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This blog is about computers and what I have learned about them, maintaince repair and optomization. Products that I have used and recomend to use. Please enjoy reading the posts I try to provide acurate (at the time) information. Thank you.

Thursday, March 17, 2011

Why I haven't posted anything lately.

After I left Texas, I came to Bakersfield, Ca.

 and have been involved in a few  major projects, that are in the final stages.

My very good friend here is a daughter of a Minister who was pastor at her church for 28 years and the church had it's 55 year anniversary in October 2010.

So what does this have to do with me, she asked me to show her how to make a pictorial history of the church, using the computer I built for her a year or so ago, when I was here back in January for a couple of weeks.

Thus when I returned again she asked me to actually do the project as she in her work, church activities and having a series of Medical Exams her time is greatly consumed.

Since this is for the Glory my God and Lord I could only say. "Yes."

What a trial and learning experience this has been. If I had know that I would be here a month plus in the process of completing this I would have never started.


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Relearning how to use Windows Move Maker,

on a computer that was not my laptop has been a frustration, trying to burn DVD a greater frustration, Learning how at the age of 56, to find download and use a bunch of different mp3 recorder's, Video Converters, and finally a DVD maker that I felt comfortable with to make the final product.

Have learned that Windows XP Home SP3 does not have a DVD burner and that Windows Movie Maker can only be copied to a CD.

Thank God, everyone else on the Internet already knows that, so I could figure out how to do this project.

All of these being  Freeware from the Internet boy-houdee what a challenge.

Did you know that there are 30 plus video formats used all around the world.

That every cell phone maker uses a format of their choosing.

That these formats are not recognized by Windows Movie Maker.

That Windows Media Player DOES NOT RECOGNIZE THEM.

We had videos sent from Africa, that were made on cell phones, videos that were sent by past pastors.
and all were on flash drives.

One flash drive sent had been screened on my friend's, sister's computer; as she uses only her administrator account the end results was that her computer went ape crazy and she had to have it rebuild.

When I put that flash drive in the computer to see the video, the anti virus " Microsoft Security Essentials" LIGHTED up like a flare. This computer is not connected to the Internet. Yes it has Antivirus on it. Nasty, Nasty, Worm. I need not say more on that subject.

Windows move maker is very cantankerous I had to rebuild the video 6 times over a 3 week period as each final draft that I made test copies of would not load correctly after we did a bit of editing and of course there was the:

I WANT TO ADD SOME MORE, so I would have to wait to get additional pictures or video that she wanted to stream.

There are videos that I could not get W.M.M. to accept even after converting to a format that WMM will accept.

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This has been the main project.

Here is what I did while waiting to get, video and photos, that date back to 1955.

Ordered a cheap desktop case, some hard drives, some motherboards ,processors, windows operating systems, power supply, (CoolMaster 450 watt), memory 1gig 667 DDR2 ( 12 of them), DVD burners.

Why you ask well I am building my Nieces in the Philippines a Internet Cafe, though I taught them how to repair and rebuild computers when I was there to say good-by to my wife and her funeral.

Even sent them a copy of Monte Russell's fine manual  "Self Computer Repair Unleashed" (Get your copy by clicking on it at the right side of the blog).

I wanted to make sure that the components  were working and that there would be no bad ones.

I built 5 computers total using a single case. Installed the operating systems by cloning and them used the key code of the different OS I purchased to activate them. Took me awhile but I figured out how to do so.

Did have one bad motherboard got 2 that were open box from Newegg.com and in spite of their brag that they check these board 1 did not work. When I pulled the processor I noted that there were bent pins in the socket that failed to note when I installed the processor. (Newegg; gave me a RMA and a refund.)

I replaced the 1.8Ghz single core processor that I built my friend's computer, with a 3.02Ghz. Dual core Pentium and that computer really rocks with 2 gigs of memory. I shipped all the componets to the Philippines via snail-mail.
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The  case has evolved,

I have a DVD Burner a DVD-Rom  Floppy Drive, Patriot Dual 2.5"-3.5" SATA, drive bay an internal hard drive sata 80 gig, Pentium dual core processor in case 2 gigs memory. and a slot cut in the left removable side panel that allow me to stick the power and drive cables out the side to allow me to externally clone the drives.

An add-on card (PCI) that give me additional SATA / IDEA (PATA) hard drive connections. Which allows me to clone any hard drive to any hard drive I can run the software in the DVD drives and can clone 2 hard drives at the same time, "I think"! Haven't tried so yet. Guess I don't reall need the dual 2.5" drive bays with the external, set-up.

This ended the problem I have had with the burn time using an external USB 2.0 Adaptor. 1.5 hour as appose to 6-10 using the USB adaptors and external cases.

Hope this gives you the reader somthing to think about.

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 Rebuilt my friend's old Compact Presario 7360 computer,

Nothing wrong with the original computer AMD processor Compact motherboard 8 gig IDE hard drive 1/4 gig memory 98 OS.

Now has a Biostar G41-M7 motherboard, 2,6Ghz Dual Core Celerion Processor PATA hard drive & DVD Burner, combination; floppy drive, card reader ,front usb 2.0 and a 4 bay Patriot 2.5 " hard drive bay that allows for up to 4 TB of storage. 2gigs memory.

It is now a NAS with Remote Desktop and file sharing via the router I got for her....

She, my friend has 50 years of pictures, she wants to scan and store on hard drives. This is a nice usage of the old compact case.

I did have to change out the power supply 95watt OEM to a 300watt micro power supply. new LED's & power switch  as the Compact power switch / LED were cabled together and use a 10 pin connector to the motherboard.

Compact was ahead of the game in the building of computers 11 years ago; too bad HP bought them out.

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I know that this has been a mouth full but figured that you who reads would like to know what I have been doing.

Now I have only to figure out how to make that DVD burner software work to make a copy that actually plays all the chapters and access the chapters and sub chapters then I can go back to work and start earning a living.


Dang, got 2 more dvd's to make, then I can pack my bags.

Hope you enjoyed this post.