Archive for the 'General' Category

Just looking at one of the bits of paper that came with the docking station I bought for my new laptop from Lenovo.

I think it is supposed to be some form of notice or warning – but I couldn’t really work out what they were saying !

Docking Station for Lenovo ThinkPad Notebook PC is for use only.

mmm … I think they are trying to tell me to not try and use any other brand of notebook with this docking station.

AC Adapter of Lenovo ThinkPad Notebook PC or enclosed AC Adapter shall be used.

Yes, it shall ! But what what the point of telling me that ? Perhaps they were actually trying to tell me that I shouldn’t try and use another type of power adapter ?

When different AC Adapter is used, there is danger of emitting smoke, and an electric shock.

Ahh … now it makes more sense … I learned this in Electronic Engineering classes at uni … if you let the smoke out of a device, it generally doesn’t work any more. You need to keep the smoke in – that’s what makes it work !

WARNING
This product is not portable device. Don’t carry.

So now I’m stuck. How do I get it out of the box and onto my desk if I can’t carry it ? Perhaps I could slide it – they didn’t say I couldn’t slide it. Now to find something long enough to reach from the floor to my desk so I can slide it up there where it needs to go !

I’m sure the Chinese would get just as much fun out of us trying to write or draw sinographs !

Just remembered – my other “new” laptop arrived today too !!!

I bought a reconditioned T41 ThinkPad from IBM (probably ex-staff machine), to use as a server.

I’ve been running an old T22 for the last couple of years as my always-on server, which runs my backups and my digital set-top-box EPG (electronic program guide), plus various other scheduled tasks which I run overnight. Alas, I’m going to need to give that machine back to IBM shortly, and I really didn’t want to go back to running my desktop machine as a server – it is rather noisy and creates a LOT of heat (my indoor thermometer reports a steady increase in temperature in the room by when that machine is running – can add as much as 5 degrees to the room temperature !!!).

I was considering running a new Mac Mini or AOpen Mini PC (about the same size as the Mac Mini), but they were both quite a bit more expensive, and potentially noiser than this laptop. I also get a free screen with a laptop that I wouldn’t get with the other devices. The T22 runs the free VMware Server software and runs a virtual machine across the network off my RAID NAS box, so it doesn’t matter that laptop drives are typically slow. I use the VMware remote console software to control the machine from my desk – I have the T22 currently sitting under a shelving unit in my study – only pulling it out if the physical machine needs a reboot.

I wouldn’t normally buy second hand, but I’ve used T41 machines for a while and I know they are very good and very well built. IBM provide a 3 month warranty and a new battery – and also fix up any physical defects (other than scratches and such). It’s a pretty safe way of buying a cheap laptop.

I haven’t even set the machine up yet … been too busy with my T60.

Okay – I’ve got the ThinkPad T60 operational, complete with memory upgrade to 2GB (would have liked to go higher, but the 2GB modules are about 4 times the price of the 1GB modules at the moment … buying two 2GB memory modules would cost more than the laptop does !!!!!)

I also bought the ThinkPad Advanced Mini Dock … so I can (amongst other things) get a DVI video output from my laptop to connect to my L201p 20″ LCD screen – I now have a lovely extended desktop … 1400×1050 15″ screen on the laptop with the 1600×1200 20″ LCD screen positioned vertically above it for a huge amount of screen real estate … productivity gains are quite significant working like this.

I’ve spent quite a bit of time UNinstalling software (PC manufacturers typically ship a whole heap of “value added” software on the machine – which does nothing more than slow it down and take up space/memory in my opinion). So I’ve got rid of everything I didn’t need, and started installing my favourite utilities and programs.

Managed to get my Firefox settings across from my old laptop and upgrade to Firefox 2.0, so I’m off and running now.

Next critical step is my email and then my RSS reader. Then I start on the rest of the software.

Time to take a break I think and get some dinner.

Yay – my new T60 ThinkPad arrived this afternoon – I can move everything off my desktop machine and let it go back to being just a games machine.

I also got a memory upgrade and a docking station.

Will post more once I’ve spent some time setting it up.

Had to migrate off of my laptop – it has developed a problem with the screen which makes it difficult to use.

I’ve installed the most important software I use on my desktop games machine (which I don’t normally use because it is loud and generates a lot of heat).

I’m going to have to give my laptop back to IBM at some point soon anyway – so I’m not that fussed about having it unusable … although I would have preferred to have my new laptop available first so I could move directly to that machine rather than having to install so much software on my desktop machine first.