Manually Resetting Audio Device IRQs OR How I learned to stop worrying and eat Italian

by | Apr 15, 2004 | Imported Entry

Apparently everything is bigger in Texas. That includes food. Some of you already knew this. You lucky bastards that got to visit Casa Ole’ or Whataburger can certainly agree that Texans know food. Italian is no longer an exception. I had thought I’d be stuck with the crap-shoot that is Olive Garden forever, but no! Tonight we stopped at a little place called simply “The Italian Kitchen”. There was also a subtitle along the lines of “Mama Mia’s” so I’m not really sure what it goes by. In my book it shall simply be know as the single Italian place that doesn’t suck. I got, and I’m not exaggerating, three huge (full steak size) pieces of veal parmigiana. I ate one and the rest will be lunch and dinner for days to come. Best part is that it’s cheaper than the OG.

As for that dribble about audio things…

I’ve given up with Creative and Sound Blaster products all together. Period. The next card that goes in the next machine to come will probably be a Turtle Beach. And that’s only if I don’t get a mobo with some nice 5.1 Dolby built in. You might remember me mentioning having this rig hang or restart from time to time, usually when playing games. A few of you might even have witnessed the “clicking” issue where games will produce a horrible high pitched clicking until it eventually crashes. For years I couldn’t trace the problem to anything in particular. Now, out of a last desperate attempt to play more than 20 minutes at a stretch, I’ve finally yanked the Audigy card out of the computer and set up the nforce’s onboard audio. That was a few days ago. I haven’t crashed yet. Things are looking promising.

It took a little bit of work to get the onboard up and running though. A few driver packs and some hardware IRQ moving (to basically get rid of the prior existence of the Audigy) later, it’s all good. I’m not sure why windows won’t understand the name of the product, but if that’s it’s only hang up we’re probably doing good.

Lastly, before I go relax with Lauren and our latest Netflix delivery, have you guys seen the new Nvidia card. Holy cow. The GeForce 6800, according to both Tom’s and HardOCP which I trust explicitly, is going to absolutely smoke anything out there right now. Plain and simple. I don’t know what to think at this point. I’m pretty happy NVidia got their act together after the NV30 and NV35 crap. Apparently they’ve done good this time around. The $500 street price is kind of unpleasant but who knows. Maybe in a year or two when I’m ready to get one it’ll be cheaper.

g’night kids.

Lock it down

by | Apr 15, 2004 | Work

Work is pretty much done for today. My boss is gone, my other boss is gone. It’s 5 and I’m supposed to stay until 6. Like that’s going to happen.

I had left over chinese food for lunch today. Mu Shu actually. It was rather tasty. In order to have chinese food one must maintain certain standards. The concept of a fortune cookie afterward for example. Mine said the following:

“You will have everything you want in life”

I thought those were bold words coming from a fucking cookie.

Everything I want? Apparently I wanted debt. I would digress here and tell you about the check I just wrote to one of them and the discomfort I feel everytime I look at the mounting pile of paperwork associated with them. But I won’t.

Instead I’d rather reflect on the good things I have. My wife, my friends, my job, my car. All good, happiness bringing things. I guess the cookie isn’t such an idiot after all.

I actually just had a great idea. I should print out stuff from MY wedding while no one is here. Brilliant.

Gotta run.

But I’ll leave you with this, which I found funny:

“Abstract art: a product of the untalented sold by the unprincipled to the utterly bewildered.” – Al Capp

That has absolutely nothing to do with anything in particular btw.

HUZZAH!

by | Apr 15, 2004 | Imported Entry

A big, big, big Uber thanks goes out to Jason for figuring out what was up with the website.

“I fixed it. Finally found out what was causing this.. some munga had configured the address I use for www.docholoday.com for a filtered dialup customer. So each time this customer dialed in, it would snatch your IP address away. I’ve moved him up and out of the hindenburg range so it should never happen again.”

YAY! Like I said, a big thanks. This pretty much made my day.

Alrighty. Back to printing pictures and whatnot.

Desktop ‘O’ The Moment

by | Apr 14, 2004 | Culture

Because I like to do this every once in a while. Just a nice, complete desktop mod. In the picture there’s a few different things going on. First, the msstyle is called Chrome Milk and you can get it here. Next, the icons are a mix of World of Aqua, new WOA and SnowE2. Last but not least, the dock-bar is YzDock with a whole bunch of icons from all over the place. I can’t quite remember where the wallpaper came from but I’m sure it will come to me. Enjoy.

Three Questions

by | Apr 14, 2004 | Personal

Via Chip’s journal:

“Ask me three questions, no more no less. Ask me anything you want. Then copy and paste this into your journal, allowing your friends (including me) to ask you anything.”