{"id":139,"date":"2004-10-19T13:32:46","date_gmt":"2004-10-19T17:32:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lopeyland.com\/?p=139"},"modified":"2006-06-28T14:32:30","modified_gmt":"2006-06-28T18:32:30","slug":"a-big-thank-you-to-charlie-and-chris","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/?p=139","title":{"rendered":"A big thank you to Charlie and Chris"},"content":{"rendered":"

A big thank you to Charlie and Chris<\/strong><\/p>\n

The home computer is fixed. Finally.<\/p>\n

When we last left the ranting about the computer<\/a>, I was ready to pack it in and give up hope.<\/p>\n

Well, I broke down and got the chance to go to Fry’s<\/a> and purchased some loss-leader items:<\/p>\n

Motherboard, processor, and fan = $99 after rebate.
\n512 MB of memory = $89.<\/p>\n

Chris offered his old PC to the cause to see what was happening, but we couldn’t get the mouse to work on it despite our best efforts. It looks like a pin is shorted out on the connector. We tried to go the no-cost route, but to no avail.<\/p>\n

So, Charlie tried to put the machine together, and the first time, we tried the fancy-schmancy video card. We plugged everything in, but it didn’t work. Bummer. We got a message on the screen about powering up the video card.<\/p>\n

We try the old video card. No joy. It’s an AGP 1x card, and the AGP slot is only for 8x cards….That sound you heard was my head banging against the wall.<\/p>\n

We pull the PCI video card from Chris’ machine, but it doesn’t work. Charlie resets the PCI bus speed to 100 MHz and finally we get a video screen. Holy cow, the computer works.<\/p>\n

Now, however, we don’t have power to one of the CD-ROMs. An internal check revealed that we had plugged in the video card (which requires an external power connector) to the CD-ROM, and the CD-ROM to the video card plug end, thus creating a loop that went nowhere.<\/p>\n

The lights come on. We put the fancy-schmancy video card in, run a proper working power plug to it, take out the PCI video card, and whammo! AGP 8x video is on.<\/p>\n

Next, connecting to the net. We’re not connecting. A check of the security reveals that they default to the higher bit key thus requiring us to put in a 26 character code…Sigh. Switch the code. Bang! We connect. We stay connected.<\/p>\n

Final challenge: printing. We had a multi-function machine attached through the parallel port. Well, we purchased a smaller machine for Laureen’s school use, and since she doesn’t teach anymore, it’d be nice to have around the house. It’s USB. So, let’s try to print, shall we?<\/p>\n

3 hours later, with something I really need to print awaiting, the software from HP<\/a> doesn’t work. It won’t install. After repeated attempts, it doesn’t install at all. For whatever reason, it seems like this software off of the web will not work with Windows XP. Uninstall, reinstall, uninstall, reinstall. It can’t find the drivers. Uninstall, reinstall. Uninstall, reinstall. It’s dumping proprietary software on and off of the machine, but when Windows tries to load the drivers, it simply doesn’t. Uninstall, reinstall…no install.<\/p>\n

I wind up mailing the document from that computer to Laureen’s iBook. We take the iBook down to the printer, plug it in, and it prints. The first time. We’d installed the software earlier, but the fact that it worked so easily reminded me why the entire experience with Macs is easier.<\/a><\/p>\n

So if anyone knows how to connect an OfficeJet 6110 to XP (SP2), let me know.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A big thank you to Charlie and Chris The home computer is fixed. Finally. When we last left the ranting about the computer, I was ready to pack it in and give up hope. Well, I broke down and got the chance to go to Fry’s and purchased some loss-leader items: Motherboard, processor, and fan … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “A big thank you to Charlie and Chris”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-free-floating-hostility","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=139"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=139"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=139"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lopeyland.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=139"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}