Snow and lots of it...

Looks like it might be a white Christmas this year.

We named him George

Windows Live ate my SMB share...

Have just spend way too long trying to work out why xbmc could no longer connect to a win7 smb share. The solution after much head scratching, simply uninstall Windows Live Login Assistant. Why this application should block shares from xbmc is beyond me. I have no idea what I was thinking about when I recently installed the Windows Live software anyway, most of it easily replaced by better programs. The guys at xbmc.org made a nice post on their forum about win7 smb shares, the windows live bug is mentioned there quite a bit.

Share that screen...

Remote desktop has never been easier, useful for IT support for family members.


www.teamviewer.com

The most recent versions also include a chat function which is handy, although skype is still probably the best go to voice chat application.

Even faster is the ultra easy to use web version from logmein with an even easier to remember URL

join.me

New Chapter Starts Now

The finest home made motor craftsmanship this side of...

Subject Knowledge Enhancement for KS3/KS4 physics course under way at the East of England Science Learning Centre.. Day One re-learning all about Voltage, Current and Resistance in electrical circuits. The day was rounded off with the construction of our very own motors made out of essentially a pair of magnets and a bit of wood with wire wound around it.

Trillian for Blackberry

Out in beta now, Trillian for blackberry brings all your IM networks into one tidy and slick application.

My home screen is now much less cluttered with only one IM app icon. While chats are not yet integrated into the 'Messages' list the app is fully integrated with the profile manager and notification zone.

The bubble style chat looks great and the app shows the current time and network coverage at the very top, not something I thought an IM app really needs, but its actually very handy if you are trying to chat in an area with patchy coverage...

Check it out for free from http://www.trillian.im/get/blackberry/

Botanic Gardens

Here are a few snaps from a recent visit to the National Botanic Garden of Wales. Lots of interesting things to see.

 

My last time using the Cannon 350D as the beast was returned to the rightful owner now that he is back in the country.

Asher Banner

Should be a good read, although I do enjoy the non-Cormac books these days as the stories are less constrained by the narrative canon. Unless ofc something happens and Cormac turns really bad and blows up a few Polity planets, now that would be fun!!



Check out Neal Asher's blog The Skinner.

How to: Replace Win7 RC with Win7 'Upgrade'

I wanted to replace Win7 RC with a full version, the RC was set to expire on 01 March 2010 and it had started to nag me to update.

Looking on the web it appeared it was possible to do an 'in place' upgrade (i.e. maintain all installed programs and files etc) with some tweaking of the settings, however this was also only possible if I installed Win7 Ultimate, which is kinda overkill for what I need.

In the end I went with Win7 Professional 'Upgrade Edition'. I assumed it would not let me upgrade from Win7 RC but I still had the original Visa Disks that came with the box when it was new, so planned to install that 1st and then upgrade to Win7.

As fate would have it no Vista install was required (thank god!). After booting to Win7 RC I put the new Win7 Professional Upgrade disk in and was able to do a custom install on the partition where Win7 RC was currently running from. The partition was not formatted, files and documents were moved to a backup folder (c:\windows.old). All that remained for me to do was to reinstall a few apps.

The whole process took less than 30 mins to get the new Win7 up and running.

When replacing Win7 RC the 'Upgrade' editions work just fine for a custom install.

Icy Swansea

It's flipping cold here, went for a good long walk around the park...

Mucking Around with the new Camera

Not the most original thing to try, but its funny... :)

New Camera: Cannon 350D

Got this beast to play with from my brother while he is off for a few months on some travels.. Pictured with the wide angle lens. No excuse not to get outdoors, explore the local countryside and find some nice scenes to photograph on the way.

If you ever need to get the photos off an EOS you will need the WIA driver from cannon which is easy to get here, just enter your camera type etc. You will also need the EOS Utility, which is also avaliable from the same site as an 'update'. However this update contains the full application, but checks that you had the original installed. To force the 'update' to install the program simply add the following text to the registry (save as a .reg file using notepad then right click and choose merge).

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Canon\EOS Utility]