Category Archives: Ask J.D.

Installing VMWware ESX Server 3i (ESXi) on an Intel Atom & USB stick

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I have a couple Supermicro X7SPA-HF-O Atom boards that I’m planning on putting IPCop on. #1 is an Atom motherboard as the primary firewall (for Weblogs.us) #2 is another identical Atom board as a secondary backup firewall. Here’s the motherboard in question: X7SPA-HF-O Supermicro X7SPA-HF-O Atom Dual-Core D510/ Intel 945GC/ RAID/ V&2GbE/ Mini-ITX Motherboard, Retail – Motherboards SuperBiiz.comhttp://www.superbiiz.com/detail.php?name=MB-X7SPAHF&title=Supermicro-X7SPA-HF-O-Atom-Dual-Core-D510-Intel-945GC-RAID-V-2GbE-Mini-ITX-Motherboard-RetailSpecifications Mfr Part Number: X7SPA-HF-O CPU: Intel Dual-Core Atom D510 processor (1.66GHz, 1MB L2 Cache) Chipset: Intel 945GC & Intel ICH9R Memory: 2x

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Nikon DSLR camera recommendations for early 2011

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When friends and family ask me for camera recommendations I post the info to my blog in the hopes that it will help others too… Here’s a recommendation for Nikon DSLRs: Summary of recommendation: #1 – A very capable companion: Nikon D7000 Pros: good image quality, excellent ISO quality, fast focusing, +1080p video, smaller size and lighter weight (than D300s) Cons: may be pricier than the D90 without drastic improvement Deciding factor: if you find a good price and you

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Changing the oil and oil filter on a Chevy Avalanche [updated for 2013]

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Today I changed the oil on our 2011 Chevrolet Avalanche for the first time. A few notes on the process: the oil drain plug (bolt) is located horizontally (sideways), not vertically (downward) like I’m used to. the drain plug uses a 15mm wrench to re-tighten the drain plug, I used 18 ft/lbs torque (the recommendations I found called for between 15-20 ft/lbs) the oil filter is surprisingly small access to the oil filter is generally good, but clearance is tight. most oil

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Google Refine / Freebase

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It’s always fun to come across awesome new sites! I found Jeff Foster’s site Fatvat when I was searching for some info about Oracle and Larry, Prince Of Darkness… after reading about it on Engadget. Anyway, after all that, here’s some really cool stuff that should be very helpful to some of my database projects: Google Refine, an intro by Jess Foster http://www.fatvat.co.uk/Google Refine is a toy for playing with data, originally developed by the team behind Freebase. It’s a

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How to change iTunes backup Windows 7? [SOLVED]

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Here’s a great tutorial on changing the location of the folder that iTunes uses to backup iPhones/iPods/iPad. Change the Location of Your iTunes Backups on Windows Vista or 7 (iPhone and iPad) | The iPhone Guru http://www.theiphoneguru.net/2010/12/30/change-itunes-backup-location/Fortunately, Windows has a way of doing this using a concept known as symbolic links (symlinks, or in M$ speak, NTFS Junctions).  A symbolic link is similar to shortcut, but… Specifically, the folder to be moved is “C:\Users\%username%\AppData\Roaming\Apple Computer\MobileSync\Backup”. Moving this off our your

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Overcoming the Kindle Clipping Limit

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The Kindle is a wonderful reading device, unfortunately it has some arbitrarily imposed limitations that severely impact its usability for serious study or research work. One of the most limiting aspects, is the limit on “clippings”. These are the exported text highlights that you make when reading a book. If you find yourself reading a book for an assignment or article and have been fastidiously making highlights of important sections, you may very disappointed  when you go to retrieve those

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UnRAID preclear disk commands and notes (WD 2TB Green EARS drive)

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Notes and misc info, some from the unRAID wiki/tutorial… How to preclear disk sdc preclear_disk.sh /dev/sdc How to save the preclear results (then accessible via network share “flash”) grep preclear /var/log/syslog | todos >> /boot/preclear_results_2011-03-12_WD2TB-Green.txt Samples results from: WDC_WD20EARS-00M_WD-WMAZA122XXXX Mar 11 12:59:23 Tower preclear_disk-start[2404]: smartctl version 5.38 [i486-slackware-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-8 Bruce Allen Mar 11 12:59:23 Tower preclear_disk-start[2404]: Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/ Mar 11 12:59:23 Tower preclear_disk-start[2404]: Mar 11 12:59:23 Tower preclear_disk-start[2404]: === START OF INFORMATION SECTION === Mar 11

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Create seperate toolbars in Windows 7 (left, right, top of screen)

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In Windows XP it was easy to add toolbars to the top/left/right side of your screen. Just drag a folder onto the edge of the screen and voila, your toolbar was there. You could auto-hide it, or lock it, or do just about anything you wanted with. Not so with Windows 7. You can only add additional toolbars to your primary taskbar. Furthermore, I believe that taskbar can only be at the top or the bottom of the screen. It

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