front242

[solipsistnation]

Perhaps it's just the whopping piles of caffeine speaking, but I am suddenly really getting into Front 242's _Pulse_, an aptly-named album if ever there was one.

Or it could be the highly-repetitive chugging electronic grooves. Suddenly I wish I had some programming to do...

Instead, I am installing MacOS X 10.3 on amymarr's old powerbook, which has a dead screen-- it's a broken wire to the backlight, which her erstwhile male companion tried to fix and failed. It's very touchy in there, and the screen is, for no obvious reason, glued together. Sure, it makes it very slim, but it also makes it very difficult to fix. I'd had the idea of fixing it, but if he couldn't get it to stay fixed, I doubt I could.

So, as it stands now, I've got it hooked up to a monitor with a USB keyboard and mouse, and I am referring to it as a "free Mac Mini." (It's only 667MHz, but hey, I'm certainly not going to complain at all, being, as I like to think, "not a jerk," and certainly not one to complain about free potentially-useful hardware, especially _small_ free potentially-useful hardware.)

I'm not quite sure what I'll do with it. I might leave it at home on wireless with my 250GB FW drive hooked up and start loading CDs into it for the sake of having them all online, when I'm home at least. It could be a nice little media server, and, I suppose, a home web server thingy, if I felt particularly enthusiastic about it. Since that's probably all I'd do if I were to buy an actual Mac Mini, that makes it well worth keeping around, especially since it's very very small and I can just stash it somewhere out-of-the-way on a UPS or something, install some remote-desktop software on it, and have it be a pervasive apartment presence...

Whee! Morning! Pu-erh in my cup! Beats in my head! Small computer installing under my desk! Payday soon! A month's worth of comics waiting at That's Entertainment! Huzzah!

Comments

Dead laptop screens

[ex-susumu64.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the exact same thing has happened to my sister's old iBook. Now I just need to convince her to give it (back) to me so I can use it for exactly the same purposes.

Re: Dead laptop screens

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

Remember, broken computer hardware is considered hazardous waste-- best to have a professional deal with it.

"Goodness, it's broken. Too bad, nothing to do but dispose of it. Here, I'll take it to the recycling center for you."

[amymarr.livejournal.com]

You said you were going to use it for parts. Liar.

BTW, I found the other hinge. :)

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

It wasn't as dead as I thought it would be. 8)

(Getting it set up enough to use an external monitor at all was kind of a pain, though, and involved a very bright light, holding the screen at just the right angle, and squinting and trying not to lose the mouse pointer...)

[zeeke42.livejournal.com]

Sounds like a surprising usability loss for Mac. On any PC laptop I've used for quite a while, you simply press Fn+F4 or similar to toggle between the panel and external VGA.

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

I think there's a function-key thing to do it, but I don't remember what it is.

[amymarr.livejournal.com]

ROTFL. gregmarr and I had to do the same thing, and it was a PITA. We were trying to use our daughter's cow flashlight...

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

Once it has an OS on it, you can either start it up and immediately close it (before the OS even begins to load) or let it boot, close it, and then wake it up by hitting a key on a USB keyboard...

Of course, with a totally wiped disk, um, it was sort of hard to get that far. 8)

[krzzl.livejournal.com]

Do you really like Pu-erh? I was under the impression that it is barely drinkable.

[sauergeek.livejournal.com]

Icon love! I haven't seen The Wizard of Speed and Time in a while.

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I really like it. It's got a definite earthy aroma, but it's very smooth and (I find) doesn't need sugar or milk or anything.

Come by sometime today and I'll give you a little lump of it. If you feel like hanging out a bit and have ten or fifteen minutes to spare, I also have an infuser basket and an electric kettle in my office.

[krzzl.livejournal.com]

You can get it in "lumps"? I've only seen the teabag kind from the Polish store that my cousin in Poland swears by to lose weight, though she loathes drinking it every day :)

I tried that kind once, and it seemed like it had almost a "sandy" taste to it which was sort of interesting but sort of yucky at the same time.

[solipsistnation.livejournal.com]

It's this.

Yum.

Not sandy. More earthy... It actually kind of reminds me of how the barnyard at my grandfather's farm smelled.