Tom Lorenz

Update, 11/24/2003: Things were never the same after that old camera died. Its replacement sucked. Bad. It was really awful. Now my colleague has requested that I shut it down because it's eating up too much bandwidth. Frankly I'm not very upset about it, since the quality was so poor. Still, it was a goofy bit of fun while it lasted.

Update, 10/10/2003: What the hell? I guess the problem was more than just a bad outlet, because the camera crapped out again overnight. The good news is that I'm tracking an eBay auction for a replacement even as we type. I already won an auction on a couple of black & white cameras, but this one is color. Let's hope I get it!

Update, 10/1/2003: I am happy to report that the camera is back in business. Who knew that moving its power adapter from one outlet to another would do the trick. Go figure.

Update, 9/19/2003: I am sad to report that the camera I used for this project seems to have perished. At about 2:00 this morning it went black. When I noticed that this morning, I unplugged the power supply from the back of the camera and plugged it back in. That worked - for about ten minutes, after which it went black again. I tried the maneuver about a half dozen times since then, always with the same result. I think it's time to pull the plug, literally and permanently.

My old PowerCenter Pro 210 has finally bitten the dust. It has served me pretty well since I got in in July of 1997. Yes, its three fans made it loud as hell. Yes, its network connectivity had been flaky for the last year or so, but apart from that, it was pretty solid. Any time I needed to scan something or convert an old LP to CD, it got the call. Most other tasks fell to my little iBook.

I must say that for a six year old computer, that sucker had a lot of life left in it. It could still run all the apps that were written before OS X, it could still handle browsing every web site, and it could still play all the cool games from at least a year or two ago. It could even handle USB peripherals, thanks to a PCI card.

But its life has been cut short, I'm afraid. I saw it coming last week, when it would even give me a startup chime. A few days later I tried it and it booted up perfectly, so I started copying its contents to the iMac so I could back it all up on DVD. I had just finished burning a last CD of system files when it crapped out for the last time.

After that I took it down and began doing hardware diagnostics on it. No matter what I tried, I got no startup chime. Nothing. Sometimes this sort of behavior will ocur when there's a SCSI ID conflict. After trying all different combinations of SCSI devices it was clear that the problem lay elsewhere, and I am not prepared or qualified to pursue it any further.

After six years, this machine owes me nothing. It got me through a ton of projects, helped me create a ton of CDs, and helped me play tons and tons of games. I'm sad to see it go, but I confess to not having much of an emotional attachment to it. I haven't used anny of my old compact Macs in years, but I still cannot bear to clear them out of my attic. This guy? I'll pick him clean and sell his parts on eBay, then haul the rest to the curb. Cold? Maybe, but after all - it's just a computer.

Those little ol' Macs in my attic, well, they're something special.

The question now is what to do about it. Should I replace it with a different Mac of the same vintage? Should I just get a USB scanner and use my iBook exclusively? I don't yet know. I like the idea of replacing it - especially if I can find one of those AIO (all-in-one) G3 Macs that were only available to schools. But would that be throwing good money after bad?

Whatever. I'lll figure it out soon enough. In the mean time, there's an eBay auction for "Return to Castle Wolfenstein" that ends in just over two hours - and I'm on it.

As you may recall, I have been pondering what to do about losing my old Mac clone. Should I replace it? Should I just get a USB scanner? Should I replace it with a G3? I couldn't make up my mind.

Well, yesterday afternoon my friend Bill hipped me to an eBay auction for an Apple PowerMac 9650/350 Workgroup Server - the top of the pre-G3 food chain. With one day left, no bids and a starting price of $65, I had to watch this auction.

This really is the Mother of all pre-G3 Macs. It has the fastest 604 processor, a case that's ridiculously easy to open, and six - count 'em - six PCI slots. Granted, three are already taken up with SCSI, video and Ethernet cards, but that still leaves three to play with. Plus, the friggin' thing is G4 upgradeable!

So I decided to pursue it. Just before 1:00pm today I won the auction. That makes me happy. I'm getting a machine that's only a year yonger than my clone, but it has a much longer usable life. Plus, it has over 300MB of RAM, so it has plenty of horsepower.

It ain't state-of-the-art, but it still rocks.