Author: Paul Tomblin

Last update on the hard disk problem (I hope)

Ok, hopefully last but hopefully not least:

  • I took the disk that was failing (call it “A”) and the disk that normally lives in a USB external drive case (call it “B”) and put them in my Windows box and booted with Knoppix, and copied all the files over.
  • I put “B” into my Linux server, and it’s working perfectly. Unfortunately a few hundred songs on my mp3 collection are stuck in /mp3s/lost+found because of various Reiserfs problems along the way.
  • I put “A” into the external USB drive case, and IT WORKS PERFECTLY.

Now all I have to do is figure out how to read the ID3 equivalent information on AAC (m4a) files, so I can restore all the files in /mp3s/lost+found to where they belong.

I’ve extended an offer to Alan Cox to ship my “A” drive to a kernel developer if any of them want to see what’s going wrong there, since as I’ve said before the drive passed WDC’s diagnostics, works fine in the 2.4 kernel, and fails in the 2.6 kernel no matter which machine, cable, motherboard chipset or IDE controller I try it on. He hasn’t responded yet.

A bad idea, badly implemented

I’m watching a show about the bomb plot to kill Hitler – I think the series is called “Virtual History”. They’re doing recreations, but instead of the usual recreations with actors, they are morphing real images of the prinicple characters over the actor’s head. Unfortunately the real image looks totally un-animated, making them all look like zombies.

The other stupid thing they’re doing is trying to make the recreations look like historical movies by using bad colour, hissy sound and fake “damage” (scratches, dirt, pops and splices) on both the video and audio. No good can come of that.

Eerily accurate


Are you Addicted to the Internet?

78%

Hardcore Junkie (61% – 80%)
While you do get a bit of sleep every night and sometimes leave the house, you spend as much time as you can online. You usually have a browser, chat clients, server consoles, and your email on auto check open at all times. Phone? What’s that? You plan your social events by contacting your friends online. Just be careful you don’t get a repetitive wrist injury…



The Are you Addicted to the Internet? Quiz at Quiz Me!