Author: Aren Cambre

New computer working, but another wrinkle

I got my computer running a couple of weeks ago. A potential problem with NewEgg is that warranties are generally 30 days long, and customers pay all return shipping costs. However, even after returning my motherboard, I still paid less in shipping than I would have paid in sales tax had I bought locally.

The down side is that if something goes wrong, you will eat up most of that 30 day warranty period waiting for a new product. After that 30 day period, you have to handle all warranties through the manufacturer. Based on this experience, you may want to reconsider NewEgg unless you have known-good parts to swap out in case of a problem.

I selected the case based on my brother‘s recommendation. Fancy cases and huge power supplies aren’t that important to me, and I’ll bet this current case is overkill with its 420W power supply. Regardless, after rebate, it was actually less expensive than many plain jane, inexpensive 350W cases. And it has spiffy LEDs, so I can be all leetzor and stuff!

The side has a fan that lights up and shines on the inside.

With the flash on, you can see that I didn’t bother with fancy colored cables. I don’t care, since I am never going to look in there.

This is the front. Oooh, aaah!

This newer computer is unquestionably faster than that old Dell. It’s nice when two people can be logged in without dragging everything down to a crawl.

Unfortunately, all the kinks haven’t been worked out yet. Three days ago and twice today, the computer has had a BSOD and spontaneous reboot. It appears that this may be due to RAM problems. This is the STOP error:

The important numbers are 0x0000004e and 0x0000008f. These codes suggest either an I/O problem (unlikely) or a memory problem (more likely). I am not sure why I got so many days out of this memory before a problem showed up. Oh, well. another thing to diagnose! Upon reboot, Microsoft suggested I run a memory tester. I will see if that turns up anything. If not, I may run my memory through a memory tester (diagnostic equipment found in repair shops).

Gas Lamps are Expensive

While redoing our landscape, we ripped out a nonfunctional gas lamp because it had rotted at the base.

We weren’t sure whether we want to restore the gas lamp or convert to an electric lamp.

I like how gas lamps look. They look far better than the typical electric-conversion gas lamp.

Gaslite America West’s Gaslight Specifications say that a 2 mantle gas lamp consumes about 1.5 MCF (thousands of cubic feet) of natural gas per month. I checked with someone who recently installed a gas lamp. Comparing his Sept. 2005 gas consumption to Sept. 2004, 1.5 MCF appears reasonable.

Coincidentally, my most recent gas bill is for 1.5 MCF. Using an average of Department of Energy-calculated annual natural gas prices over the prior 6 years (1999-2004, link), and adding on the taxes and surcharges in the Dallas, TX area, natural gas is about $10 per MCF. This means that a gas lamp costs about $15 per month to operate.

Gaslite America West and other sites say that a 2 mantle gas lamp generates the same light output as a 100 watt incandescent light bulb or a 25 watt compact fluorescent bulb.

Calculated from a DOE spreadsheet (link), 1998-2003 US electricity prices averaged $0.0841 per kWh. A 100 watt bulb consumes 0.1 kWh per hour. If I ran this light 12 hours per day, 30 days per month, that would be 36 kWh per month. 36 kWh per month is about $3.00, tax included. If I ran the 25 watt compact fluorescent watt bulb, that would be a measly $0.75 per month.

Note that the prices I quoted above are average. Energy prices are currently high, although natural gas’s current percentage increase far more than electricity, even if you factor in upcoming 24% electricity price hikes.

According to a post at Google Groups, there is a device that can throttle down gas lamps during the day. I have not found any other reference to such a device. Even if it was for sale, a best case scenario may be around a 25% consumption reduction. (You can’t totally shut it off.) Even at that consumption level, the gas lamp would still almost 4 times as expensive as the 100W incandescent or about 15 times more expensive than the 25W CF.

Conclusion? It’s expensive to run a gas lamp. You’re looking at around $180 per year just for a 2 mantle gas light. Is that worth it? Probably not for me.

Lost all my exercise data

I keep all my exercise data on an Excel spreadsheet on my PDA. I talked about this last summer.

Today, I needed to refer to something in this spreadsheet, and I noticed that it wouldn’t open. I checked the version that is synchronized to my desktop machine with ActiveSync. It was only 14KB, much smaller than its normal 150+ KB.

Argh! It looks like my spreadsheet file got truncated in a file transfer, and I didn’t notice this before the old version got overwritten. (When a file is deleted, the contents are still on the hard drive until other data overwrites it.)

Dang! There goes three whole months of exercise data. I guess I need to script a utility to make regular backups of my PDA data.

Theft Update

I have more details on the theft I experienced a few weeks ago.

I didn’t talk about this previously because I didn’t want to possibly tip off the perp, although I doubt he knows much about the internet. Now that the SMU Police Department has discussed the case with the SMU Daily Campus, I can talk more freely.

Like I previously mentioned, I knew the perp used my credit card at a place called “CityPlace Market.” That’s all my bank was able to tell me the evening of the theft. The CityPlace shopping center is about 3 miles south of SMU, and it has several stores. The next day, I checked my online credit card statement and the statement clearly indicated that the perp went to the Target store at CityPlace. (HUH? Why couldn’t they look up the information that evening?)

I called the CityPlace Target and spoke with the security department. They were glad to hear from me. They got superb videos and photos of the guy, and they also got his license plate.

The SMU police department found where the vehicle was registered, and they found that it is not stolen. So they had a solid lead on the guy.

The PD staked out this guy’s residence. They did not see the vehicle or the guy at the house. After a few days, the PD eventually talked to a resident and found that the vehicle owner is not the perp. The vehicle owner knew the guy and provided a photograph.

The police department is very adamant about tracking this guy down. They are almost certain he committed crimes against at least two people the day of the theft, although it may be up to five. Based on what he did to me alone, he could be charged with class B misdemeanor theft ($50-$500), felony burglary (does this mean 3rd degree felony?), and two counts of felony credit card abuse. Depending on what my bank does, this guy could end up with more felony charges. Since the guy already has a criminal history and is on probation (per a reporter from the SMU Daily Campus), this cannot be a happy day for him.