04 Dec
At work, my employer provided me with a Dell Latitude E6400 laptop. While I do actually like the machine in general (despite it’s running Windows most of the time…), it had one very disturbing issue: from the very first day since I got it, the laptop suffered from Windows insomnia.
I was neither able to put it into standby nor hibernation mode successfully. When I tried to do so, I was logged out of Windows and greeted with the “Preparing to Standby/Hibernate…” dialog that just never disappeared.
It turned out I was not the only one experiencing that problem. Last week, I finally got the hint that led to the solution: Another Dell user found out that reverting the Dell Webcam driver to the previous version solved the issue. I can confirm: this worked for me, too. Finally!
Update: I just learned that there are users who have the same problem with the Dell Latitude E6500 laptop, although they are trying other approaches to solve the problem.
Update 2: I was also experiencing a problem with the CPU running at ~100 Mhz, so my E6400 was replaced after 3 days of usage way back in April this year. It seems that Dell is now admitting the issue: they released a BIOS update to solve that strange behavior.
08 Nov
Adobe makes a good job of promoting its new version of their Flash Player 10. They seem to have removed almost every single link to the previous version on their website and all old links redirect to the download of version 10.
This might be great if you want to run their latest software, but if for some reason you need a specific older version, you’re gonna be quite upset, e.g., you want Flash on a legacy operating system such as Windows 98/ME, Mac OS X < 10.4, or older Linux/UNIX OSes.
In my case, there is a web site that has been programmed in such a bad way that it is simply broken and unusuable with the latest version of Flash Player 10. I don’t use the service of that website on a daily basis, but I wanted to install Flash Player 9 on top of a Windows installation in a VM.
You can find the installation files for the legacy Flash Player 9 download on Adobe’s TechNote site. Please keep in mind that Adobe may (and surely will) stop releasing any [security] updates for those old versions of Flash.
Of course–after I eventually found the download link and installed the old Flash version–I remembered having a moldy Ubuntu Live DVD somewhere in my drawer… And I bet it has Flash Player 8 or 9 installed…
19 Feb
Installing a floppy drive into a computer, booting off a Ubuntu Live CD, formatting an old 3.5″ floppy, copying Promise RAID drivers onto it. In order to be able to install Windows XP.
I wish Microsoft had provided at least one additional way to add drivers to the installation process (USB memory stick, anyone?). At least when I tried with an official SP2 installation CD.
Next step after the Windows installation: add a Ubuntu installation in an LVM partition. So the Ubuntu alternate installation CD was helpful twice with this computer.
01 Jan
Gestern Abend habe ich doch noch ein richtiges Schnäppchen gemacht und dank altem Mehrwertsteuersatz richtig Kohle gespart… 1,03 Euro!
Nun Spaß beiseite… Wer auf einem neueren Intel-Mac gerne Windows benutzen möchte und dabei die Einrichtung von Boot Camp scheut oder (wie ich) das aus chronischem Platzmangel nicht einrichten kann, dem sei Parallels Desktop for Mac ans Herz gelegt. Windows im Sandkasten. Ich war so begeistert von der Geschwindigkeit (im Vergleich zu Virtual PC, das ich vorher auf dem G4 laufen hatte), dass ich mich gestern zum Kauf entschlossen habe.
Derzeit gibt es noch ein paar (ca. 20) Lizenzschlüssel für Parallels Desktop zum Preis von 40,93 Euro im Shop von Unimall.de (gegen Nachweis: Immatrikulationsbescheinigung o.ä.). Verkauf solange Vorrat reicht, danach gilt wieder der reguläre Preis von ca. 80 Euro.
[Update 2. Januar 2007] Die reduzierte Ware ist ausverkauft, Parallels ist mit der Edu-Lizenz nun wieder für 49,90 Euro zu haben.
01 Nov
Das gleichzeitige Aktivieren von
[X] Uhr automatisch auf Sommer-/Winterzeit einstellen
und
[X] Automatisch mit einem Internetzeitserver synchronisieren (Server: de.pool.ntp.org)
liefert nicht unbedingt das gewünschte Ergebnis, wenn seit dem Zeitpunkt der Umstellung schon mal ein Linux gebootet wurde, das sich ordentlich um die Uhrzeit gekümmert hat. Windows stellt dann die Uhr einfach noch mal eine Stunde zurück.
Und wo wir gerade schon mal beim Thema sind… der Webserver läuft auch noch auf Sommerzeit, Alturo!
