New Headers...

I've made some updates to the visuals... but they don't FREAKING SHOW UP!!! :@:@:@

Back to XP...

Well... I've switched back to Windows XP professional and curbed Windows Vista for the time being, so I can get back to business!!!

I was soooo close to switching over to Linux or purchasing a MAC.. no, really, I was pissed. Don't get me wrong, Vista as an OS is superior to XP in that it offers alot more, has a fancier User Interface, and nifty little widgets, higher security, blah blah blah.... and I'm sure it runs like butter when you install any Microsoft Product with it... BUT... ALMOST NO THIRD PARTY SOFTWARE IS OFFICIALLY SUPPORTED!!! :@

I was almost willing to just stick it out and bear with it... but I NEED those applications to do my stuff. Something as simple as Winamp is not supported. What did that mean for me? That meant that I was not able to setup my shoutcast server. I didn't even bother to see if there was a hack solution to that problem. I didn't want to messy up my Vista install with bs hackjob solutions. I tried to install Alcohol 120% as well... just so I could make images and burn them for my co-worker... oh, and so I could make a couple of virtual drives... but nooooooooooo... I couldn't install that either.


My solution was to install Windows XP and create a dual-boot system. Easy enough, right? What a crock of shit... apparently Windows Vista and XP don't play nice... If you don't use the Vista boot disc to prepare your HD for an XP install and just decide to use the XP CD... it fracks your bootloader / partition table / don't know what else. :@


I'm no tech guru, but I have enough experience to know how to research extensively and implement my findings. Plus, it's not like I haven't built a dual boot system before... not to mention, I DID graduate from Tech College :)


So anyways, I put in the Vista Boot DVD and then realized that I hadn't partitioned my primary drive... actually, I did, but for some reason it didn't show the secondary partition. Instead of following the instructions that I found online and deallocating some space, I decided to pop in the XP CD and go from there... wow... not a good idea. Even XP couldn't see the other partition. When I tried to boot into Vista to free up some space it would do the POST.. but then just sit there, cursor blinking... fak.


When I used the Vista DVD to boot again, my primary drive wasn't showing up AT ALL!!! I was pissed... now when I used the XP CD... it DIDN'T show up!!!

After fiddling back-and-forth between the two I connected my backup drive to see if it would recognize that. Yes, it did... then when I put in the XP CD... it fracked it again... Either way I couldn't boot into my OS... And when I tried to run Vista Recovery it didn't do anything... there was no drive showing up thus no OS to install...


By this time I was irate.. and pretty anxious because my backup drive contains at least 3 years worth of data filling roughly 120 GB... about 15-20GB just music and a whole smackload of photos from over the years. Yes, I'm a pack rat :p

I remembered that a co-worker of mine had an external HD housing that I could put my SATA drives in so I drove back to my workplace at 9:30pm just so I could swap out my drives and check to see if the data was intact still. I was soooo prepared to pay a data recovery specialist some big bucks if I wasn't able to see the data on the drives... one thing that I was also upset about is that I couldn't remember if I had xferred my parents' vacation photos to my primary drive or my backup drive... that would have been 600+ photos down the drain.


After placing my drive in the housing I plugged it into my laptop and let out a sigh of relief. Everything was intact!... however, when I plugged in my primary drive, it said that it was not formatted, so ya... XP trashed the partition table!


I ended up formatting the drive and reinstalling XP... no more Vista for me, not until a Service Pack or I find out that the majority of 3rd party companies have announced Vista support. Then I'll go and purchase a new tower and build a new Vista PC. Oh yea, I had the same problem with Windows Media Center on the Final release of Vista Ultimate as I did with RC2. Even after installing the Vista Codec Pack and ensuring that my media would play on WMP 11 I fired up WMC, when I went to play the media... it told me that it couldn't find the required codecs. Screw you MS :@

If I didn't only have 1 tower, I would already be playing with Linux... and if MACs didn't cost so much... then I'd consider one of those too!!! If not just because of their awesome commercials :p

PCs are great! :)

Grrr...

Hey boys & girls... Yes, I'm still here and yes, I still think about how I haven't been posting :(

Work has me very very busy (ya ya.. excuses)... and I've been catching up on my GTA: San Andreas :p. Also, I was in Edmonton the week before. It was nice to catch up with my cousins there. The trip was work related BTW.. and I paid an extra $28 to extend my stay :D weeeeeeeeee!

Anyhoo, hopefully I'll find the time to continue the writeup about visiting M'sia / S'pore. Actually, not hopefully.. I WILL find the time to finish them.

Another thing is that I trashed my Windows XP install while trying to get rid of the Vista RC1 dualboot install... now I'm running Vista Ultimate :D

Since I'm running Vista I haven't reinstalled my Photoshop & everything else soooo... ya, another excuse :p but I'm thinking of installing my XP and dual boot into that... meh...

Hope everyone is well! Ciao for now!