nixgeek

I too have no problem with hackling, it's like getting called a n00b in WoW, if you can't take it and you whine you get looked down upon even more. That said, the word makes me think of the word Zergling, from Starcraft.. now who didn't love those guys? :)

Jarett or nixgeek 'round these here parts. Favourite game: Planescape: Torment Favourite OS: Gentoo (Although I hate reinstalling it) Favourite console: Gamecube Nationality: American Accent: People tell me New Yawk Sex: Male Age:34 Race: White Height: 6â€1' Status: Married, Kids x 3 Build: Soft, squishy geek Favourite band: Aerosmith Favourite book: Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy Favourite author: Douglas Adams Favourite movie: Lord Of The Rings trilogy Favourite director: Peter Jackson Favourite TV Show: The Riche$ Favourite actor: Eddie Izzard Favourite actress: Renee Zellweger Favourite Pinup: I'm married, pinups get you castrated Favourite Comedian: Eddie Izzard Other hobbies: Finding Old PC games, Gadget hound, Pen & Paper RPGs Car: 2001 Dodge Grand Caravan Occupation: Technical Support Rep

This is why the word "Backup" applies to most Sysadmins running production servers containing any sort of important data.

I could ask the question, "Why would you want to?" but i'm sure i'd get the obvious "Because I can" as an answer. ;)

Something else of interest. http://neosmart.net/blog/2006/easybcd-151-released/ I'm going to play with it today.

Kopete is also an option.. but not as cool as Gaim. I dual boot Vista and Linux on my laptop and run linux on my server.

This may be dumb but make sure you're in the right workgroup.

Ask and ye shall receive http://www.vistabootpro.org/ Try this little tool. It'll save you from screwing around with bcdedit.

Then i'm not sure ERD is what you're looking for. He's looking for more a customized XP install.

N-Lite is what you're looking for. Not sure it works with Vista yet.

Vista.. i've been using it since RTM hit. Points: Install - Quick, easy, painless. 30 minutes or so depending. UAC - You'll either love it or hate it. Imagine XP asking you EVERY time you do something if it's ok. Multiple times. You can turn this feature off but Microsoft "does not recommend it" as it makes the PC insecure. This is good as it essentially nags you when something wants to run/be installed on your machine. So if you always click Allow without looking at what's being installed, the viruses/spyware is your fault. Aero - Is it pretty? Yes! Do you need it to function on a daily basis? No. Can we say eyecandy? Compatability - So far, so good. I haven't really had Vista complain about any of the software I installed. I'm a gamer and Vista has held it's own as far as gameplay is concerned. Hardware - This is a sticking point for most people. I installed clean Vista Ultimate on my Inspiron E1505 and needed to get my wireless card driver. Wasn't on the disk. Was it a terrible inconvenience? Not really. After the driver was installed i just upgraded some drivers from Dell's support site. Readyboost - interesting little addition to how windows runs. Readyboost lets you use a USB Key, SD Card, etc as a "swap" device. We all know that xfer rates are better off USBkeys and SD cards so Vista lets you use that extra space to increase system performace. Does it work? I've noticed without Readyboost there is a slight hit in performace. Do you "need" Readyboost? No but it's a great idea and worth assigning a USB Key or SD card to the task. IE7 - It's IE7, big whoop. Looks different, decided to go tabbed browsing a gazillion years after all the other browsers. Security holes anyone? DX10 - Big big big plus for gamers. Not much in the way of native DX10 games out yet that i've noticed but it'll come. Other nice things - Media Center Built in (at least in Ultimate), Windows DVD maker, Windows Defender built in. Browsing a folder with many media files, Vista does not take 5 minutes to load thumbnails. I have yet to see Vista BSOD (*knocks on wood*) Integrated Pocket PC support. Things that bothered me - Disk Defrag - Now i don't know about you but I liked to watch the progress of the defragment. I don't trust Microsoft's ability to estimate time. Well the old defrag screen is gone. Sidebar - Really neat idea, although done already by some company with fruit as it's logo. It eats system resources, my cpu usage shoots up when sidebar is loaded. The Gadgets are starting to become more plentiful but, there were very little that i was actualy interested in. Install size - Ultimate - We're talking 4gig plus. Now space is not a premium on a 60gig drive but, 4 gig for an OS? Conclusion: All in all, Vista is a decent OS. Do you need to upgrade to it? No. It's more of a want. I however hear whispers of Microsoft releasing the OS after Vista in 3 years, so take that into account. Anyway, i hope this helps prospective Vista pre-converts. Seeya on IRC! - nixgeek

Being a linux user and having to use Windows at work, it drives me NUTS not having tabcomplete.

To turn on tabcomplete in the versions of windows that don't have it, just add this to the registry: [HKEY_CURRENT_USERSoftwareMicrosoftCommand Processor] "CompletionChar"=dword:00000009 "DefaultColor"=dword:00000000 "EnableExtensions"=dword:00000001 This should allow for tab completing and shouldn't require a reboot! nixgeek

Writing a batchfile to automate some procedures at work, however I want the user to be able to run the batchfile without arguments and have it give them the correct syntax for the batchfile commands. I know an IF statement is involved but can't seem to figure it out. Any help is appreciated! nixgeek

Just figured i'd throw this out real quick. I have a PC dedicated for my kids use and they're younger kids. They have quite a few games that require CD media to play but I don't let them handle the CDs because... well.. they tend do destroy them. I run a server inhouse and decided to ISO up all their games and store 'em there, mount em on the PC with Daemon Tools and off they go. This however required me to be on hand when they decided they wanted to change games. So after a tiny bit of research on Daemon Tools forums I came up with this batchfile, one per game changed to fit each game. This works in Vista too, which the PCs running. Automount and unmount batchfile rem Mount network drive with games directory net use X: "vashstorage3games" rem Mount with cmd line cd image "C:Program FilesDaemon Toolsdaemon.exe" -mount 0,"X:game.iso" rem run game call "C:gamegame.exe" rem Unmount cd image from cmd line "C:Program FilesDaemon Toolsdaemon.exe" -unmount 0 rem delete network drive net use X: /d Now this is fairly simple to put together, just have to turn off Secure Mode within Daemon Tools otherwise it will prompt you each time you mount and unmount the disk with the batchfile. I changed the shortcuts for each game to point to this batchfile and also run it minimized so my kids don't have to see the batchfile running. Completely and seamlessly mounts the CD, runs the game and when they quit, dismounts the cd and kills the network drive. Happy Hacking! nixgeek