Noble, he'll keep science as his six-shooter, although the wind tunnel is insufficient to test these effects explained above, he's gone to supercomputer computations of fluid dynamics to simulate the pressures his Bloodhound will have to endure.  So far, the computers have estimated at 1,000 mph, 12 tons of air pressure will squeeze in on every inch of the vehicle.

Tech Trix

Vegetables, aside from being tasty and health-abiding also have electrolyte properties.  What does this mean?  It's got more than juice you drink, it also has juice your electronics thirst for, electricity.

Some of you may remember making potato batteries in school, although we only used them to light a flashlight bulb, comprising certain vegetables and metals in larger quantities can generate enough "juice" to power some of our everyday devices...like your iPod.

How?  By the magic of physics.

Zinc and oxidation bring about a wonderful result when properly combined, electricity.  That means you can take zinc, stuff it into a vegetable (potato, apple, etc) and make some juice without a squeeze.  Wrap some copper into the mix and guess what, you have a completed electrical circuit, just apply some wiring to attach the circuit to a device and voila!...power.

Theodore Gray decided to use apples when putting vegetable power to the test.  He corded the apple into rods which he then sliced into disks.  He placed pennies (zinc...and copper!) between the slices making penny-apply power sandwiches.  After comprising 6 "batteries" with 20-25 cells (penny-apple sandwiches) Gray wired them to an iPod cable giving the device enough power, for 1 second of operation.

Although vegetables can't hold a candle against chemically manufactured batteries, in rough times or post-apocalyptic Earth, it may keep your iPod running, imagine if Hurley from Lost knew of this, he'd still be listening to his CD player on that beach.

Blue Line to Black Diamond

I just got back from seeing Kiss live at the Staples Center.  Luckily my mom entered a drawing at work and scored some free tickets, but the drive wouldn't be free...and neither would be the parking.

So instead of dealing with the traffic-gauntlet that is the OC to LA connection on one of the busiest traffic nights of the year, we parked her car at work and jumped on the Los Angeles County Metro Rail Blue Line.

That's right, public transportation...why you ask?

The parking at the Staples Center is a price I don't know because I've never parked there, but either way, its way more than $5.00, the cost of a day pass on the metro.  Add in a 15 minute car ride to my mom's work with free parking on location, and we still stayed well under the average price of personal vehicular travel to the Staples Center. (And considering the trip from the Willow Station in Long Beach to the Pico Station at the Staples Center took only 30 minutes we even beat traffic)

But what about the walk from the station to the Staples Center?  Would I be willing to drop $10 - $15 more for convenience of distance?  Luckily, the Blue Line's Pico Station is literally right across the street from the Staples Center's front doors.

Since it's opening in 1990, the LA Metro Blue Line has ferried 60,000 to 80,000 passengers from downtown Long Beach into the heart of LA on a daily (weekday) basis.  It's estimated yearly ridership is around 24 million.

For the 22 mile 22 station track, that's a lot of people moving cheaply, effectively, and less harzardous to the environment, fantastic contraption isn't it in the land of drivers? 

The light rail (or smaller than train) system utilizes high voltage electricity to create traction and friction that propels the tram down the track.  Seriously, I saw one of the power stations at the Pico Station.  And let me warm you, its deadly electric and illegal to enter, apparently unauthorized personal found within the premises are subject to California Penal Code 555.

So the next time you find yourself considering a trip to LA, consider the Metro.