Tales of PC repair

Phone call last friday from part time boss.

Boss: Hey can you install win 7 and install a gobi driver on this PC?
Me: Sure thats no problem ive installed win-7 and updated drivers.
Boss: also make sure the gobi has verizon running and that all the hardware is properly installed.
Me: ok no problem i have done that before.
Boss: Oh and i forgot to mention this pc does't have a cd drive.
Me: !!! says something about using a usb stick to install 7.
Boss: Also i need you to install a map program and configure the internal GPS unit to the program.
Me: Nervously saying i think i can do that.
Boss:sounds good you have until monday to finish this.

Later on during friday.
Boss: heres the laptop and a USB stick. All the dvds are in the box.
Me: thanks ill get this done asap.
Boss: Hey how much do you think this laptop is worth?
Me: definatley more than 1000$.
Boss: yeh much higher around 4000$. So make sure nothing happens to it.

What i forgot to mention about this weekend was that it was my birthday weekend. That i was going to be busy most of the day saturday and sunday. I tried researching how to install Win 7 via usb stick, but it was to complicated for me to work out to meet my monday deadline. So i ended up calling my brother who luckily enough had a usb dvd drive i could use. Got win 7 installed and all bu the gobi file installed by saturday night. I finished up mid afternoon on sunday.

Im really enjoying the part time work im getting from this boss. Its rewarding and definatley sharpening my trouble shooting skills. In the few weeks that ive been getting side work from him i have dealt with PSU issues, viruses, repairing windows installations. Its been an adventure especially since I currently borrow my neighbors internet. Which makes updating deaktop units a huge chore but nothing i couln't work around. I just finished fixing the 5th laptop i was given to work on. I really enjoy this work the probelem solving gives me a great since of accomplishment. The best part is im finally building experience, the extra money doesn't hurt either.


Edits done for clarity blogger doesnt like the use <> as name tags i blame the html.

Heh funny what happens when your removed from a blog roll.

Have you ever noticed when your blogs removed from someone Else's site? Well i just did i was once linked on Marckos site just my two copper. He was the reason i began making gold in the first place. I find it discerning to be removed from his blog roll. I guess i shouldn't complain most blog writers believe that Marcko is thing more than a sly business man. I however have no view other than his site is a great resource and i'm curious why my blog was removed from the list. Marcko if your reading this i wouldn't mind an answer you can drop it in the comments.

I guess i may have ran him off with my views on MJ, I wonder how many people i alienated for those post? I don't really care maybe they read it and learned something. Maybe it opened their mind to view the world in a different more free way. All i know is that when you have something on your mind that consumes it one way to alleviate this feeling is to write about it. MJ policy is one of those subjects for me.

The reason why im for changing our current MJ policy is because it was created by racism, lies, and propaganda. That the laws have been enforced unequally causing major harm to minority groups and young people. What little good is caused by the prohibiting the use of MJ(the safest drug available) is destroyed when you look at the harms of prohibition itself.

Prohibition has caused an increase in violence by drug dealers, cartels, gangs and given them a monopoly on distribution and production of MJ. It placed parents in jail and broken up families placed teens in jail. Prohibition has given police the ability to plant GPS on your car without a warrant. Prohibition has allowed police forces to use paramilitary forces to serve warrants entering homes by kicking down doors instead of knocking. Prohibition has allowed for swat to use tatics such as shoot dogs when serving warrants. Prohibition gave cops the power to steal property and sell it profit. Making MJ bust a great way to profit from the low hanging fruit. Prohibition has de regulated the sell of drugs allowing anyone even young teenagers 13-14 easy access to drugs through drug dealers.

The reason im for MJ policy change and only want legalization is because i know the current laws don't work. Prohibition of MJ has not ended use of MJ, Prohibition has not diminished the production or distribution of MJ. Prohibition has only cost us money destroyed lives and created criminals out of other wise law abiding people. People who just want to be taxed and accepted for their recreational drug of choice. A recreational drug that is safer than most pharmaceuticals, alcohol, or any other drug. A drug that was freely available since ancient times and used as medicine until 1913 when it was removed from the American Pharmacopoeia. A drug that grows naturally from a plant all it needs is tender loving care.

Genisis
11 Then God said, "Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds." And it was so. 12 The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.

A plant that if your christian was put here by god for people it was good. A plant that is so safe a person would have to smoke 80,000 joints in one hour to OD on. A plant that has more uses than just being a recreational drug. MJ and hemp its non drug cousin have been used by mankind for years and to forbid the use especially when it harms no other individuals goes against nature, common since, and the desire of god who said it was good.

Regulation reduces teenage access.

With MJ being on the ballot in CA for legalization there is going to be opposition to this law. Some of the strongest opposition will come from parents of children. They will sling comments about how legalization sends a bad message to children or use the tried and true statement "what about the children?". While many drug law reformers such as my self laugh in the face of the comment. I think we need to stop laughing about it and start teaching these parents the facts. Here is a nice fact about teenage usage. According to a 2009 survey called Monitoring the Future, about 7 percent of 8th-graders, 16 percent of 10th-graders, and 21 percent of 12th-graders had used marijuana in the month before the survey. Not to mention another survey that stated most High School Students found it easier to get MJ in less than an hour than it was to get alcohol. Whats even more interesting is that these numbers could be low people don't generally like to self incriminate themselves even in anonymous surveys.

With these facts in mind can you say that our current MJ laws work? Sure we arrested 849k people for MJ last year that's got to make a difference right? Well it doesn't arresting/ fining non violent users doesn't reduce the use . Arresting a MJ dealer will get that one off the street so another one can take his place. The war on MJ is an un-winnable war that has not even gotten close to accomplishing its task of creating a MJ free world. The worst part to me though is parents who blindly say lets keep pot illegal because its bad for teenagers or morally wrong etc.

These people keep it so that teenagers have access to MJ. You know why teenagers have access to MJ? Its because drug dealers don't ID. If we made MJ legal and regulated it similar to alcohol and tobacco i can with out a doubt say that teenage MJ usage would decrease. It won't go away but it can be decreased by simply legalizing it and regulating it. As for moral arguments against the use of MJ i say keep morals out of the law. When society regulates morality it creates a crime out of nothing. There is more to be said about this subject but now is not the time or place.

Hopefully one parent will read this article and change their mind if so then i did what i wanted. Some may read it and say just another dumb stoner wanting weed to be in the super market. I really just want people to realize that current laws don't work and that they create a crime out of something that harms no one else but the user. To allow for the pursuit of happiness as long as that pursuit doesn't tread on the rights of others thats what i want.

Added feature. Off topic post,

I added polls to my blog today so that i can get an idea of how similar my views are to my readers. The first question i decided should be something controversial and non wow related. I did this because there are times where i want to use this blog for more than wow related subjects that interest me. So expect a few post about off-topic things. Mainly these topics will center on my other interest which is the movement to legalize MJ aka marijuana, cannabis, etc. While many people will disagree with my view on this subject i do plan to begin posting on it occasionally. it may just be links to other websites that interest me or it could be a full post on the subject just depends on my mood. If you do not agree with my view or wish to bash me for it go ahead and disagree however i ask you to use logic and refrain from name calling and personal attacks. Im just one voice with a few readers i don't plan to change any ones minds i just want to share my views with my readers.

So moving on and to help people who may not know what Prop.19 is ill give you a very very brief overview. Prop. 19 is a ballot initiative to legalize the adult recreational use of Marijuana in California. It was created by Richard Lee a marijuana legalization activist and medical marijuana provider based in Oakland. Its the first attempt since 1973 to legalize MJ for recreational purposes. The legal language of the bill dictates that an adult 21 or older Will be able to have in possession 1 ounce of MJ, they can grow a garden of 5x5 feet in order to grow their own MJ similar to home breweries. It also allows local county and city authorities to dictate how best to regulate and tax the sale of MJ similar to how alcohol is done (wet and dry counties and cities). The law states that MJ users can't smoke in front of children and places legal action against those that do. It also does not change the DUI laws meaning if your high and driving you can and will be arrested. This is just a basic overview of what the law does there is probably more but i need more time to write out a detailed post. Please cast your vote and if you want share your view in the comments just remember keep it civil.

School feels like this

A never ending run.

I also realized that i have attended 3 colleges. Which means while applying to a fourth to possibly pursue a bachelors degree I have to request a ton of transcripts. Its ok though i got 3/4 transcripts ordered only have to get my high school one sent. Hopefully ill geta transfer scholarship esspecially since i graduated with my AAS with 3.5 gpa and high school with a 3.5 gpa. WHo knows though ill just have to wait and see.

Microsoft is offering a new antivirus solution (Off topic)

Are you a home user paying $50 a year for anti virus? Are you a network admin struggling to make a bogged down network better? Maybe your antivirus is the problem. It could be slowing your computer and network down. Microsoft has just released two products to help home and business users with these problems. These products are Microsoft Security Essentials and Microsoft Forefront.

First, I’m going to discuss Microsoft Security Essentials or MSE as I will refer to it. MSE is a light weight antivirus suite that protects your computer from viruses just like paid-for antivirus programs such as Symantec Antivirus. In various test MSE has performed exceptionally. According to a review done by Nick Mediati, PC World, 06/25/2009

"When put against AV-Test's "WildList" collection of 3,194 recent, common viruses, bots, and worms, Microsoft Security Essentials detected and removed each and every one of the malware samples. How does this compare to other security products? AV-Test coordinator Andreas Marx notes that "several other [antivirus] scanners are still not able to detect and kill all of these critters yet." In addition, Microsoft Security Essentials put up a perfect score with zero false positives--it didn't flag a single clean file as being malicious. AV-Test also took an initial look at Microsoft Security Essentials' root kit detection, testing it against a few root kit samples, and found "nothing to complain about."

Another great thing about MSE is that it does not take a lot of system resources. It also offers active scanning. This means that while you are surfing the internet it will scan for malware. The best thing about MSE for home users is that its 100% free. Which means you can save 50$ a year and have a top rated anti-virus suite.

The second product Microsoft released is geared for businesses small and large. Microsoft Forefront is a business class security suite. It was built with some of the same fundamentals of MSE such as being crafted to reduce the stress put on business computers and their networks. The other advantage of Forefront is that it integrates into a windows environment easily. It will protect your various servers and services such as Exchange Server, Microsoft SharePoint, and Office Communication Services.

Both of these products show promise for changing the way users think of antivirus. They are giving users excellent protection while not bogging down their computers. This is why MSE is one of the best free anti virus suites available. At the same time Microsoft Forefront is establishing itself as a robust business class security suite.


This was a post that i created for my brother to post on his companies blog. Hopefully its useful to some of my readers. Please rate this and let me know what you guys think.

Off Topic - no post

I'm currently about to install windows 7 on my laptop so ill be off of wow for a while. At least until tomorrow or later. So I'm not going to have any post for tomorrow.

Changing

So the blog is relativley new and im still not happy with the layout of it. Over the next few days I may be changing the templates to find one that fits my personality. I hope this does not cause you my readers any trouble. If you see one that you despise let me know i dont want the blog to hurt your eyes why you read. So if your willing to bear with me as i go on the search for a better blog template and give your criticisms