Cerberus

Hebbedingetjes

2010-04-01T02:58:00.001-07:00

Op mijn verlanglijstje:

Een 256Gb SSD voor in mijn laptop
Een e-Reader +/- A4 formaat die PDFs kan weergeven.

En het liefst allemaal voor wènig!

WD1001FALS-00J7B1 and TLER not working!

2009-10-12T15:11:00.000-07:00

I picked up 4 WD1001FALS hard drives the other day. I tried to run the WDTLER utility on them, but this failed. The application shows the drive and its serial number, however it says it failed to update the TLER read and write settings. (It can't read the setting either).

My SATA controller is running in IDE emulation mode (I can choose, RAID, AHCI or IDE on this Asus M2A-VM HDMI board).

I read the WDTLER utility can be picky on the controller so I also tried it on an Intel 82801 (IHC7 family) on board SATA controller. The same issue here. Connecting a WD1600JS drive worked however... I can see the TLER settings.

My goal was to create a 3TB RAID-5 array. The WD1001FALS seemed a very nice choice to me especially after reading about successful WDTLER stories from other users (also on this forum).

Yes, I know that I should have picked RE edition drives but as a home user I found these too expensive.

Did Western Digital change the rules? The newer WD1001FALS drives no longer support it? Or is it a firmware issue (can't find anything about this either).

Did anybody see this behavior? How can I fix it or should I return the drives and go for the more expensive RE edition WD drives?

-----
For this guy, it worked....
Now, let's wait for some answers....

Updated on 2009-10-15: I was only now that I noticed that my drive is model WD1001FALS-00J7B1 instead of model WD1001FALS-00J7B0!

'Telegraaf wil geld voor bezoek websites'

2009-08-17T04:01:00.000-07:00

Slechte kwaliteit, suggestieve titels, vol met spel- en grammaticafouten, arrogant en bijzonder onnozel. Daar gaan vast een hoop mensen geld voor betalen...

Mwuhahahaha!!!

Refreshing COM

2009-07-07T08:13:00.000-07:00

For my current (embedded) project I have to refresh my COM knowledge. I'm reading this (ancient) book: Essential COM by Don Box. It's a very good book!

Knevel interviewt Balkenende (hylarisch)

2009-06-05T02:04:00.000-07:00

Our South Caribbean Trip

2009-05-28T06:10:00.000-07:00

Zondag 10 mei: San Juan, Puerto Rico
Maandag 11 mei: St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands
Dinsdag 12 mei: Dominica
Woensdag 13 mei: Barbados (False Swine Flu Alarm...)
Donderdag 14 mei: St. Lucia, West Indies
Vrijdag 15 mei: Antigua
Zaterdag 16 mei: St. Kitts, West Indies
Zondag 17 mei: San Juan, Puero Rico

Goede voornemens?

2009-01-20T05:27:00.001-08:00

Ik had nog géén goede voornemens voor het nieuwe jaar, maar nu wel!
Mijn voornemen is als volgt: ik stop met het lezen van de site van de Telegraaf. Afgezien van het feit dat het gros van de artikelen populistisch en rechts geschreven is, alles wat naar links riekt wordt afgekeurd en een groot deel van de koppen suggestief geschreven is, heb ik toch een andere reden voor dit besluit. Een deel van de redacteuren is te dom om een artikel te schrijven zonder kromme constructies en domme taalfouten. Nu kom ik regelmatig stukjes tegen op de website van deze krant die taalkundig van een abominabel niveau zijn. Zodra je daar iets van zegt, wordt je reactie vervolgens gewoon niet geplaatst onder het desbetreffende artikel.
Sterker nog: er wordt gewoon niets mee gedaan. De fouten zitten er weken later nog steeds in!

Een lezersreactie werd geweigerd omdat deze niet zou voldoen aan de huisregels. Ik heb er nog een geplaatst, maar zelfs als je opmerkingen in de trant van "hebben de redacteuren van de Telegraaf eigenlijk wel hun middelbare school afgemaakt?" achterwege laat, wordt het niet geplaatst.

Weg met de Telegraaf uit mijn bookmarks en RSS!

P.S. Tot mijn grote verbazing is 'naar verluidt' dan wel weer goed. Weer wat geleerd. :)

70-300... Done!

2008-11-04T07:07:00.000-08:00

After acquiring the MCAD title (70-316, 70-320 and 70-340) I now passed exams 70-315 and 70-300. MCSD will be phased out soon by Microsoft, so the next one I'm going to target is: Exam 70-552 UPGRADE: MCAD Skills to MCPD Windows Developer by Using the Microsoft .NET Framework.

My sleeping alter ego hates my aXbo

2008-11-03T02:15:00.000-08:00

A few month ago I bought an aXbo sleepphase alarm clock. I've always had severe problems with getting out of bed, especially during winter.
I'm not going to explain how it works, you can read that for yourselves.
Anyway, it seemed to work! It woke me up at the right moment for a couple of days.
But then things got nasty. Since the aXbo was next to my bed I switched it off and turned myself around for a nice extended nap.
It's all about discipline. To prevent this, I moved the device to the other side of our bedroom. At least I had to get out of the bed and walk a couple of meters. Just enough to realize that I really had to get up and show some discipline. That seemed to be the solution I was looking for.

However, things got even nastier. I don't know how it happened but somehow my subconscious me found out that pressing the button on aXbo's sensor (yep, the one that's around your wrist) is enough to turn the alarm clock off at the moment it thinks it's time to get up. Damn, 200 euros down the drain...

Then, a friend of mine (Mark) came up with the idea to cover the sensor's button with a solid piece of plastic. Nice idea, but it has to be really solid since my sleeping alter ego will do anything to press through the plastic in order to silence the aXbo.
I dismantled an ADSL splitter and used its plastic cover to create a piece of hard plastic as large as the sensor itself.
Next I covered the sensor's button with it and wrapped some good old Duct Tape around it. I can tell you: this works!

Quest en Oxxio

2008-10-22T08:21:00.000-07:00

From: Angela
Sent: woensdag 22 oktober 2008 17:18
To: Erik Vermeulen
Subject: Re: Vraag over verstrekking abonnementgegevens aan derden

Beste Erik,

Hartelijk dank voor uw reactie n.a.v. het aanbod waar Oxxio u mee heeft benaderd.
Wij betreuren het zeer dat onze trouwe lezers op deze manier worden bejegend.

Wij nemen uw klacht uiterst serieus. Inmiddels hebben we dan ook actie ondernomen, en is Oxxio gestopt met deze benadering van potentiële klanten.

Nogmaals dank voor uw e-mail.

Met vriendelijke groet,

Redactie Quest.

-----Oorspronkelijk bericht-----
Van: Erik Vermeulen
Verzonden: donderdag 9 oktober 2008 10:22
Aan: abo.quest
Onderwerp: Vraag over verstrekking abonnementgegevens aan derden

Beste lezer,

Zojuist word ik gebeld door Oxxio met een of ander hoera verhaal over hun energietarieven.
De vraag waar ze mijn telefoonnummer vandaan hadden werd beantwoord met 'u bent lid van de Quest'.

Ik heb inderdaad een abonnement op de Quest, dit heb ik vorig jaar als cadeau gekregen en het is voor komend jaar verlengd.
Ik kan mij niet herinneren dat ik toestemming heb gegeven voor het verstrekken van mijn gegevens aan derden.

Met vriendelijke groet,

Erik Vermeulen

MySQL Query Browser execution time

2008-10-15T01:17:00.000-07:00

After executing a query in the MySQL Query Browser, in the status line you see something like this:

3448 rows fetched in 0.0817s (0.0034s). What does this mean?

After a bit of Googling I found the following:

X row(s) fetched in Y s (Z s)

X = number of rows (of course)
Y = time the resultset spent in transit from the server to the client
Z = time it took the MySQL server to execute the query (parse, retrieve, send)

Thanks to Chris Casto, Bill Lumberg and Mike Lischke

Disable Beep in Windows Command Prompt

2008-09-24T03:57:00.000-07:00

I was playing with mysql.exe from the command line and since I'm not really into the command line options yet, the bastard was beeping through the PC speaker all the time.
Running mysql.exe with the -b option would be a solution. However, a way to disable the beep altogether would be even better.
Ever 'typed' a binary file by accident? Then you'll know what I mean. I found the following:

How to turn off the beep sound (in a virtual machine in Virtual Server 2005)
Kill the annoying Windows Beep (internal speaker)

Beeping is actually done by a Special Beep Device...

1. net stop beep (After a reboot it runs again and the annoying beep is back)
2. sc config beep start= disabled (To disable it altogether)

Of course, another solution would be "becoming a mysql.exe guru"... ;)

Hehe

2008-08-08T05:34:00.000-07:00

Windows XP SP2:

Vista Home Premium SP1:

Presidential elections in Zimbabwe

2008-05-14T07:29:00.000-07:00

It was confirmed that Morgan Tsvangirai accepted a second round for the presidential elections of Zimbabwe.
In the first round, neither Robert Mugabe (43.2%) nor Tsvangirai (47.9%) obtained the absolute majority.
First, Tsvangirai insisted that a second round should be monitored by independent international observers, however, when Mugabe stated that this demand had to be dropped otherwise resulting in another presidential term for Mugabe, Tsvangirai gave in.

It's very obvious what's going to happen next. When we observe history, Zimbabwe has known fraud and violence during any presidential election since Mugabe grabbed power. Why will it be any different this time? Members of the opposition, the Movement of Democratic Change (MDC) have been taken into custody by Mugabe's security forces and the police; they are brutally tortured and charged with treason.
It's all crystal clear: Mugabe abuses his country and its people. He wants to keep his power no matter what.
Democratic elections are a farce because there is no independent monitoring of the process. We have seen it many times in the past: elections in Zimbabwe are fraudulent. I've been to Zimbabwe in 2001 and all I heard was people saying: we will vote against Mugabe during the next elections. The opposite happened. Mugabe is not afraid of using any possible way to keep power: electoral fraud, intimidation and torture.

In may 2008, there were three candidates running for president. Besides Tsvangirai and Mugabe, it seemed that Simba Makoni would take a chance.
Now here is the plot: Makoni was minister of finance during the period 2000-2002 under Mugabe and has been a ZANU-PF member (Mugabe's party) until he ran for president as an independent candidate. In the first round of the elections he gained 8.3% of the votes. Since none of the candidates got more than fifty percent of the votes a second round is needed. In the second round, Mugabe will win: 43.2% + 8.3% = 51.5%. Tsvangirai will have a bit more than 48% and there will be several tenth of a percent of blank votes. The explanation that ZANU-PF will have for this result is the fact that the Makoni voters switched to Mugabe instead. Mugabe will be president of Zimbabwe for the rest of his life.

Update on May 16th 2008: The media just released the news that the second round will be on june 27th which is six weeks from now. Plenty of time for Mugabe to manipulate the process...