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Current incarnation of HP dv9000t custom...
My HP dv9000t (custom build) that I have had since February 2007, had it's hinge break a few weeks ago.
Apparently this is a known (common) issue with this size of Pavillion laptop.
Warranty process went easily and smoothly, I had it back in about 5 days, however, upon receiving it back, the package dropped off by FedEx was badly mangled, with a big hole in it. Looked like someone played soccer with it. I made the FedEx guy make a note of it, and I took a photo before opening. Sure enough, the hard drive just made the dreaded "spin-click" and wouldn't boot. And HP had gone ahead and replaced one of the two hard drives, the DVDRW, the base, the top, the entire screen assembly and screen, and even more. Phew! It was practically a complete overhaul, but I had to send it back.
I received it back the second time about a week and half later. They had replaced both hard drives, and performed a little more overhaul surprisingly. So, now this laptop is pretty much like new.
Of course, it came with Windows XP Media Center (blech!). Just for the sake of supporting clients, I keep it, and Vista, but never use them for my own work.
I have the free Vista Home Premium upgrade with it, so I run the install, but install Vista to a different partition on the second hard drive (yes, this laptop actually holds TWO hard drives simultaneously!), and stop it from wiping XP, so I am able to dual boot it between the two (since Vista is a totally worthless pieces of phlegm). :-P
Finally, after using Knoppix live DVD 2008 to resize the NTFS partitations, I have today finally finished installing OpenSuSE 10.3
After all the evaluations I've been doing for so many Linux distros (see www.techtalkhawke.com, and despite Suse being one of the more bloated and slower distros, it still gives me the least grief on hardware and software, and when using KDE, runs MUCH more stable than any of the Gnome distros.
I setup the drives up in a complicated way.
Hard drive 0 is as follows:
partition 0 (/dev/sda1) = NTFS = Windows XP (and boot drive) (30 GB)
partition 1 (/dev/sda2) = d7 (HP) (I moved it from near the end of the drive, to right after the XP (2 GB)
partition 2 (/dev/sda3) = ext2 for /boot for Suse 10.3 (later on 11, the 11 beta 1 was unusable) (1 GB)
partition 3 (/dev/sda4) = extended for rest....
partition 4 (/dev/sda5) = Linux Raid autodetect (40 GB) / = ext3
partition 5 (/dev/sda6) = Linux Raid autodetect (40 GB) /home = ext3 plus encryption
Hard Drive 1 is as follows:
partition 0 (/dev/sdb1) = NTFS = Windows Vista Home Premium (30 GB)
partition 1 (/dev/sdb2) = Linux Swap (3 GB)
partition 2 (/dev/sdb3) = extended for rest of drive usages....
partition 3 (/dev/sdb5) = Linux Raid autodetect (40 gb) / = ext3
partition 4 (/dev/sdb6) = Linux Raid autodetect (50 gb) /home = ext3 plus encryption
HD 0 partition 4 and HD 1 partition 3 are setup as a RAID1 "mirror" array mounted for the root partition "/"
HD 0 partition 5 and HD 1 partition 4 are setup as a RAID1 "mirror" array mounted for the /home partition
Additionally the /home partition is encrypted.
So, lots of layers of complexity in this setup, but performing like a champ, and much easier to do this setup under Suse than any of the other distros, all through the GUI tools during setup.
Part of the reason I am putting this here, is in case I need it for later for myself. But also maybe it will help others considering making the most of their similar laptops with two hard drives.
Once I"m fully moved (back) over to this HP (which I'm typing this blog entry from right now), I will wipe Ubuntu 7.10 off of my Dell (that's what it came with), And (attempt to) install the lastest OpenBSD 4.3 (just came out and is en route in the mail), and the latest Solarix x86, and then MAYBE I'll try the newer 8.04 ubuntu (though I can't stand Gnome), and/or set it up with Kubuntu (if it's worth anything, we'll see).
This way, between my three laptops I can cover just about any operating system i might run into when helping folks out. Summary of my laptops in my (heavy) laptop bag and their proposed OSes:
Ciao for now! -Hawke
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Facist Nanny State and Sheeple.
In about a 15 minute period today, I my visual and auditory senses were assaulted with facist and facist nanny messages.
I ran out to drop off one of my kids to his early orchestra class, and then get the tags renewed on my motorcycle trip (of course it's raining today), and get a new tirevalve stem valve for my motorcycle as well.
In the 15-20 minutes or so it took to run those errands, I saw 1 bilboard, and listened to multiple ads covering the following:
- Billboard: "We're watching for literrers. Are you?" "Litter and it will hurt". - With a zoom in picture on someone's eyes peering sideways while on a cell phone.
- Radio ad: "Click it or ticket". "Whether you are in the city or the countryside, we'll catch you if you do'nt buckle up". "...you think you're safe? Think again."
- Radio ad: "All your pets must be licensed..." ".. the amnesty period is right now...."
I'm not against littering, but I am painfully reminded of the Nazi (and other Facist countries) messages to turn in your fellow citizens.
I'm not against requirements to HAVE a sealt belt in a car, but for the government to mandate I wear it? That has always irked me.
If I want to earn a "Darwin Award" for studpidity, and remove myself from the gene pool, that should be my choice. The issue gets a little trickier with children, it might be considered neglectful if parents don't enforce it with their kids, but there is such a thing as the government getting far too involved in a families decision making process. "Education programs" about the risks. Fine.
Pet licensing? I'm reminded of the Monty Python routine "Hello, I'd like to purchase a fish license". Pretty soon I'll be taxed for my amount of air I breathe, and oh wait, my "carbon footprint". That has to be just around the corner. At least in this state.
The whole seat belt issue, many could see from miles away. This is a perfect model of incremental facist implementation. I always wore my seat belt long before there were any laws on the books. I had an incident when I was 4 years old and the car door opened on the highway while I was leaning against it and my mother was taking a turn. I barely held on. That encouraged me to keep the door locked, seat belt on, and not lean much on the door. Fortunately (or not, depending on your perspective), i survived that potential Darwinian-potential-elimination moment. Neither I, nor my parents would have tried to sue anyone (car manufacturer, highway, parents, whatever). Nowadays, it seems that is exactly what too many people would do. That's a whole other topic of course. I digress.
First they made it a "secondary" ticket (offense) to not have your seat belt on when pulled over for something else. Of course, a few years later, it's now a primary offense. And now they have this gravel-voiced commercial saying "if you think you're safe from our patrols, think again". Are you kidding me?
I am certainly for the "rule of law", but there is a balance. And it really feels like in the past 15-20 years that balanced has slipped over the line.
Worse yet, it seems the "Average" people are just fine with it. The whole "boiled frog" approach works all to well. <sigh>
Anyhow, I needed to vent. At least I'm (for now) allolwed to do so (in this country), without having to worry about getting fined (yet) or taxed (yet) for it. Of course, that is exactly why services like TOR (The Onion Router) to anonymize and re-route and obfuscate your location, exist. Just a shame it's headed so quickly in that direction. It's like being in a bus stuck on the wrong side of the railroad tracks. I can see the other oncoming train, and am yelling to the driver an dthe people to move the bus off the tracks, or get out of the bus ASAP, but everyone is just smiling and saying "the bus driver knows what's best for us". meanwhile all the exists are blocked by these "sheep-people" (sheeple? sheople?). <Sigh>
Ok, enough of the rant for now. Let's see if i can get out and ride the motorcycle for the day for some taste of freedom. ;-)
Ciao for now.
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Short (Rainy) trip past Long Lake
After a great (hot) week prior, of course, on this day, the entire northwest was covered with rainstorms.
We went for it anyway. Taking a slow, winding route on Waikiki, to Rutter Parkway (BEAUTIFUL area btw, and one of the few roads deserving the title "Parkway"), finally to highway 231, going north by Nine Mile Falls, and continuing up to Long Lake, past Tum Tum, and finally stopping at the Long Lake dam. The vibration from the water coming from the spillway on the opposite side of the canyone could be felt through my boots on the rocks. It was gorgeous.
The ride back became increasingly wet and cold.
It was however well worth it. I got in some zen-riding-restorative time, and had a nice short adventure. It was approximately 80 miles round trip. Stopped a lot to read markers, look at inidian paintings, stop at a cafee/saloon that had decent mexican food, and chat with the postal worker at the Tum Tum (micro) post office.
I'm very tired (had kid's concert to go to afterwards), so these blog posts might be a little disjointed, sorry about that.
Some pics below....
Hawke's 2001 Suzuki Bandit 1200 on lookout platform opposite Long Lake reservoir spillway.
May 20th, 2008.
Hawke on lower lookout area opposite Long Lake Reservoir spillway (with helmet still on warding off the rain). Already quite soaked, even through the leather jacket. But enjoying very much. ;-)
Hawke and Bandit in front of Tum Tum Post Office that has apparently been there for over 100 years.
According to the postal worker, they used to do delivery by lake long ago. You can't tell from this shot, but it's probably only a 20'x30'x structure. Long Lake is in the background beyond the trees.
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Brennan, Cello, Orchestra, Mead High School, May 20, 2008
Brennan had his final Mead Beginner Orchestra performance tonight.
He has been working hard on his cello playing, even when he was sick, making the effort to put in some good practice time.
He's obviously having a great time with it, and his (private) teacher, Nina Petersen does a great job teaching and inspiring him.
You can see from this photo what a great time he was having:
And here the concentration and focus:
They are coming along very nicely. Each group, Advanced, onwards, were very impressive, and had a fun selection.
We all especially enjoyed the mor senior groups renditions of Orange Jam and The Lord of the Rings.
Brennan was "rockin'" to the music.
On a side tangent, the lead violinist (Concert Master?) for the high school group, was Michael Mortier, the son of my voice teacher. He received numerous awards, and his violiln playing was wonderful. It was great to talk briefly with Steve (his dad) as well.
The audience actually gave a standing ovation for the final piece (which had the violin players scattered throughout the audience for a nice "surround sound" effect.
All very nicely done. Way to go Mead Orchestra!
Way to go Brennan!
G'night all.
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Hawkes-Robinson Clan
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Find and copy *.<ext> from multiple directories into one directory recursively.
I'm getting lazy in my "old age" using GUI too much.
I am still setting up my HP (moving back over from the Dell), and I wanted to move all my various and custom fonts over.
Well, each font is stored in a separate subdirectory, and sometimes sub-sub-sub-directories.
The GUI way would be to tediously go through each directory one at a time (or run the GUi search) and then copy the files over.
But I _knew_ there was an easier way from the command line, but I couldn't remember the syntax.... Had something to do with using find...... Now if i can just _find_ what that was... ;-)
This should work for any/most/all UNIX, Linux, BSD variants. Of course, you must have working versions of "find" and "cp" installed, but that's (almost) certainly the case.
I didn't find the exact answer online, but found enough similar examples to piece together and refresh my memory.
I'm posting it up here in case I forget again (INCONCEIVABLE!), and/or maybe help others out.
(Edit: 2008-05-25)
Sheesh, I forgot to post the actual code when I first posted this blog entry. Here it is:
find . -type f -name '*.TTF' -exec cp {} ../All-Fonts/ \;
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Nix
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