Glenn's HP 360n

This one has been a pain.

The thing wouldn't boot. It would get to the screen where you could choose to enter safe mode, but then would lock no matter which option was tried.

So I tried doing a non-destructive system recovery. It didn't work. I think it would lock too.

So I tried putting in another hard disk and recovering from the system CDs. After running for many hours it would get an error. I thought it might be due to the EZ-BIOS ingrained on the hard drive (see previous message). So I tried another drive. It also got an error.

Since there were 7 CDs, I thought the new hard drive might be too small to hold all the files. So I installed Windows ME on the new drive. That kind of worked, though it didn't recognize the video card (among many other things).

From here, I put in the original drive (which is much bigger) as a slave and ran Partition Magic on it to create a new partition and hid the old partition.

Then I tried to install to the original drive. After many hours, it got some kind of memory violation. So I tried again with the same (or similar screen).

So I took out one of the memory chips and ran again. It went to the end after a couple false starts. But it still wouldn't boot.

So I put back the ME drive and ran partition magic to see what was going on. There was a small XP partition and a larger unused partition (in addition to the recovery partition). I converted the NTFS on the parition to FAT32 to see what was going on. And it looked like a clean XP install. So along the way, the old data got wiped even though I had hidden the partition. Or maybe it got wiped in my first attempts at system recovery.

Forget it. I wiped out the whole partition (except for the hidden HP recovery partition) and formatted with NTFS. Then I ran the recovery from the CDs again. It copied all the CDs to the hard drive and then started copying from hard drive to hard drive. After a few hours it stalled again. So I rebooted and restarted the recovery. Luckily it didn't have to copy the CDs again. After running overnight (maybe about 12 hours) it finally finished.

But when I rebooted I got that same screen that I got when I first got the computer (the safe mode screen) and it would lock up again no matter which option I tried.

Back to square one.

Now I find I could have tried system recovery from the hard drive (instead of the CDs) by pressing F10 upon bootup. So that's where I am now. I am wondering though whether recovering from the CDs just creates that hidden partition from the drive after which it begins the recovery?

I'm starting to not like HPs.

* * *

OK, that didn't work. After restoring from the recovery partition, it did the same thing. Locked up on boot. Then got to the Safe Mode option screen from where it would lock up when the option was chosen

Next step. Reboot back to ME. Run Partition Magic. Wipe the drive clean (remove all partitions including the recovery partition). Set back to master. Restore with CDs. Maybe the recovery partition was somehow corrupted. So I think the CDs will make a fresh one.

(if this don't work, I'll try loading in ME from my system CDs for my HP. after that, I think I'll give up)

OK, finally finished loading up the CDs and the file copy (which took like 12 or more hours), but the thing still went to that safe mode screen.

I decided to reset the BIOS to default and this time when I went to the safe mode option the hard disk started being accessed. After a while (I just went away while it was doing it), I got a message that setup was completely installed and to try again (or something like that).

So I rebooted and after a while (I went away again) it went into the Welcome to Window XP screen. There's hope.

The sound doesn't work, but maybe it needs powered speakers.

* * *

OK, the sounds works after plugging it into the amp.

Installed AVG, ZoneAlarm, Ad-Aware. Updated to SP2 (had trouble at first - got an error message and had to rename then recreate a folder). It took a while, but I think it's finally ready to go.

* * *

Wait a minute, the floppy drive doesn't work. No problem, I'll put in another drive. Hold on, the cable is keyed. OK, I'll put in a regular cable. Neva work.

Good thing I had another out-of-service HP around. After pulling the floppy drive and installing, I think everything is now ready to go (again).

HD DVD

A new DVD format is coming next year.

Here's the investing angle.

How to get rid of EZ-BIOS

Use EZ-Drive. The problem is where to find it.

Stay tuned. This is a work in progress.

my new DVR

With the volleyball regionals coming up on CSTV and my HP Media Center still not able to access the DVD drives, I decided to go for it and get a DVD-recorder. It was a Panasonic DMR-E55 on sale at CompUSA. (I bought it there since I had several unused giftcards still lying around.) It must be a fairly new model, judging from the dates of the epinions reviews.

Overall I'm satisfied though I'm still not totally sold on the video quality. It looks a little blocky on close view.

One problem I'm having turns is that when I'm recording something from my DVR it goes into power-save mode thus ruining the recording. I had this happen on my very first recording of the American Idol finale when the message occurred toward the end of the show. I thought I had fixed it by turning off the power off in the DVD-recorder, but it happened again when recording a volleyball game.

It turns out not to be a problem with the DVD recorder, but with the Scientific Atlanta DVR cable box! The box automatically goes into power save mode between the hours of 1 am and 6 am if you don't press a button on the remote within two hours. From what I read, I think the solution is to power off the cable box when recording something unattended between the hours of 1 am and 6 am. (It can't go into power-save mode if it's already off. I would guess.)

OK try again. Good things these DVD-R discs are cheap. 25 for $10 on sale at CompUSA (Memorex).

looking for EZ-Drive

I found it from a lead from the Hardware Junkies MSN Group

Mossberg likes Apple

Walter Mossberg is on CNBC bemoaning the state of the Windows platform and alternatively praising the Mac. In particular he likes the iMac G5.

Ruggles likes it too.