Yesterday Dell released the Inspiron Mini 9 which falls into the sub-notebook / mini-notebook category. It appears to be Dell’s first approach to make something similar to the EeePC. The unit has the option of being shipped with a stripped down version of Ubuntu 8.04 LTS or a stripped copy of Windows XP. The base price is currently at $350.00 for the 512MB / 4GB SSD model running Linux. Since I am always on the road and my signifigant other is a college student, we decided to purchase two of them on opening day. I ordered both units with 1GB of RAM, 16GB SSD (Solid State Hard Disk), and built in webcams. One of the systems was ordered with Windows XP while the other is coming with Ubuntu. I will give additional details and a review once the systems have been received.
A few quick things that I learned while ordering:
Apparently they will only sell the Windows unit with the upgraded 8GB hard because Windows XP and the bundled Microsoft Works & McAfee AV use up much of the drive. I have heard reports that even the 8GB drive is heavily consumed by the OS and additional software. This is one of the reasons I chose the 16GB drive in each machine.
The Windows based system with the 8GB drive apparently comes standard with the 0.3 megapixel camera. The same is not true with the Linux system.
For some unknown reason the Windows machine costs less to upgrade from the 8GB SSD to the 16GB than the same upgrade on the Linux box.
Perhaps they are feeling sorry for the people that order the system that comes with the preload bloat. XD
–himuraken
I found this terminal command for quick removal of ACLs from files and directories in mass. Found a need for this when restoring a system from a time machine backup that corrupted permissions on some files. (leopard 10.5.2) The restore added ACL’s to files that should never have them.The following works because one chmod will be executed for each directory, like we want:
find . -type d -exec chmod -a# 0 {} \;
Just replace the ‘type d’ above with ‘type f’ to remove the ACL for regular files.
–DocB
Info provided from unbounded.org
After a 5 hour flight from RSW with a short stop in Miami, Kyle and I arrived at Dulles International Airport around 11:00pm last night. I realized I made a major planning mistake when our cab driver quoted us $80.00 to get to our hotel. Supposedly there were two airports between us and the Marriot in Greenbelt. We finally settled in to our room a little past midnight. The hotel is nice, though our room smells a bit like mothballs when you first enter. Kyle slept well, I didn’t. It could have something to do with the freight train that was laying in the bed beside me. Ear plugs are now on the Walgreens shopping list.
Well, after a satisfying 4.5 hours of sleep we made it down to the first day of training. Today was targeted towards sales guys. Most of it was an overview of their product line with an emphasis on wireless back haul, but there was some useful information. Tomorrow should be pretty intense, though I think I know more than two other guys in the class. After class we rested up and headed down to DC. 40 minutes on the metro and a lost credit card later we had arrived at our location… a nondescript bar on L street. The vodka-redbull did wonders for the body. Three Makers on the rocks, two pints of Stella and three games of “Big Buck Hunter” later we headed back to the hotel. We opted for a 1.2356 mile walk from the Metro station over a $5 cab ride. The walk helped clear the head.
So, the first day was good, slightly uneventful, but good. Oh, and I found my Credit Card once we got back to the hotel room. Too late though I had already canceled it.
–BuddyM
Ran in to this one recently. During a recent attempt to add additional CAL’s to one of my SBS 2003 boxes, the license wizard would just close, regardless of whether I was trying to add, backup, or transfer licenses. Here are the steps that I took to resolve the issue.
Step 1:
Make sure that the DLL is registered properly by running the following from the command line: regsvr32 “C:\Program Files\Windows for Small Business Server\Administration\wizchain.dll”. You should get a message stated the the DLL registered correctly. Try to use the license wizard again and proceed to step 2 if the issue persists.
Step 2:
Go to System Properties and then click on the Advanced tab. Next, click on Settings in the performance category. Now click on the Data Execution Prevention tab. Make sure that “Add License Wizard” is excluded from DEP. If the license wizard isn’t listed, you will have to add it manually. After this apply / save your changes and re-run the license wizard.
After performing the above steps I was able to successfully add and backup SBS CAL’s on my server. Another classic case of Windows protecting Windows from Windows… Umm, yea.
–himuraken
Got a nice surprise yesterday morning when I tried to run the remote desktop connection, it failed. The error given was “The pre-release version of Remote Desktop Connection has expired. To download the full version of Remote Desktop Connection, go to Windows Update or contact your system administrator.” After checking Windows Update and finding zero updates available I began poking around my system. I queried Google a couple times and found nothing. My laptop is running Windows XP SP3 v.3244 which was the latest beta / release candidate. Setting the system time to a date prior to April 7th is a quick work around, but it comes with its own set of repercussions. Luckily, when I install SP3 I choose to archive SP2 files in case an uninstall of SP3 was needed. In safe mode go to C:\WINDOWS\$NtServicePackUninstall$ and locate the files “mstsc.exe” and “mstscax.dll”. Create copies of these files and paste them into your C:\Windows\System32 folder. Restart the computer in normal mode and test your RDP client by going to Start -> Run, typing in mstsc, and click OK.
–himuraken