Getting in the groove

After slacking around for a while I found out that I want to slack some more. I really don’t know what happened but I really have no interest at all in getting things done lately. I am just glad that the semester is over some weeks ago. I planned to start reviewing but I can’t. I would read a few minutes then mindlessly surf again.

———————————

I was talking to one of my friends about the amount of shit you have to put up with before you quit. As much as you want to win all of life’s battles there is only so much you can do. You have to choose your battles. It’s not as if all of them are as important as fighting for world peace.

———————————

I visited my former office last Monday and I was glad seeing my former officemates.

———————————

I have started to really work last week. I have solved some bugs and fixed them. Going back to coding after a long time is really refreshing.

Aaargh!

I bought 1GB of DDR 400 Kingston RAM and it won't work with my 512MB of DDR333 RAM. I just hope that this setup would be stable.

Lesson learned: upgrade your processor, motherboard and RAM at the same time. 

 The only good thing is that Super Pi now finishes at 51 second. Three seconds faster compared when using my old RAM. Sweet!

I've been fixing and cleaning things this holy week. My new rig is a bit stable now. I wasted almost four days assembling and reformatting it. All I need now is a GB of RAM. One of my RAM is incompatible with my motherboard.

 My room is a complete mess due to the numerous papers I have to read(kuno) for the last semester. It will be a complete mess again when I study for the comprehensive exam.

 —————————-

 I was thinking of the things that I need to do for the next few months. Aside from finishing graduate studies I have to refactor a lot of code. The first thing I need to do is to come up with a plan and a schedule. Heroic programming and cramming will surely not work. 

I was cleaning my room when I came upon a 2003 Villman pricelist. Three years ago a 2X DVD writer costs 17k! Now you can buy a 16X DVD writer for less than 3k. 

The Great Upgrade Ordeal

I've been trying to upgrade my PC for the last few days. I bought my a new proc(Sempron 3000+) and a new motherboard. The first ordeal was installing the cooler of the CPU. When I installed it, the brackets are a bit skewed. 

 

 I took it off and the CPU went with it. The pins are bent. Fortunately I was able to straightened them out and insert it again on the socket.

Afraid that it might be broken I took it back to the store and fortunately it was not. When I try to boot it at home it would not boot. So I took it back again with my memory and it booted. I don't know what happened there. Might be I inserted the RAMs too lightly.

 When I tried to install Windows some weird errors occured. The error said that ntoskrnl.exe was missing or corrupted. I did some repair and it worked. I was able to finally install Windows XP. 

When I ran Super Pi and Prime95 they both reported an error. I took my other RAM and now both worked. 

 The other problem that I encountered is that sometimes ntoskrnl.exe is reported missing or corrupted. I noticed that when the case is standing upright there would be an error but if I place it horizontally it is usually fine. I noticed that the 12V cable for the CPU is near my RAM so I placed it far. After that I could boot to Windows XP normally.

I would install the rest of my applications today and do some load testing. Hopefully there would be no problems.

Now I need to buy a stick of RAM since 512MB of RAM is not enough for me.  

Results of Super Pi:

Athlon xP 1600+: 1m 38s

Sempron 3000+: 54s 

Complete!

Finally I completed my CS298!
 ——————————

The bad thing is I'm sick right now. Must be the humidity whacking my system. Include the sudden changes in weather and  I'm really done for. I guess its payback time. For the last months or so I have been working quite hard. 

 ——————————
I noticed recently that ants have been crawling on my keyboard and did what I normally do(tinaktak ko). But this morning the ants are still there. I took the spacebar key off and to my surprise the ant made my keyboard their home. 

 Sick and all I disassembled my keyboard. Good thing I still have a spare keyboard and a set of KYK philips screwdrivers. They are not the best in terms of screwing. I regretted that I did not bought the Stanley set. It could made my life easier. 

I don't know though if I could put it back again.

One more week to go!!!

I just presented my thesis proposal, which I would not do since I will be be taking the comprehensive exam route, to sir Ced and I think I did okay. I just need to make a few revisions and I will have a passing mark. If nothing goes wrong I think I will pass all three subjects this sem. 
————————– 

  I will start my new job on Monday. It will be an 8-5 job. It will pay less(just enough to pay the bills ), but less stressful than my former job. At least I can study for my comprehensive exam.

 ————————–

 I'm stil thinking on what case to buy for my new PC. Either this or this. The Casetek 1026-9B is priced 500Php lower than the 1026-10. The 1026-10 has a nicer paint though.