I give up.
I've had it with exploding hard drives.
Either I got a bum replacement for my laptop drive, or the problem is worse--my laptop is hungry and likes platters of magnetic particles.
Yup, that's right. It looks like something is hosed. I'm hoping that it's just a few corrupted files, so I'll be upgrading the linux install over the next day or two, but I am fearing the worst.
Wish me luck.
In other news, looks like May 16th will be made through putty instead of linux ssh. Here goes nothing.
I've been watching my < href="http://marcolson.net/blog/archives/000142.php">new teevee quite a bit lately and I really like the HD content that is available over the air. Thankfully I live in the Chicago area and get quite a good number of digital stations (check this and search for zip 60056), many of which broadcast in HD (although some stretch their normal broadcasts [boo]). I do miss tivo (or tivo like functionality) on the HD stations, and I also would like to have some of the non-OTA statiions in HD (ESPN, HDNet, etc.).
Here are the options as I see it, although one is pretty much out of the question. See if you can figure out which one...
DirecTV
Cost for HD: ~$300 for standard HD receiver, or ~1000 ($600 on eBay) for HD TiVo, $10/mo on top of current service
Pros:
- Great picture quality
Cons:
- DirecTV is changing the encoding of their HD stations within the next year from mpeg-2 to mpeg-4. I don't want to buy a doorstop for a grand.
- TiVo lacks modern functionality (no usb ports, no HMO, etc.)
- No locals in HD
Comcast
Costs: ~$47 + 5 (HD) + 15 (DVR)/mo for 16 months for switching from DirecTV. May switch my cable modem to them too ($46/mo 6Md/384ku)
Pros:
- cost. they have a great deal for those switching over from satellite. that cost is for digital cable, with one premium channel and on demand content.
- Motorola 83xx HD DVR with firewire port enabled
Cons:
- I've heard pq isn't that great--Comcast gets their HD OTA signals with a large antenna, instead of directly from the stations over fiber (like they do for the SD stations)
- Not impressed with the dippy do that answered the phone last night--after 10m on hold
Wide Open West
Cost: ~$140/mo with all the movies (~110 w/ no movies), HD, DVR, and current cable modem
Pros:
- good PQ. WOW gets their broadcast signals over fiber from the stations. No interference.
- already a cable modem customer
- I've had great luck with their customer service--usually < 1m hold times
Cons:
- no deals to switch over from satellite, or to keep an existing customer (customer support girl said "yeah, oh well...")
Did you find the one that's out of the question (that is unless a HD box comes falling out of the sky)? I think the other option may be to see if I can get *just* the HD and DVR service from WOW (like $15/mo).
I don't like the idea of losing my TiVo, nor do I not like the idea of not being able to build a MythTV box to record "encrypted" HD stations (espn, hdnet, etc.). TV is changing, but I'm still on the early adopter side of things. I know that things will be different in a year or two (comcast DVR w/TiVo, etc.), but I want an oompaloompa now!
I guess I have bad luck with hard drives. I got a notice on bootup yesterday that SMRT--oops, SMART--detected an error on my laptop drive. This morning, I had to boot twice. The first time, I got a seek error on the drive, the second time was fine.
Let's just hope that the new drive gets here before this one decides to go tango uniform.
I think today is the first time that I have ever seen a FedEx driver pull into a driveway--let alone back in. Of course, that's discounting my parent's old house and their 800 foot long driveway...
The stand for my new TV came today, now I am anxiously awaiting the business end of this whole thing--the TV itself. It's pretty funny that the stand weighs a whole lot more than the set itself, but I guess that's what it takes to support a beeg teevee.
What a waste of a day. I finally got everything loaded back on. I was able to recover *most* of my data by throwing the drive in the freezer for about an hour and then copying it onto the new drive.
I think including office, but discounting the reboots for connecting and disconnecting the drive, my final post install reboot count is at 8. That's pretty rediculous if you ask me.
Now I have to figure out how I'm going to makeup the lost day. Who needs sleep?
I get into work this morning to a dead computer. I turned it on and the hard drive started clunking. Nice way to start a week...
I dig up a new to me hard drive and begin the windows installation process. At which point my laptop decides to hang. This will be a fun morning, won't it?
Anyway, working on getting windows back up, and maybe I'll be able to get some of my data off.
Post-install Windows XP Reboot Count: 5 (ah ah ah)
I was driving into work this morning, and one radio show was reporting that Illinois was disqualified from the tourney for accepting gifts (t-shirts, etc.) from non-allowed sources.
Another radio station was reporting that Dee Brown and Luther Head were sick with a fever.
I was trying to figure out what was going on when a third radio station wasn't reporting any problems with the team.
Then it hit me.
Stupid April Fool's Day.
