Brian’s Blog – Mostly Harmless…

This last Tuesday, Microsoft released a bunch of patches and updates for Windows. Normally, I recommend everyone should update but on this occassion I don’t!

Why? Well take a look here, the list of people with problems after this update is growing by the hour and they are having serious problems. My own machine(s) updated themselves automatically and, thankfully, seem to be working – Matt though has a problem with his laptop which, maybe coincidentally, now refuses to boot.

Matt’s machine failed with the famous BSOD (Blue Screen Of Death) and the display reports a problem with the boot section of his internal drive. While I can see no reference (at the link above) to the same thing happening anywhere else, it does seem odd that it happened on the same day as all these other reports.

There are fixes and details of how to apply them at the link – as usual with these things, it’s a good idea to read the most recent thread posts before doing anything which changes your setup….

I guess the other problem may be that you won’t be able to read this if your PC won’t boot! Doh!

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Filed under: Hardware, Software, Techie

Well the hype is over and the web is alive with reviews, “hands-ons”  and more about Apple’s latest release, the iPad.

Yes, I like Apple products and yes, I did follow the bloggers covering today’s event; but I have a small problem before parting with my hard earned cash. Why? well take a look at the US Apple site (today anyway)… looks good eh?

Well yes it does until you look at the “Environmental Requirements” down at the bottom right….

The first line makes sense but, what the heck does he second mean?  Current temperature here on the IOW is about 2°C, according to the spec published, the iPad wouldn’t be working here….

Yes, of course I know what they mean, but surely they employ people with enough intelligence to avoid this kind of confusion?

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Filed under: Funny, Hardware, Isle of Wight, Techie

Well it does really… we had a couple of inches of snow during last night and it’s still coming down in fits and starts today.

These are the views from our house in Winford this morning (click on the pics for bigger versions):

The back garden probably best shows the scene, but here’s one of the front too.

Thank goodness I have a colour camera eh?

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Filed under: Home, Isle of Wight, Seasonal

Anyone who’s been following me moaning on about the lack of Remote Desktop hosting in the Home Premium versions of Vista and Windows 7 will be pleased to know that those very clever folk over at The Green Button seem to have cracked the problem.

Take a look at this post, the discussion there is a little confused in that it combines the basic lack of RDP function in Vista and W7 with the details for logging in concurrently with other users. MOST IMPORTANTLY the file posted there for download works! – Note: If you use it, make sure to run it as Admin

I can now connect to my W7 PC from anywhere with a couple of small caveats:

1. So far I have no sound via the connection – probably soemthing to do with the remote Dell PC itself
2. The RDP service runs perfectly and even sorts out firewall permissions, it doesn’t though show up as an option in Computer/Properties/Remote.

Well done Green Button… great work!

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Filed under: Software, Techie

For ages now I’ve had a BT broadband speed (recorded by the BT Home Hub) of 3,200Kbps. This has been disputed by the SamKnows speed trial but it’s near enough. Anyhow, for the past few days the Home Hub has been showing 3,800Kbps.

I have no idea what BT have done to get the improvement, they haven’t moved the exchange, that’s a certainty, and I haven’t seen any Openreach vans along the road. I can only assume they found a fault somewhere and I have gained 600Kbps from the repair.

I seriously doubt anyone from either BT or Openreach will ever read this post but, in case they do, well done men…. may you repair many more similar faults

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Filed under: Hardware, Home, Isle of Wight, Techie