Recent Posts

5551

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Mini-Review: Wubi - Painless, partion-free WindowsXP/Ubuntu dual booting

« Last post by Darwin on May 28, 2007, 03:24 PM »

Has anyone tried hacking this to allow you to use a different (ie installing a non-Ubuntu) distro when selecting to manually download linux? I'd like to give PCLinuxOS 2007 as recommended by Zaine a shot, but would rather not bother with partitioning, installating and dual-booting (I'm lazy and I want to have my cake and eat it too!).

PS Got the harddrive, but not the RAM... As Carl notes, the RAM's not a big issue but I WANTED some more  because enough (1024MB at the moment) is never enough!

EDIT: whoops! Forgot the hyperlink...

5552

What's the Best? / Re: What's the best Journal (Diary) software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 28, 2007, 01:21 PM »

As a mere female

?!

Anyway, iDailyDiary looks quite interesting - thank you for drawing it to my attention.

5553

General Software Discussion / Re: Pistachio: windows usability addon

« Last post by Darwin on May 28, 2007, 09:46 AM »

I find it indispensable as well. I keep finding myself double-clicking to no avail on computers without DOpus.

-cemole (May 28, 2007, 05:07 AM)

Exactly!

5554

General Software Discussion / Re: Pistachio: windows usability addon

« Last post by Darwin on May 28, 2007, 12:40 AM »

It doesn't coexist very well with Directory Opus either (double-click for a new lister, for example, didn't work).

Dealbreaker for me... It would be impossible to over emphasize how dependent I have become on this feature in DOpus. There aren't words!

5555

What's the Best? / Re: What's the best Journal (Diary) software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 27, 2007, 01:03 PM »

A Pelikan is high on my list of pens to own. However, I am very happy with my M-Bs, and my Pilots, Parkers and Sheaffers. There's room in my world for more than one brand of pen or watch or car... I *hate* this about western culture/values: there's always someone trying to tell you that X is better than Y, or worse, that Z is the best period and you've missed the boat if you settle for anything less. What really sticks in my craw is university rankings. How the hell is it possible to come up with a consistent, quanitifiable, and most importantly reliable/meaningful set of criteria for what makes University X better than Y? Why is it meaningful that such and such a university is ranked 67th in the world and the one that I acutally went to ranked 134th (I made those numbers up out of thin air)? Says who? So what? It (and by extension it's alumni) are better because someone else says so? What a load of bunk. Sort of analgous to people who *have* to drive a Hummer but never leave the city, never leave paved roads, never drive in the snow...

Sorry. Rant over.

5556

Living Room / Re: Free Acronis TrueImage for Seagate/Maxtor HDD owners

« Last post by Darwin on May 27, 2007, 12:57 PM »

Agreed. I've been using the free versions of Paragon apps for a while. Most recently my $80 copy of Partition Magic refused to partition my harddrive - I kept getting errors. I installed Paragon Partition Manager 2005 and it did the job flawlessly. Paragon appears to make very simple apps that work as advertised.

5557

What's the Best? / Re: cd burning

« Last post by Darwin on May 27, 2007, 12:55 PM »

Unfortunately, Deluxe Suite 9 is a 650MB download... I *just* uninstalled Roxio/Sonic Deluxe Suite 8 because I realised that I don't use ANY of it, and had never used more than the CD burning feature in the past, prior to picking up Ashampoo Burning Studio.

Roxio is a FINE suite, it's just overkill for me and I got annoyed when I upgraded to 9 and discovered the size of the download after checkout. I RMA'd it without even downloading it and after a few weeks consideration, got rid of the previous version as noted above.

5558

Living Room / Re: POLL: How many students are active here (instead of writing up?!)

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 10:12 PM »

Nice one Grorgy. Sadly, I think the cartoonist has really summed things up in my case 

-Darwin (May 23, 2007, 09:52 AM)

What do you mean, in your case?

-Armando (May 26, 2007, 06:39 PM)

Well... didn't want to generalise and paint all PhD students with the same brush that I would apply to myself

5559

Living Room / Re: Why don't you pay for software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 12:51 PM »

it is a BASIC right to copy/modify/run software as you wish, because software is NOT property, software = ideas and creativity, and limiting ideas and creativity with ownership is always a bad idea. That is the ethical truth.

 Paying for software should be done out of sympathy, goodwill, brotherhood with the developer, not because you have to, just to have the 'privilege' to use the software.

-Gothi[c] (May 26, 2007, 03:09 AM)

Sorry, but your basic premise is not correct.  Software is not just the idea, it is also the work and talent to make that idea work.  Talent should always be rewarded.  Paying people for the software that results from ideas and creativity does not stifle that creativity, working at mcDonalds does.

-thomthowolf (May 26, 2007, 12:40 PM)

Nicely said thomthowolf.

5560

Found Deals and Discounts / MusicIP Mixer Premium Memorial Day Weekend Sale - 40% off

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 12:45 PM »

MusicIP Mixer is on offer at a 40% discount over the US Memorial Day weekend. It's a feature rich and fun music organizer and player introduced to the donationcoder community by urlwolf here. Grab it here through Monday the 28th.

Note:

The discount does not get applied until checkout, so don't worry that the full price is listed on the landing page there - you should see the discount once you press the "Check Out" button.

I took advantage of this and can vouch for the fact that the discount does indeed appear after you press "Check Out". This takes you to an order confirmation page, so you can confirm that the discount has been applied before finalizing the order.

5561

What's the Best? / Re: cd burning

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 12:35 PM »

The links are still working for the discounts but they have changed the price to $19.99 (USD) / £14.99 (UKP)

-Carol Haynes (May 26, 2007, 10:28 AM)

Drat! Still, if I were (a  ) Clevercat, I'd try the "make us an offer" site at Ashampoo (can't find it right now; often I can get to it via the special offers link from the Help menu, although at the moment it's offering me ClipFind instead) - start at $4.99 and work your way up. I'd bet they'll take something in the $7.99 range, but it would be worth starting low... Just a thought...

5562

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Free computer help online (tune-ups, customization, etc)

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 09:54 AM »

"Verily, verily, I say; let not your right hand know what your left is doing" - the Bible says about giving money-gifts to the church. Maybe MS got the occasion wrong.

5563

What's the Best? / Re: cd burning

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 09:48 AM »

I was reasonably impressed with the Ashampoo PhotoCommander trial that I ran a couple of months ago. It was pretty slick. However, as I already have PhotoCollector and exifPro (not to mentino SnapFire Plus) I passed on it. Seemed really nice, though.

I *think* you can still get Ashampoo Burning Studio 7 via the links that Carol and I posted on the previous page. If you're in NA it's $9.99. However, version 6 is excellent, too!

5564

Living Room / Re: Why don't you pay for software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 26, 2007, 09:44 AM »

I've highlighted a key word or two in my original quote: you and I, as far as I can tell, aren't as far apart as you apparently think! I guess my choice of the word "respect" was unfortunate... Equally unfortunate is that I can't think of a better one right now. I was trying to say that if one is going to make a case for stealing, surely they could come with something better than "the product sucks, so it's ok to steal it". At least saying the you steal because you find the price more than you can bear is... stumped again, but how about: understandable?

-Darwin (May 25, 2007, 04:32 PM)

You're right; looking at it, I think I must have misunderstood your post.  I had just read through all the posts up to that point and replied to yours as the last one I read. Sorry if I sounded as if I was aiming it at you! Though I think I had thought you were trying to justify -- to an extent, even if only a mild extent -- the appropriateness of stealing software based solely on its cost. Sorry!  Didn't mean to "preach" at you, Darwin!

-J-Mac (May 26, 2007, 01:15 AM)

No worries! As I noted, my choice of words wasn't very precise... Still can't think of a better word, either. Embarrassing.

5565

Living Room / Re: Visual-syntactic text formatting - cool paper about optimally formatting text

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 11:45 PM »

Is anyone else reminded of gri in this?

-Josh (May 25, 2007, 10:50 PM)

Ha ha, I was thinking the same thing as I read Mark0's description!


edit by jgpaiva: fixing quote

5566

What's the Best? / Re: What's the best Journal (Diary) software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 11:17 PM »

Moleskine and Mont Blanc. Nice! What version of each is your tool of choice (MS 146 Medium - although I also heavily favour my PFM I and my Vanishing Point - and the lined Pocket Journal for me...)?

5567

DC Website Help and Extras / Re: Windows CDBurning

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 11:15 PM »

Somewhere buried on the Roxio support site (you can probably find it via their support forum) is a complete removal tool for the various Roxio apps. See if you can find it and follow any further directions that accompany it on the site. I had to do this about three years ago - it was not fun and I went with Sonic, who promply bought out Roxio! I'm with Ashampoo Burning Studio now...

5568

General Software Discussion / Re: PIM's

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 08:07 PM »

OK! Done Josh - I included the other information that you PM'd to me. Hope this works out for you.

Best,

Mike

5569

General Software Discussion / Re: Seeking opinions about combination antivirus/firewall products

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 05:19 PM »

Great to see you back here Ken! I hope this signals an active return? We've missed you!

Anyway, I interpret your post to be seeking opinions about security suites, such as Zone Alarm Pro Internet Security. IOW, apps that protect against more than one kind of threat (spyware and virus, for example). These are attractive at first flush because they can replace up to 3 different apps from different vendors. However, I've shied away from them because I'd rather have the best anti-spyware, and the best anti-virus and the best firewall and I am not confident that one company can deliver the best in all three categories.

Having said that, I note that PC World or PC Mag (can't find the reference) just handed a big award to ZoneAlarm Pro Internet Security Suite. The review (whereever it is) claims that the anti-spyware component is now class leading, besting Spyware Doctor and Spyware Sweeper in that category and that the firewall is topnotch and the antivirus (licensed from Kapersky, I believe) is also top notch. I dunno... I recently disabled plain jane ZoneAlarm Pro (with antispywar) from running at system start because it's such a resource hog! Like Mark0, I now rely on my hardware firewall and Windows XP's built-in one. If I take my notebook off site, I'll enable ZoneAlarm...

Just my rambling two bits 

5570

General Software Discussion / Re: I Need Help w/ ConvertXtoDVD program

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 04:58 PM »

trex and Hotmamma need help all right...

Fortunately, Carol, Ken and others have pointed you in the right direction!

5571

General Software Discussion / Re: PIM's

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 04:53 PM »

Hi Josh - I've had good experiences so far with GemX and have an active account on the user's forum. I'll gladly post a question for you over there but have a question for you: what kind of e-mail address are you using to try to register? Just a thought... I think mine is yahoo.com and I don't recall any problems at all with registering it.

Anyway, I trialed Do-Orgranizer at version 2 and again when version 3 came out. Because I have a licence for TexNotes Pro, I qualify for drastically reduced cross-upgrade pricing to get the full blown version of Do-Orgranizer 3 but have passed so far. For my needs, Outlook does all I need it to and I really don't want another e-mail client. If they didn't have that built into the base, I'd probably jump at the cross-upgrade and just not install e-mail...

Let me know if you want me to post something over there for you!

5572

Announce Your Software/Service/Product / Re: Free computer help online (tune-ups, customization, etc)

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 04:44 PM »

OK - my bad: I shouldn't have said "version". The article is right - they are two completely different apps that happen to read and send e-mail. Let me rephrase what I wrote to: " OE is their freebie e-mail client while Outlook is their fully-featured, big bucks e-mail client".

5573

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Mini-Review of Ink$aver (Money$aver)

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 04:35 PM »

The apps that come closest to this for laser printers (that I am aware of) are products like Fineprint or Clickbook.

5574

Living Room / Re: Why don't you pay for software?

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 04:32 PM »

Regarding my earlier post and the quote that I made in it, I can even respect, even if I don't agree with, an argument about ripping off Microsoft or Adobe because their stuff is too expensive. However, stating that you rip a company off because their products suck is ridiculous! How many car thieves target rusted and clapped out non-exotic cars?

This is where I differ: Just because a company's products are too expensive, I don't feel I have any right whatsoever to steal the product.  If I did feel that way about, say, Chevrolet, I wouldn't think to steal a Chevy to "get back" at them!

I either pay up and grumble like everyone else, or I make do with alternative applications. But I won't steal them.

Jim

I've highlighted a key word or two in my original quote: you and I, as far as I can tell, aren't as far apart as you apparently think! I guess my choice of the word "respect" was unfortunate... Equally unfortunate is that I can't think of a better one right now. I was trying to say that if one is going to make a case for stealing, surely they could come with something better than "the product sucks, so it's ok to steal it". At least saying the you steal because you find the price more than you can bear is... stumped again, but how about: understandable?

5575

Mini-Reviews by Members / Re: Mini-Review of Ink$aver (Money$aver)

« Last post by Darwin on May 25, 2007, 12:49 PM »

Thanks for the review patteo  . I've been using Inksaver for a couple of years now and have it installed on two machines. It's not quite so indispensable since I purchased a monochrome laser but still sees service whenever I need to print in colour (an infrequent occurence these days). Anyway, just wanted to reiterate that it does work, it does save money and it's seamless - once it's installed and configured, you forget that it's there.