For the past few months, since a little while after I got my new computer, I set up Remote Desktop on my old desktop computer so I could log in and use it from inside my laptop. This is a tool that I have seen, but never really knew how to use, or wanted to use. But now that I have a portable computer, it is nice to control the desktop from anywhere in the house. This little gem that is built into Windows is a fantastic tool.

It was a little time consuming to get it set up because the desktop only had one user account. This made me have to create my own user account, with a password, so I could log in and control the computer remotely. I also had to use a piece of software to hide the user so the computer stays logging into the main account when the computer is turned on. After that, the software is great.

Probably the two reason I use this the most, is to administrate the desktop and do necessary maintenance, start uTorrent and downloads, and to test software. I used the computer to test Firefox 3.0 Alpha 7, also known as Minefield. Because the computer wasn’t my main system with all my important stuff on it, I felt it was the perfect environment to take the plunge with playing around with Alpha software. More recently, I also tested Windows Live Messenger 9.0 Beta and had a play around with it. I now use both of these applications on my main computer because I have felt they are stable enough to use and they do run very well, but I wanted to check them out a little bit before taking the plunge with them on my main system.

It is really nice to be able to use these little gems hidden in your system. There are a lot of things included with Windows that I don’t use, or don’t even know about. Remote Desktop is one of those and it is a great application that is bundled with Windows. I wish I could use it more and for other things and connecting to other computer, but unfortunately I cannot. I wonder what I will discover next, hidden in my computer.

Being a Vista user does have its downsides. Software incompatibility, annoyances with the OS, and the occasional crash. But after seeing that a fair share for the first few month using Vista, I have learned to love the Blue Screen of Death. Having to go back to XP for a few weeks a while back, I just realized how great a Blue Screen is compared to a freeze.

When using XP, I have only once had a BSOD, and that was when I yanked out a USB drive while before it ejected it. Computer didn’t like that. That was the only blue screen I have had for the few years of using computers. It is kinda daunting to see that giant blue screen glowing onto your face for the first time ever. What went wrong? Why did that happen?

But a blue screen is much better than having your system freeze in my opinion. I always dread when my computer stops responding for more than a few seconds and fear for the worst. I have no idea what went wrong, why it froze. Also who knows how long it is going to be in this trans before it starts responding again. How long is long enough to wait for it to wake up and hold down the power button and listen to the awful sound of a hard shutdown.

At least with a BSOD, it gives some kind of error that shows what went wrong. I generally don’t care what went wrong but I can tell what went wrong by what I was doing before I saw the blue. Also with a blue screen, at least I know that my system should be up and running in a minute or so, ready for me to log in. You know whats in store when you get a BSOD. I can’t say the same about a freeze. I like knows whats coming next, thats why I love the Blue Screen of Death.

As you should know, my laptop has gone back to the repair shop to get the wireless fixed. Its been gone for three days now so I presume they are either lazy, or waiting for parts to come or something. I really miss my laptop and would trade this desktop in anyway, just to have it back. Lucky I am not going to have to do that and can have both. Here are a short list of things that I miss about her. Don’t worry, its not a top ten list.

I really miss Vista. Some people will think I am crazy but there are heaps of little things in Vista that I wish they had in XP. One of the things is the quick search. Finding applications in “All Programs” is a tedious task and is becomes very easy to miss just typing in the first few letters on an app and hitting enter. Not only that, but I miss the stylish black bar and the blue Windows orb. XP looks so square and unclean, if you know what I mean.

I also miss the smooth video playback this temporary computer doesn’t offer. I have had to suffice with jumpy, poor video playback. I assume it is due to the crappy video graphics this computer has but I wouldn’t know to be honest. Video looks great on my laptop, its also in nice widescreen so there are not huge black bars above and below a video. Also the glossy screen makes the video look so much better, not really but it makes me feel better about watching TV shows on it.

Another thing that I miss about my laptop is it being portable. I can use it anywhere, in the living room, in the kitchen, in the bedroom or even in the bathroom/toilet if I please.  I miss being able to snuggle into bed with my laptop on top of me watching a few TV shows to finish off the day before I go to sleep.Its a luxury I wish I had but obviously this desktop computer can’t provide me with that. Being stuck to this desk with and uncomfortable chair is annoying, I just wanna hop into bed and watch some shows.

The thing I miss the most about my laptop is that fact that it is mine, all mine. No sharing, no one else’s grubby mits on it, no one else’s hard drive space or anything. Its 100% mine and I can do anything I want with it.  Not having to worry about losing other peoples files or having stuff running that will slow down the computer for other people is great. This desktop is so slow and if I lose my families documents, or pictures like I have in the past, I’m in trouble. Everything that happens with my PERSONAL computer is my problem and I will be the one to suffer any consequences.Too bad that it feels more like HP’s computer than mine at the moment with all the problems as well as the stupid junk software that got loaded onto it when they reinstalled Windows.

Hopefully my computer is back to working order every soon. It will probably Tuesday if the problem isn’t too deep. I really miss the little thing. To be honest, I wish they could have just replaced the whole dam thing with a nice working one. We all know that that is never going to happen though, haha. They don’t wanna lose money, which is why they wanted me to attempt a stupid system recovery to reinstall Windows  so they hopefully didn’t have to pay for repairs. Sucks they they are paying for it twice. Come home soon lappy, I miss you

As I ranted about two days ago, my wireless in my notebook isn’t working.  yesterday I rang Compaq and they told me to do useless crap that I had already tried. I told them I had done it but they insisted that I tried it again. Anyway, without luck, I was told that I would have to restore my system. I backed up my files and waited for the call center to open up the next day.

They walked me through restoring it with their recovery software and I had no luck with that. The software stalled at the par where it re-installs the operating system. I tried restoring from the recovery disc but no luck, same error.  Now I had no way of restoring my computer. The hard drive had been reformatted so there was nothing on the disc. I then had to drop my laptop at the HP certified repair center for them to put Windows Vista back on it and test the wireless adapter and replace if need be.

I have no laptop now and I won’t be getting it back for at up to seven days. That is a long time to wait for her I miss her already. Now I am resorted to a slow, crappy Windows XP desktop. I hate this machine! It will do though, better this than nothing at all. I’m going to have to convert my TV Shows to watch on my PSP because this stupid computer doesn’t play well with Divx. Poor Me!

In 3.71, Sony added theme support. Initially you could only use themes Sony had created but they shortly released a kit for people to make their own themes. I tried out some of the themes and some are pretty good, but most suck. If I want a theme on my PSP, it would have to be slick and nice. Most of the themes have jaggered icons, some even have icons that aren’t transparent so you can see white, very lame and unprofessional.

I have found a handful of decent themes. I’m sure everyone can predict the types of themes people will be creating, and yes, you are right. The good thing is most of these cliche themes are pretty decent, its the other stuff that is amature. Windows theme is a theme using the basic Windows icons and such to help you identify features on the PSP, for example the Internet Browser is the IE logo. The Mac theme is pretty similar but the icons are replaced with their OS X counterparts, lie the file specific folders and the music and photos menu icons. Vista theme features all the slick icons from the new Windows operating system. This is the best theme I have seen so far (in terms of looks, nothing to do with the actual computer operating system.) Last but not least, iPhone. There had to definitely be an iPhone theme. It has the iPhone icons associated with PSP features, Music, Pictures, Internet ect. ect.

The themes I have mentioned were all made at a high standard and anyone with the PSP with 3.71 (or 3.71 M33 custom firmware,) should definitely check these themes out. I have attached the themes I have mentioned plus a few extra one so now you have no excuse not to check them out. If you find any good ones, please lead me onto them, also tell me what you think of the ones I have attached.

• Windows XP
• Mac
• Windows Vista
• iPhone
• iPhone (2)

Note: Themes posted here are not mine. I take no credit for them. All rights belong to their original owners.

Most Windows users update their systems using Windows Update. Its nice and easy and does it automatically, sometimes. That is great. But… there is one thing I dislike about updating, and that is restarting my computer. I dislike restarting, or even shutting down my computer. I prefer to hibernate at night so it is using no power and I can just resume where I was when I left it.

Generally Windows Update give me the option to postpone restarting the computer, which I do. I also select it to remind me again in 4 hours, the maximum time it allows. I do not get why there is a low limit of 4 hours to remind me. Why can’t there be the option to remind me in 6, 12 or even 24. More conveniently, how about the option NEVER reminding me that Windows needs to restart to finish installing updates. Does it think I will forget to restart? Does it think I don’t notice the little Windows Update icon in the taskbar? I think it not giving me enough credit there.

But wait, there’s more! After about 12 hours without being restarted, it now also counts down when it’s going to restart automatically. Okay, this is a useful feature for some people, getting the computer to restart when they are not using it. You are given the option to postpone it more if you are there, but that’s the problem. Sometimes I live the computer for more than 5 minutes for various reasons, some people leave it on so it can do other tasks (for example Virus Scans and Legal Torrenting) while they are not using the computer. A restart at this time is annoying and kills what we are doing.

I should be telling the computer what to do and what not to do. I am the boss of it, I am its controller, I am its master. It shouldn’t tell me what it feels like doing and doing it without me giving the command. I don’t care if its something as basic as restarting but if computers can do that without user prompt, imagine if it decided to format the C: drive, now that would be a problem. I know, I’m being over-dramatic, but who knows what computer are going to do next, we are living in the matrix!

The other day when I tried to open a movie in Quicktime, my computer crashed. Quicktime is a frustrating piece of software for me, it doesn’t do video very well for me. It can play video on an external source, whether its a USB Drive or a Network Drive or a Memory Stick of some description. The only thing it can’t do it play videos that are saved onto my hard drive. I just don’t get it and why, 6 months later, it hasn’t bean fixed.

After some searching on the internet, apparently Apple blames nVidia for a bad driver for its Serial ATA driver and nVidia blames Apples bad software. No one seems to want to take responsibility for this and it is a pain in the arse for me and other people with this problem. People have been somewhat forced to use Quicktime alternatives. I eventually gave up and decided to take that route too.

I downloaded VLC Player and it pissed me off from the word go. It played video fine but it done annoying things that pissed me off. First off it made itself the default for all video formats. It would have been nice if it asked me first and not just presumed that I would want it like that. Trying to get it back to my original configuration was a pain in the neck and resulted in my uninstalling it and fixing settings individually to get it back exactly to the way it was.

After reinstalling it, I watched a H.264 HD video. I was disappointed with the quality becuase it was not as good as the quality Quicktime offered. It was extremely apparent when the podcast, Diggnation, displayed websites which were crystal clear and readable in Quicktime, but were slightly pixelated and harder to read in VLC. Another tedious thing is the volume control in VLC which is not simple to use and also thanks to Vista, makes it animated, which can be distracting when watching video at times.

Everyone is going to blame Vista and say thats what I get for being an early adopter, or a user in general. Yes I accept that but that is not going to make me switchback to XP. My XP days are over and I am only looking forward now. On the Quicktime problem, I have two options, put my videos on an external drive and play them from there in Quicktime, or play them with VLC but suffer because if degraded quality. I guess I’m gunna have to live with an annoyance either way so it’s whatever one is more convenient so VLC it is, unfortunately!

UPDATE: I have made a retraction to one of the things mentioned in this post. You can find it here.