Rants for the day.

Well, as I go through the teething troubles with AL-9000, I find I am learning a lot about computers. Instead of putting my system on a wireless network like most people have done I have chosen a wired network for my systems. Its a little harder to deal with as far as the wires are concerned, but you don't have the security issues involved with wireless networks. I'm probably going to do a spring cleaning soon since I have to get the place cleaned up to really organize the wires and make it easier to access things.

I had a sound issue with the system, and I was going to have to find a driver for the sound chip on the motherboard. Instead I opted for a separate soundcard and I found a SoundBlaster live card at the used computer store I got AL at for $25. I also got my router and a Battery backup for my new system. All this for under $60 which isn't bad.

I'll probably have everything set up once I get the AntiVirus installed. I don't want to access the Internet without protection. There is just too much junk out there to ruin your system by jumping the gun. Besides, my present system is able to access the internet, albeit slowly, for the time being. I would have gotten the AntiVirus sooner but its $70. I want the best, which is Trend Micro. A lot of enterprise systems (i.e. corporate) use it and its rated as among the best in the market. PCcillin is very user friendly, but its a bit of a memory hog like most Windows program. However, with AL's expanded memory, I should be able to do most anything without problems. Eventually I will get me another 1 GB stick and AL will be able to do most anything.

I found out something that was interesting. Windows XP will not recognize any memory more than 2.5 GB. So, even if I put in 3GB of memory, it would do no good because the program would not recognize it. Kinda silly, but that is one of the problems with Windows.

Ok, enough computer talk. Now on to the business of the day. Gas jumped in price around here twenty cents overnight from $3.51 to $3.69 a gallon. Its time to consider getting a smaller car and ditching my gas guzzler. I learned that this isn't a problem elsewhere but it might be soon. The gas prices are getting outrageous. Considering there is a surplus, YES a SURPLUS of gas in the US, the prices are still rising. The Law of Supply and Demand is supposed to be a foundation of economics but its clear that it isn't.

The other thing that is bothering me is that I know when our country ended it reign as a superpower. It happened with Katrina. Now this article is tracing the end of an Oil-Addicted Superpower. Very interesting read. http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/printer_050808F.shtml