Crossloop adds Paypal

It's been awhile since I've commented on Crossloop. They've recently added a way to link Paypal to your profile. This is a great for those that you've helped to thank you. I have added it to my profile which you can see here. I love the program and it's easy to use. I generally stick to family or friends but if you'd like to have me help you shoot me an email or contact me through Crossloop. It's a nice way help others and perhaps make a little extra pocket money. I also forgot to mention the people behind Crossloop are awesome too. They are very friendly and helpful. Here's a cool video demo I found which goes into a little more detail.

Update: I got a MAC!

After playing around with the Macintosh Classic for a couple of days I'm still a bit fascinated by this little machine. It's seems to have a bit of an odd cuteness about it. Sort of like an old VW bug does. Stylish but practical. Obsolete but appealing. Of course my wife saw it and said something like what the heck to you plan to do with it. Of course it's not really practical for anything these days other than curiosity.So I'm not really what to do with it. I may try and upgrade the memory but beyond that I'm not sure. I hate to throw away or discard things that still work even if they are out of date. I've found no shortage of fans around the net including of course Youtube has it's contributions as well. On the downside they weren't terribly easy to work on or easy to upgrade. This guy demonstrates how to open a MAC Classic with his special tool.

Problems with Firefox 3

A short while ago I upgraded my Firefox browser to version 3 on our trusty family computer. This computer while getting on in years(8 years old) is still the family workhorse running Windows 2000. I do like Firefox as a browser but this version seem to give me a few hiccups. Most recently it crashed and I wasn't able to open it at all. I'd get a pop up window that said:

Firefox had a problem and crashed. We'll try and restore your tabs and windows when it restarts. Unfortunately the crash reporter is unable to submit a crash report.
Details: The application did not leave a crash dump file.

I would click "OK" and then nothing. I tried it in "safe mode" and I got the same result. I decided to try and switch back to Firefox 2 and see if that would help but I soon ran into another problem. The browser would work but whenever I tried to go to an encrypted page I would get a message like:

Firefox SSL Protocol has been disabled

You don't realized how much you need this until it's gone. I tried to check on it through Firefox using the Tools/Options/Advanced/Encryption route to no avail. Everything according to the settings was correct though I still had the same result. After trying a few different things I came across the idea of creating another Firefox profile. I'm not sure exactly where I came across this idea(I think it was through a Firefox support page) but I gave it a shot. After creating a new profile and opening it I was happy with the result. Then I had to move my bookmarks to my new profile and I was up and running. It was kind of a pain but I worked it out. I'm still not sure what caused the problem. I haven't switched back to Firefox 3 just yet. I'll probably just leave it for now and see how it goes. Thanks for coming by and have a good day.

I got a MAC!

I got a Macintosh Classic that is. A friend of mine had this and let me have a go at it. At first it didn't work and all I got was the "sad mac" face with some error numbers. After playing with it I got it booted.

It's alive!

It is a Macintosh Classic model no. 0420 manufactured in March 1991. It has 9 inch monochrome CRT display. A Motorola 68000, 8 Mhz processor and it has at least 1 MB of RAM(I've been unable determine exact amount as of writing this). It is capable of holding 4mb of RAM. It does have the 40 mb hard drive.

It'll be interesting pulling this apart. A lot different from dissecting your typical PC. Unfortunately as far as software it doesn't have a lot installed. Ironicly it does have Microsoft Word and Excel installed along with some miscellaneous software. The software does work but tells me I don't have enough memory to use. It will open the program though.

One button mouse. Hard to believe these people now make the iPhone now.


It's an interesting computer to say the least. Hard to believe these were going for $1000 a piece back in the day. It's kind of a neat computer though I'm not sure what to do with it just yet. I could try and upgrade the memory a bit. From what I read these were popular for schools back when they came out. It's certainly different trying to use this with tiny 9 inch monitor. Boy has technology come a long way since then. Thanks for coming by. If your interested in more information on these here are some links I found:

Macintosh Classic - Wikipedia

History of Computer design: Macintosh Classic

Cracking open a Macintosh Classic - Tech Republic

Macintosh Classic - EveryMac.com

Macintosh Classic - Apple

How can I speed up my computer?

This is a fairly common PC question. Now there are numerous tips and tricks you can do on the software side. Some work and some don't. As far as hardware goes, one of the quickest ways to add speed is to add more memory (aka: RAM or Random Access Memory). You'll probably see more difference with a memory upgrade than most other's aside from perhaps a new video card. How do you know what to add? Well with the numerous different hardware configurations it can be confusing. Some memory vendors or manufacturers websites can help you a lot. I'm going to highlight a couple of my favorites.

First up is Crucial Technologies. Crucial I've used many times and I've been very happy with both service and they are reasonably priced. If you go to the Crucial home page you can look up what you need both manually and automatically. To use manual method(Aka: Crucial Memory Advisor Tool)you need to know the manufacturer of your PC and model number. If your unsure or if you have a custom or home built PC you can use the "Crucial System Scanner". This will scan your PC and tell you what you can use. They'll give info on your PC such as how much you memory you have, how many slots you have open and what your system can handle. FYI if you use Firefox or Opera as a browser you have to download a quick add-on. Otherwise just switch to Internet Explorer. The memory is guaranteed to be compatible with your system.

Another vendor that has a similar set up is MemoryStore.com. Same idea though . You can look up your memory either by manual method or a system scan. I like the system scan method because it takes out much of the guess work. Other manufacturers to try out are PNY and Kingston Technologies are alternatives to try (without the system scan). I wish you luck and happy computing!

TeeBeeDee

While were on the subject of social networking I might as well mention this one. I found this (ironicly) through Facebook. It's a social network of those of us over 40 called TeeBeeDee. I joined up out of curiosity. It seems pretty cool with some serious discussions about work,sex,marriage and life in general. It looks interesting so far. I just thought I'd pass along the info.

Social Networking

I came across this article at PCMech by Rich Menga about social networking. It kind of got me thinking about it on a lazy Sunday afternoon. I'm sure anyone whose been around the internet or perhaps not have heard of the big guns like Myspace, Facebook etc. Others include Twitter, My Yearbook, LinkedIn should be mentioned too.

I've had some experience with them though I'm not a heavy user. Perhaps it's a twinge of guilt of being on the computer and not socializing with my own family. Kind of ironic I know. Anyway I just thought I'd give my two cents worth on the subject.

MySpace: I've actually had a MySpace profile for quite awhile. I just never did much with it though. I think I tried it out when they first got a lot press and I was curious. I've added some things to it here and there. I've got some friends on there but it sits mostly unattended most of the time.I never quite knew what to do with it.

My Yearbook: I was recently invited to this one by a friend and I tried it out. Though the name implies it's geared for the late teen and early twenties crowd I found plenty of people my age on there as well. It's kind of fun and silly at the same time. Not really a place for serious friendships or networking in my opinion. You tend to get a lot of "friend" requests from people you don't know. It seems like more of a popularity contest at times. Kind of like high school was(or is). I've got one real life friend(who originally invited me).

Facebook: I actually kind of like this one. It's a semi serious social network. Most of the people I have contact with are real life friends or relatives. Don't get me wrong it has it silly side but, it tends to be on the more mature side.

LinkedIn: This one is more on the serious side. Geared for more actual networking with professionals. It's almost like having your resume' online. If your looking for professional contacts or job hunting this is more your kind of site. No silly stuff here.

Well this was just my take on these sites. I don't have a particular dislike for any of these. They all seem to serve a niche. I guess it just depends on what your looking for. Have a great day.

Picnik at Flickr

My other passion besides PC's is cars. I go to cars shows and take tons of pictures. I love sharing them on Flickr. I tend to upload the pictures without doing much of editing or touching up. Flickr recently added a feature called "Picnik" which allows you to edit and touch up your photo's after you add them to Flickr. I started trying this out and I was amazed at the results. It's fairly simple to use which I like very much. You go to the photo you wish to edit and click "Edit Photo" above your picture. It opens up Picnik and you can start editing.

It has basic features like AutoFix, Rotate, Color, Exposure and etc. Nothing too fancy.

The features are fairly intuitive and you can see the results as you go along.

You can even create black and white, sepia and other effects. There is also a feature to add text and frames to your pictures. Heres a before and after sample:


Before Picnik


After Picnik

I think it does a decent job. Plus it's a nice feature if you've already uploaded a ton of pictures and wish to touch them up or play around with them. You can either replace your old photo with the new version or add the new one keeping the old one. Here is where I found the only glitch in the program. Sometimes for some unforeseen reason it wouldn't let me replace my old photo. I had to keep the old one and add the new one. Kind of annoying but not a deal breaker though.Overall I liked very much and found it very addicting.