Author: George

I have been in the IT profession over 27 years. Most of my experience was providing Workstation / Desktop support for several clients.

LinuxMint

Booting Linux Mint 8 from USB Flash Drive

Post author By George
Post date December 8, 2009
2 Comments on Booting Linux Mint 8 from USB Flash Drive

A few days ago I downloaded the new ISO of Linux Mint 8. I wanted to update my USB flash drive from Mint 7, but figured I should rebuild the whole OS from scratch due to some problems I had with upgrading Ubuntu 9.04 to 9.10.

The process was simple. First I made a backup of my data and second partition to my Ubuntu 9.04 PC at work. I downloaded from pendrivelinux.com a copy of USB-Installer-For-Mint8.exe and saved it to a folder called Mint 8 on my Windows 7 Enterprise Desktop and copied over the Mint8 ISO file too.

To have the 4GB persistent file I formatted the USB drive at FAT32. I ran USB-Installer-For-Mint8.exe and followed the directions making sure I chose the correct drive to install Mint 8. A few minutes later I was done.

I booted from the USB drive and in no time was running Linux Mint 8. I changed the wallpaper to the black pinstripe, enabled Desktop effects, and installed my HP Color LaserJet 2605dn laser printer. Connecting to wireless was a snap. I also like the fact all the codecs we installed by default. Watching the Mac ads at Apple.com, checking in with Facebook, and watching videos on Youtube.com worked like it should. In my opinion, this is the way Linux should be presented to the public. Everything works, no need to install a bunch of drivers or codecs just to get basic functionality.

One thing that is confusing, the OS boots with the LiveUser account ALL THE TIME! I’ve tried to disable it, but on every reboot the PC will logon with the account mint. Even if I had to keep the account on the PC, I want to be able to pick who I am going to logon as. I was able to configure GDM to display the logon screen so I can choose which account to use.

If you haven’t had a chance to try out Mint 8, start Virtualbox-OSE or follow the directions provided by linuxpendrive.com to have a bootable USB flash drive and give it a run.

Tags Linux Mint, USB

Geek Stuff Video

Droid

Post author By George
Post date December 4, 2009
No Comments on Droid

Looks like I found my new phone.

I’ve been looking into getting a new phone when my contract comes up in 2010. Need to head over to a Verizonwireless store to check one out. I’ven been please with my current phone (LG Chocolate 8550) but I want something new. Besides, anytime a commerical mentions duct tape, SCUD missile, the use of power tools, it’s got to be good. Right??

Tags Geek Stuff, Video

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving 2009

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Go to Disney Family Fun to download a few PDF coloring pages for the kids and other Thanksgiving ideas. In the Box.net plugin on the sidebar is a PDF from Family Fun called 1104_rg_cornucopia.pdf which you can download for the kids to color.

Tags American Holidays, Thanksgiving

Google Chrome OS Video

Google Chrome OS

Today I watched the presentation from Google about Chrome OS. Very interesting. I would like to download a copy and run it in a VM. If the final product looks as polished and stable and I think, then this will be my new OS when I purchase a netbook.

Release date some time in late 2010.

Security

Boot Speed

UI Concept

Tags Google Chrome OS, Video

Google Chrome

Google Chrome for Windows 7

Post author By George
Post date November 16, 2009
No Comments on Google Chrome for Windows 7

Like so many people have done already, I’ve installed Google Chrome on my Windows 7 PC. I am amazed how fast Chrome is compared to Microsoft IE 8 and Mozilla Firefox. I went to Dell‘s website to build a XPS Studio 16 notebook with the Intel Core i7. Usually it take a long time to move through each option such as memory, HDD, case design, etc. With Chrome, I was able to zip through it in no time.

Make you wonder what Google has in-store for Chrome OS.

Tags Google Chrome

Windows 7

Steelers Desktop Theme for Windows 7

Post author By George
Post date November 13, 2009
14 Comments on Steelers Desktop Theme for Windows 7

Last night I was playing around with Windows 7 and decided to make a Desktop Theme dedicated to the Pittsburgh Steelers. You can find the theme in my Box.net plugin on the sidebar of this blog. Download Pittsburgh Steelers Win7 Theme.zip to your Windows 7 PC.

Please note the theme was made on Windows 7 Enterprise. I’m not 100% sure if it works on other versions of Windows 7. I might try it on my Windows Vista PC at work.

I’m really staring to like Windows 7. I think there is some real good quality in this product. I still prefer Ubuntu Linux as my OS of choice, but I think I will install a VM on my new PC and run both.

UPDATE:

I posted a new Steelers Windows 7 theme.

Tags Sports, Steelers, Windows 7

Home PC Ubuntu

Upgrading to Ubuntu 9.10

Well it turned out I had some free time on October 31st. I decided to use Update Manger (as I’ve done in the past) to migrate from 9.04 to 9.10. Well that was a mistake. First off, it took forever since everyone was upgrading at the same time. I was not too happy about that, but it was my fault.

After the wonderful process was complete, I noticed several things that didn’t work:

Sound card was non-existent (never had that problem with any Linux distro)
Ubuntu would not start in the new Linux 2.6.31 kernel
Boot time was almost 90 seconds (I thought it was suppose to be faster)

Needless to say I was disappointed. Although I had a backup image of my home partition, I figured it was time to back it up into a new folder and wipe the / partition and rebuild from scratch. So November 1st at 12:00PM after the backup completed, I booted off the Ubuntu CD I downloaded using Vuze. Within about 30 minutes or so, I wasn’t watching the clock too closely, I was able to get a fresh install of Ubuntu 9.10 up and running.

Much better!! Everything worked as it should this time. And the nice thing, I alny had to install a few things to get all the multimedia up and running. I can play MP3s, my videos I saved from YouTube, watching the Mac commericals on the Apple web site, and watched movie trailers on Quicktime’s web site (2 good ways to verify Quicktime is working.)

I used the Application Software Center to install Filezilla, Thunderbird, and a few other applications. All my e-mail was present and connected to my 2 accounts with almost no problems. I had to remove Lightning and Gmail Calendar and then install them from the Application Center. Now I have access to my Google Calendar.

Last night I installed Picasa some Microsoft Core fonts, Stellarium, and dvdrip. I didn’t have time to try them out, but I’m sure they’ll work just fine. I also installed bootchart, and my boot time is longer than the previous OS version. The PC now takes 64 seconds to boot, what happened to boot times becoming faster?

Do I plan on updating my Ubuntu 9.04 PC at work? No. I heard but still need to confirm, there are issues with Samba server with Windows 7 clients. I have 2 Windows 7 clients that connect to my Ubuntu PC’s share for PST and document storage. Plus, since the Update Manager process was a bad experience, I would prefer to rebuild from scratch. But then that means I have to redo the Samba server, ensure I get everything setup correctly, install ssh server, install NX again, and all the other stuff I customised. I think I will wait for the next LTS.

UPDATE:

Here is the latest bootchart from my PC. 69 seconds.

Tags Home_PC, Ubuntu

Home PC Software Ubuntu

BT Ubuntu 9.10 Desktop – Server

Post author By George
Post date October 29, 2009
No Comments on BT Ubuntu 9.10 Desktop – Server

Today I tried to download the iso files for Ubuntu 9.10. Needless to say it was taking hours. At one point my computer said it would take 2 days to complete! OK, time to switch to a Bit Torrent. (I am running Vuze on my home PC.) I found the BT files for Ubtunu 9.10 Desktop and Server. I had both iso files under 10 minutes.

Some people might quit their session once the files are downloaded. Not me, I’m keeping the feed going until I get home from work. Tonight I will stop at the store, pickup a stack of CDRs and burn the iso files. Since I have a lot on my plate this week, I might not get to try them out until Sunday November 1st.

Tags Home_PC, Software, Ubuntu