Category: Tech

My new computer: initial impressions

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Merry Christmas everyone! I’ve been customizing my new computer since 10:30 pm last night. Well, I did get six hours of sleep in there too.

My computer was delivered yesterday before we left for my parents’ but I didn’t have time to turn it on until we got home. We unpacked the box and set everything up before leaving, however. I have to give Dell credit – everything is packed well and the software is extremely organized; they even mark the CDs to let you know what software is already pre-installed on the machine. It made setting everything up (hardware-wise, at least) effortless.

I have to say, the tower and matching monitor are very sleek looking; prettier than I was expecting. Everything runs fast on my new machine too. But you knew this entry was going to focus on the things I don’t like, right? Of course you did. This is in no particular order, just some annoyances I’ll either get used to eventually or rectify in some manner as I learn more about my new machine and Windows Vista in particular.

1) The CD-DVD RW drive isn’t really designed to be used vertically because I think Dell assumes people are going to set it up horizontally. I personally don’t like turning it on its side and putting the monitor on top because I don’t like looking up at my monitor. I keep mine low; probably lower than most, but that’s the way I like it.

2) The monitor height is not adjustable. I did know this beforehand, however, but figured I could manage. What’s more annoying to me is because the monitor is wide-screen, I lose vertical desktop space. Perhaps this is something that requires getting used to, but I find no reason for extra width since browsing typically requires vertical movement. I’m very tempted to go back to using my old LCD monitor which I love. It doesn’t match the tower, though, and I’m big on aesthetics, so I will have to think about it some more first since the tower is now on my desk in the back corner.

3) The fonts Vista uses are taking me time to adjust to. They don’t look as sharp as on my old machine even though I am running at the monitor’s native resolution and have tweaked all I can find to tweak. This is particularly noticeable in Firefox in the tab I’m currently working in because when the text is bold I see a purplish fringe around the letters unless I view them straight on by adjusting my position or the monitor angle. I know I’m super sensitive to stuff like this since many people, including my husband, don’t notice what I’m talking about. It still bugs the crap out of me, however.

4) I can’t use my Logitec wireless mouse and keyboard because the one connection is PS2 and my PC only accepts USB connections. Until I buy an adapter I’m forced to use the included keyboard and mouse which are very basic.

5) Windows Vista assumes you’ve never seen, let alone used, a computer before so they hide basic settings that most savvy users like to tweak. I had to visit forums and help sites just to figure out how to change some things I had no problem locating in Windows XP. I mean who needs their icons to take up so much space on their desktop? I am not blind for christ sakes. If I’m running in a super high resolution don’t keep my icons huge. That’s just retarded.

That all being said, I am really enjoying the speed of my new machine. Programs load quickly, as do websites. I can only imagine how much more awesome it’s going to be this weekend when I quadruple the RAM. And can I just say how sweet USB 2.0 is? Many of you have been enjoying its benefits for a long time but I was stuck in USB 1.0 land even though technically my old computer supported 2.0. I could just never get it to work. Transferring files to and from my iPod isn’t painful anymore.

Also, my computer came with Yahoo! Jukebox which rips CDs in the exact manner I want to. I couldn’t get iTunes or Winamp to extract songs in the format or file name I prefer but Yahoo! does it quickly and easily. Now I don’t have to download and install MusicMatch (my previous cd ripper of choice). Oh and it recognizes my iPod which for some reason Windows Media Player does not. I thought maybe on the new machine it would detect it, but nope. It tells me to connect a portable device even when it’s already connected.

My PC is closer than I thought

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Holy crap, Dell just sent me an e-mail saying my PC was shipped yesterday and is due to be delivered on Monday. I am so excited! I sure hope it gets here before we leave to take the kids to my parents’. I have no idea what schedule DHL follows in my area since I’ve never had anything delivered by them. UPS always comes after 6 pm, so I’m hoping DHL comes much earlier in the day. Otherwise I’ll be picking my PC up after Christmas. I can’t complain, though, since the original estimated delivery date was New Years Eve.

Gifts, moolah, etc.

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This is my first chance in days to sit down at the computer for more than fifteen minutes. Let me tell you about the week I’ve had.

Monday I was in a seven hour meeting which basically kept me from doing my regular work until Tuesday. I’ve been busting my ass for the last three days to get caught up and get as much done as possible since I’m off tomorrow and won’t be returning to work until after Christmas. This time of the year is pure hell where I work with all the last minute end of the year requests.

Monday evening we headed to the girl’s school for her chorus’ winter concert. It wasn’t as boring as I was expecting; the kids sang well. Plus it was only an hour. It was a little uncomfortable, however, because Joe’s ex’s parents saved us seats so I was sitting directly in front of his ex the whole time. She wouldn’t even look my way though. Heehee.

Tuesday I spent my evening making Christmas cupcakes (no photos, sorry) and helping Joe wrap presents for my coworkers because Wednesday was our gift exchange. Check out my loot! Isn’t that stuffed bear adorable? I love it.

Tuesday night before going to bed, after a little deliberation (but not much since it was a steal), I ordered a brand spankin’ new computer from Dell which is due to arrive on New Year’s. I am so excited because I haven’t had an all-new computer in forever. Just to have functioning USB 2.0 will be a dream come true (mine won’t work). Plus I’ll have a nice fast processor and Windows Vista, which is nice as long as you have enough RAM. :)

Woo hoo! Last night we got a bunch of Christmas cards, including the one I look forward to all year – my uncle’s. I love that he sends me five scratch-off lotto tickets every year because they are so much fun but I never buy them for myself. Two years ago I won $25 but last year I don’t think I even won a free ticket. This year made up for that because I won a free ticket, $2, and $100! I totally had a blonde moment with the $100 winner (the last ticket I scratched off, no less). You have to match three like numbers to win that amount and as I was scratching off the last space I was like, “come on $100!” but it was a free ticket, so I was bummed… until I noticed I already had three $100’s scratched off. Sometimes I am such a tard!

We also got our cards from Joe’s parents and for some reason they sent us checks for five times what they usually give each of us for Christmas. Cha-ching!

Oh and we had phone service installed last night as well. Joe was like, “aw, it’s our first phone together”. We’ve always had cell phones but never a home phone. The service is through the cable line which is pretty cool. We get a monster discount so it’s like $15 a month for unlimited calls in the US and Canada. I like the ring tone for the cordless phone we picked out. Not that we’ll hear it much since we don’t plan on sharing the number with anyone. Of course that didn’t stop Joe from picking up the phone (mind you, this was before it was connected) at random times during the week and going, “hello? hold on”, turning toward me and handing me the phone saying, “it’s your mom… again”. LOL!

Anyway, tonight after work we were back at the girl’s school to watch the boy’s beginning band put on a concert. This time we sat far away from Joe’s ex. This concert was even shorter than the girl’s, and quite frankly, not as good. But it’s middle school so really not that bad when you put it in perspective. I didn’t take band until high school (I played clarinet) so I give those kids a lot of credit.

On the way home we stopped at Fry’s and I got a cute iPod case that looks like a wallet. I had bought another case made of silicone earlier in the week but I don’t like it because the plastic that came with it to cover the screen and click wheel suck. Mine wouldn’t stay put and the plastic itself actually put a long scratch on the click wheel. I was so pissed!

Alright, I think we’re all caught up now. I’ll probably be going to bed soon because we plan on doing some shopping tomorrow for some new clothes and stuff. I like getting to the mall early before it gets crowded.

Mission Unpossible

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Today’s missions included getting cases and car hookups for our iPods and the Nintendo DS for my stepson.

I’m sad to say our first mission failed and the second one nearly did as well.

We hit Walmart after dropping the kids off and looked at their iPod accessories but were hesitant to buy anything since we planned on visiting the Apple store. That visit, however, was a bust. I have to say I was disappointed in their selection and surprised they didn’t have more to offer. None of the cases struck my fancy and all the car kits were around $80. Who would have thought Walmart would have a cheaper and better selection? I will be going back later this week to get the car kit so I can kiss my CDs goodbye. :)

After the Apple store we headed to Target with intentions to get the boy’s DS, except they were completely out of stock. When we got home I started checking other stores and everyone was out of stock as well and had no idea when more units were coming in. Panic started to hit. “We waited too long,” I bemoaned to Joe. But Joe, always my hero, thought to check Toys R Us. We rarely shop there so I had completely forgotten about it. After calling to confirm they had the black DS, we raced over, and collectively breathed a sigh of relief once we had it in our hands. Could you imagine how fucked up it would be to give the boy two DS games and no DS? (We had gotten Lego Star Wars and Pokemon Pearl at Target).

I don’t even want talk about the Nintendo Wii. I’m supposed to get one for my parents but I can’t find any. The girl at Toys R Us said they usually get them in on Sundays but warned us that people line up outside the store between 3-4 am. I love my parents but there’s no way in hell I’m doing that. They will have to get a rain-check I guess.

At least we’re completely done with the kids’ gifts. I ordered the girl a $75 Discover gift card today and included the message – “for the girl who doesn’t know what she wants (except an iPod) :)”. We thought that was funny.

Die computer!

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I hate my computer. It all began yesterday when we decided to do a repair on my C: drive to try and get Windows to run faster. Joe ran the repair while I was still at work, but got a bunch of errors, so I ran it again when I got home. The second time seemed to work – things were running faster, particularly with the new RAM Joe installed. I was able to load all my programs and surf like normal the entire evening. Things were good.

Fast forward to this morning when suddenly my computer locked up on Joe and would not load Windows. Nearly all my personal files are not on the same hard drive as Windows, and I had backed up my bookmarks the other day, so we decided to do a clean install of Windows. Joe formatted the C: drive and ran the install.

Everything seemed fine after that except my computer would not connect to the internet no matter what we did, and trust me, we tried everything. Joe thought we should do another clean install but now I was getting paranoid and decided I wanted to back up a bunch of stuff from my secondary drive first just in case. I don’t know what possessed me to do this, but I’m glad I did!

Just so the following makes sense, here’s my current hard drive setup:

Drive #1 is the main drive. It’s 80GB with two partitions. Partition #1 contains Windows and all my programs and Partition #2 contains a backup folder where I put items from Drive #2 that I’ve not yet backed up to DVD.

Drive #2 is my secondary drive. It’s 160GB and contains all my personal files including all the photos I’ve ever taken and my MP3 collection.

So I was accessing Drive #2 to burn DVDs of my photos when I realized that while the directories were there, some of the photos were not. They had simply disappeared! Luckily for me most of them, but not all, were in the backup folder, so I burned my DVDs off that data instead.

I started poking around Drive #2 after that and the extent of the damage became clear – either files simply disappeared as I tried to move them or they wouldn’t open up at all. Most noticeable was how suddenly my MP3 folder, which was nearly 30GB the last I checked, was only 13GB.

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