of my deathbed… to post …

Teh Shat…

When I get there, We’ll have lunch again, just like old times.

Some fun from Slashdot:

I get the impression that the Windows 7 launch is a lot like seeing an old girlfriend suddenly show up on your doorstep wanting to get back together. She’s had some work done, apparently: stomach stapling to take off some of the weight, breast augmentation, and a radical nosejob to make her look as much like your current girlfriend as medical science will allow.

I’m not going to Windows 7. I’m down to 1 Windows system, the Vista system that is used exclusively for Lineage II. It doesn’t so much run Vista, but Lineage II as the OS and it runs well enough that I don’t feel the need to mess with it.

In the last installment of “WTF: Snow Leopard and Wireless“, I gave up on getting it to work since I generally work with my MacBook in my office where I can just plug a cable in for net access.

I had a meeting in a local coffee shop recently and when I opened my MacBook it found the shop’s wireless and connected straight away. This got me interested in getting this to work again. It is kinda nice when I can leave the office and take the MacBook with me and work from my big comfy chair…

I did some more searching and found my provider’s troubleshooting page. I almost moved on when I read stuff like “Unplug the router and count to 10″ and “make sure the AirPort is turned ON”, but pressed on and found that the examples of the setup pages in the tutorial were very different from the setup pages that my router was showing me. A little more poking around turns up a firmware update for the router (Actiontec 701-WG).

Let me say here that I am not very fond of flashing BIOS and updating firmware. I know, I know… Its generally safe and people do it all the time but to risk bricking something that works so you can get wiz-bang new UI isn’t something I support. In this case I went ahead and downloaded the update and flashed the firmware.

It worked right off, the flashing program even remembered all the settings and replaced them after the flash.

Now, you might say that I owe Apple an apology for this but I disagree. The MacBook worked just fine with the old router firmware and failed only after installing 10.6/Snow Leopard. My iPod and Vista [spit] Notebook worked fine with the old firmware as well. The only thing that failed was the Snow Leopard AirPort connection, so I still contend that Apple was the cause of the problem, even if flashing the firmware “solved” it.

Anyway…

Now my MacBook is finally fully functional under Snow Leopard and I am happy with it. It would be nice if Apple would have been able to fix the problem, but at least there is a workaround.

“You know what’s good about you [Sinner]? You compartmentalize your curmudgeonly-ness very well.”

There is some validation in the search engine referral stats that the Snow Leopard (OS X 10.6) wireless “security” and connectivity issues are not just me. Lots of folks are searching for “WPA Snow Leopard” (plus variations) and finding their way to my little rant.

The best network guy I know is on the case and I continue my putzing around with it.

UPDATE: Got wireless working by updating my Actiontec GT-701WG router firmware.

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Apple OSX v10.6 (aka “Snow Leopard”) was released last Friday, of course I went to the Apple Store to get a copy. I even got up early and waited for the mall to open, I guess I really am a fanboi… [sigh]

Early review? MAJOR DISAPPOINTMENT!

(scores from 0-10)

Install: 10

I installed it on my MacBook. It went smoothly, as you would expect from Apple. Once it was done (about an hour) it booted right up and told me what cool new things I could do, never mind 10.5 could do all those things too. The install process was pretty slick BTW, it didn’t need me to do anything other than wait unlike Windows that requires you to do stuff every 20 minutes or so and will patiently wait for you to do it before proceeding thereby insuring that you can’t just walk away and do something productive.

PLUS: APPLE STICKERS! YAY!

Initial impression: 6

Even though Apple was careful to tramp down any expectations of cool new features I was struck by just how little had changed. It looked exactly the same. So much like 10.5 that it startled me when the visual appearance of the dock menu (hold down the mouse button on an app) changed. Can’t really tell at this point if the 64 bit upgrade is any faster, though Safari is clearly faster.

Early use: 0

I connect the MacBook to the Internet via wireless. As any sane person, I set up the super easy to defeat but still takes effort WPA “security” on the wireless access point. 10.5 was running just fine with the “security” as does my other Mac, Linux box and 2 Vista [spit] boxes. Snow Leopard … not so much. It can’t connect. I spent what little time I had to putz with my new toy trying to get the dam thing to connect to the internet. I tried the even more laughable WEP “security”, no go. I tried allowing only the MacBooks’s MAC address and it still wouldn’t connect.

I tried taking off all “security” and it connected, but I’m not really happy about my house being an Open Access Point. I gave up for the moment and left the whole thing open so I could move on and will revisit when I have more time to putz or I see a patch from Apple. At least I can take my MacBook with me and be reasonably assured that I will be able to connect to open wifi hotspots, but not to anything that requires “security”.

Turning off my router while I am away sucks since I can’t get to my SVN or leave a Lineage2 sell store up…

Exchange Server 2007 didn’t work. Got WAY farther than 10.5 in accessing my day job’s server, which isn’t saying too much, but it got about halfway through my mailbox and failed. I tried a number of times with it stopping at the same spot. I give up on this too, which is really too bad because this one feature was the main reason that I got the upgrade (other than a lame excuse to go to the Apple Store and grope the $2500 MacBook Pro).

Also a favorite Java game site of mine just doesn’t work anymore. Under Camino it crashes and under Safari it plays but buttons and some graphics are major glitchy.

Overall early score: 1

I expect so much more from Apple. Snow Leopard was initially going toward a release next week, they might have done better to wait. I hope to see a patch soon, but I have not seen anything via Google searches about other people having wireless WPA/WEP problems with Snow Leopard. I am completely open to the explanation that I am doing something horribly wrong, but since the initial wireless setup worked under 10.5 and only failed after installing 10.6, it seems that the software is at fault.

Apple fanboi rating slipping… DEVELOPING…
Microsoft loathing still holding steady though, so I have that going for me.

Currently, I am:

Running Mac OS for all kinds of applications (including the blog).
Running Windows XP in a VirtualBox under OSX.
Running Ubuntu on a remote system via Chicken of the VNC.

Is there any reason you can see why I might be confused?

A man must know his limits and I just found mine. Turns out that I can’t beat the combined evil of 2 separate State DMV bureaucracies when teamed up to keep a brother down.

I’m sure that it was only their combined evil that was strong enough to defeat me, but defeat me they did.

Savor your victory, it will not serve you well.

Update: START SAVORING!

The Video Game Voters Network is running an action alert against a rule by the Chicago Transit Authority banning certain ads from the el stations.

Normally I support the VGVN, but not this time.

Free Speech does not require the CTA to give you space on their walls. This is not a First Amendment issue.

My cadaver has a first name, its O-S-C-A-R
My cadaver has a second name its M-A-Y-E-R.

Too soon?

I, for one, welcome our new search engine based overlords.

$25 to see the Michael Jackson memorial service?.

Totally worth it if the proceeds go toward making the Giant MJ desert-roaming robot. It would (of course) shoot lasers!

I’m taking the day off and heading North:

This is why I’m proposing that June 30, 2009 be declared the first annual “Kick A Canadian In the Nuts Day”.

Anyone but William Shatner… nobody messes with “Teh Shat”…

I usually agree with Bill Whittle of PJTV, but I found myself nodding in agreement and moved to action like never before while watching his latest “Afterburner” segment.

The argument against socialized medicine has many, many points and the “loss of personal freedom” angle is one of the many winning arguments. It wins because it goes directly to core American values, you know … stuff like “Freedom”, “Independence” and “Rugged Individualism”. The stuff that we are losing at a pace that I never thought possible.

Long time readers know that I have been against socialized medicine for a long time (far longer than I have been blogging). I think the speech Bill gave in his segment is one of the best of all times. Turns out there is a really good reason this specific Afterburner resonated with me. (Spoiler after the jump)
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Just in case you didn’t get “teh snark” in my opus regarding Mrs. Sinner’s brain surgery, The Wall Street Journal has the message in a somewhat less snarky format.

Such stories are common. For example, Sylvia de Vries, an Ontario woman, had a 40-pound fluid-filled tumor removed from her abdomen by an American surgeon in 2006. Her Michigan doctor estimated that she was within weeks of dying, but she was still on a wait list for a Canadian specialist.

If lifesaving surgery was delayed to the critical point and beyond, what access to Mrs. Sinner’s procedure would there be in a Canadian world?

Thanks again Mr. President. Without you the miracle would never have happened.