Archive for the ‘ Dell ’ Category

The day after the 120 days are up

 

 

First let me start by saying Microsoft allows you to download any of there new operating systems for trial period usually 120 days but some are 90. My 120 day trial period for windows home server ended on September 15th. I waited all the way to 121st day to upgrade even though I knew by the 90th day I was planning on buying it. So when I finally got around to getting a licensed copy, which I actually ended up getting it for my birthday. Now if your unfamiliar with Windows Home Server it’s basically the stay at home server and monitors all your houses computers for issues and backs them up just in case something happens and it feeds media to our TV’s and PC. You don’t need to have advanced skills to use it. Just set it up and forget about it will take care of you. So after sending the last 120 days getting to know the Home Server product. So here imagewhat I learned first 512MB of Ram is good start but if your going to use addin’s your going to need a little more I didn’t go all crazy, I doubled the memory and now I’m getting great results. Second configuring remote access on Comcast is easier then think. you just need to configure the right ports and your done. Third there’s a addin out called WHIIST it’s the greatest thing basically what it does is builds on the the built-in IIS and remote access feature and allows for you host other site as well as customize your own remote access site. The fourth thing I learned and this wasn’t until the end was be very care how you reinstallshares your plug ins once you decide to buy the full version. I ran into problems when I reinstalled all my plug ins at once. I turned to We Got Served for help cause I could any information about my issue on the Microsoft forum. Which leads me to my fifth thing I learned The support community outside Microsoft is far better then the one provided them. This product is truly led by it’s enthusiast of course the tops one work for Microsoft or are recognized by them as MVP’s. The community is so supported that even Microsoft points users to theses community sites for news about recently developed addin’s and other product information. Now my biggest beef with product isn’t even the product its the fact that Dell doesn’t have a product out there currently that is built around Windows Home Server I freaking A your getting killed by HP, Acer, and mine others. By the ways what the point of having your own blog with followers if you can’t poke fun at others stupid Dell get with the times.

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My rack holds my HP PSC 2350 printer which is connected to my WHS on the top. The next shelf holds my cable modem, Rosewell G Wireless Router, a extra 5 port Linksys/Cisco router. Then on the next shelf is the Windows Home Server built on a recycled Dell Dimension 4400 with extra memory and a upgraded hard drive. On the bottom shelf is just extra network cables, different kinds of paper and some other random items.  Oh & Btw the little silver box on the far right corner of the picture is a Netgear MP101 this little guy plays all our music in our home office.

The Tools Of My Trade

I spend a majority of my day developing web applications for my business I wanted to tell you a little about the tools I use. I pretty geeky and cheap so the software on my workstation is primary resource based. I do have FrontPage, dreamweaver, but I would rather write my own code. I use a little application called Jedit primary. It’s basically like notepad with tons of add-ons. In addition to that I use SQL Manager to maintain my SQL servers and table. besides those two which I use day in day out. I just started developing for ASP.net so I using a GUI tool called Visual Web Developer Express edition of course because it’s free. my teammates have faster, nicer workstations but I use a Dell Optiplex GX280 SFF it’s small lite and I don’t know any other department in my company that has them besides mine.

Dell Optiplex GX280 SFF Configuration:

  • Intel(R) Pentium(R) 4 CPU 2.80GHz
  • 512MBytes DDR2-SDRAM
  • Microsoft Windows XP Professional

Oh and Additional Applications I use a lot:

Filezilla
WinVnc
GIMP

More Space

So a few months back i built this really great computer with 220 GB’s of hard drive space. Sense i got my first 20 GB hard drive in 2000 i always though that it would alway’s be enough space for anything i may need and that idea worked for a long time I mean my dell laptop still has a 20 Gb hard drive half way full my Dell Desktop has a 80 GB hard with is split into 2 sections Half Linux and the other half Windows and it’s not even close to being half used. So why when i build a system that has more space then any other computer i’ve built before would i crave such a high amount of storage space? I wanted some where i could store everthing i ever wanted to store. All my movie downloads, All my music, All my documents, All my Pictures and there’s 4 GB of that shit and ALL MY TIVO’ed SHOWS, The whole season of 24, the whole season of Family Guy, the whole season of The O.C. at this current moment i’ve got 60 GB of storage space left. So it looks like i’ll be adding 2 more hard drives.

Recipe for a Kick Ass PC (Cheap Style)


1)Take a former office (Optiplex GX150 it was 100 bucks on Ebay)
2)Add all the freaking memory you got laying around (512 MBs I gutted a old PC)
3)Add a little 802.11G Wifi card (It was 12 buck on Ebay)
4)Toss in a DVD burner (There 50 Bucks on newegg.com)
5)Add a small dash on 80 GBs of hard drive (Compusa has them on sale for 50 bucks plus rebate)
6)Oh dont forget to dress it up with your favorite flavor of OS, my favorite is SUSE but you can always use WINDOWS XP

And thats what it takes to make a kick ass pc, oh wait forgot to say BAM ADD A LITTLE SPICY TO THAT