* Posts by Neil Davies

6 publicly visible posts • joined 2 May 2007

'We could wake up smarter' - Ballmer hints at Win XP reprieve

Neil Davies
Unhappy

Maybe I'll start using Vista again...

just as soon as the mouse pointer reappears. I even tried plugging the thing into the PS2 port. It worked for about 4 days (without the scrolly button thing working, but usable all the same) and then disappeared again without warning.

Failing that, I'll just reinstall the games I use Windows for into XP instead.

I like XP - you can make a cup of tea while it boots up and everything. Who could ask for anything more?

On a more serious note though - end of life usually means end of security updates. Time to start worrying, I think.

Windows Vista update 'kills' USB devices

Neil Davies
Linux

That explains it then

My mouse pointer vanished last week and at least now I know why!

Luckily I usually use Linux, so I forgot all about it and was going to sort it out when I had nothing better to do with my time than fix this 'pretty but a bit rubbish' operating system which we all love.

Maybe the pest control part of Windows Defender detected my mouse and decided to put some traps down.

Hey car thief! Gonna shut you down

Neil Davies

Electric Shocks

It would be really neat if the battery on the stolen car discarged spontaneously right up the would-be thieves botty via a spring-action suppositrode hidden under the drivers seat.

Even if the thief should be wearing rubber knickers (either for medical reasons or because they like the feel), the car would still have a flat battery.

No, it isn't safe, but other than the smell of charred meat which would permeate the car forever I think the fun value more than outweighs any potential problems connected to the potential combustion of the car thief. And some people might like their cars to smell of roast dinners - it makes them feel like it's a Sunday morning all week long.

Doctor Who faces extermination

Neil Davies

Oh, the rumour mill still turns!

Weirdly enough, I first heard of this rumour over a year ago when, the BBC announced they were commissioning two series (at the end of series two). Some fans started saying that it must follow that Series 4 was the last. My thinking at the time was that to get that kind of commitment from the BBC is pretty unusual - they famously cancelled the series 'This Life' before the second series was aired based on the viewing figures of the first series. As we all know now, the series subsequently became amazingly popular and few understood why it wasn't being made any more. I suspect this story in the Sun is probably just some lazy old hack doing a Google search or something like that and reporting the Fan hysteria at these rumours as fact.

Oh, and by the way - the 12 regenerations thing never stopped the Master. More's the pity, as Anthony Ainley's Master was a bit of a panto villain at times. But correct me if I'm wrong, wasn't there an old story in the 1980's where the Doctors final incarnation appeared (as a guy called The Valyard)? That means he has less time than we thought.

Pay-as-you-drive roads coming to the UK

Neil Davies

About London's Congestion Charge scheme...

What isn,t mentioned here is that the London Congestion charge scheme was such a success mainly because of the public transport infrastructure (Tube, regular buses, etc) which is already in place there.

Try something similar in Stoke on Trent, where the public transport system is apalling, expensive and with a notoriously badly maintained fleet (run by FirstGroup). You'll probably see something considerably short of a success story.

Vista – End of the Dream?

Neil Davies

My Vista Fun and larfs

The most annoying thing about Vista for me is the way device drivers work - it is just as bad as in all the other versions of Windows.

In my setup there are two pieces of hardware where the manufacturers have decided they won't be producing drivers:

Creative Soundblaster Live

Some Epson Scanner (don't remember the make exactly, but it is about 3 years old and came with a device for bunging slides into to scan those).

Now I can see the execs of these companies rubbing their greasy little paws together at the sudden need people may find to replace perfectly good hardware for other hardware which does exactly the same thing and with probably exactly the same components.

The main reason for this IMHO is that whereas Linux drivers are done by Chipset (so hardware based on the same chipset as other hardware has a fighting chance of already having a compatible driver), Windows is done by product. To make matters worse, Vista wouldn't let you install drivers which aren't certified by Microsoft, so you couldn't even write your own (if you were so inclined).

Well, my response was to not bother using Vista except to check if Halflife 2 was stable with the latest NVIDIA graphics driver (which it wasn't last time I checked). I think I'll just stick with Ubuntu for day to day stuff, XP for games and Vista for when I really want to see a window manager which isn't anywhere near as good as Beryl but cost infinitely more.

And don't even get me started on the environmental impact of having to replace things which ain't broken ;)