Lawrence "The Dreamer" Chen's Blog

This morning while I was at home waiting for the building owner to show up to see about some noises inside the wall behind kitchen sink/washer&dryer. UPS showed up with a box from TigerDirect.

That should be the off-lease IBM ThinkCenter S51 that I snapped up thinking I'd rebuild 'box' on a new machine.

The condo's quarterly pest control was going to be at 1:30pm today, so he was thinking of setting off some kind of pest control spray bomb in the utility room...which may or may not reach into the wet wall space of my condo. Or consult with the pest control company on what else to try. Later as I was listening closer to the noise, I wondered if it sounded like a feret...because there's a "Lost Ferret" sign out by the mailboxes. Turns out the "Lost Ferret" is from the unit above me.

I popped in to work for a bit, and then returned around 1:30pm for the pest control visit. I arrived to find that FedEx ground had been by and there was a box sitting by my front door. Meanwhile, the building owner said the neighbor upstairs wanted to take a look and see if he can get the ferret out, otherwise the ferret owner would pay to have an exterminator deal with it. There's no openings in the wall that I knew of, but I let him. Pest control guy later showed up to do some spraying.

Well, the box was the pulled/untested power supply that I had snagged off of ebay. All the power supplies that matched the part number online were of this 'untested/as-is' condition...or more than what I had original paid for the computer (and more than what the off-lease computer I just got). Alas, it didn't make 'box' work again. Either I got another dead power supply or there something else wrong with the system that is making the powersupply not turn on. Not have an ATX P/S tester handy, I can't tell if this is the case or not.

Anyways...that eliminates one option for getting 'box' back online.

I'm pretty much leaning towards installing the latest Ubuntu server....since it looks like the main things I'd require on the system are DNS (master), DHCP (wonder about setting up peering), NTP, ddclient x 2, and email relay to my outbound.mailhop.org account, vpnc. The ivs-status-sniff stuff will just go away. And, I'll gradually remove all evidence of it and simplify the configurations on my border routers (been close to running out of nvram on them).

Hmmm, just realized that I never changed the configs on the routers to account for the lack of the internal router 'box' to reach my ReplayTVs for IVS...not just they were (date) confused because they were doing NTP off of 'box'...and first DNS in the search list was 'box'....

Also not sure vpnc is needed now, since it won't be functioning as an internal router anymore. Someday I'll upgrade to a computer where it'll be safe to install a vpn client again. My windows boxes are both pretty dorked in the network config department. The W2K box is completely dorked...when 'lhaven' died...it became pretty usuable because I couldn't get into the configs to change my DNS server. I haven't found the install disk, so risking a repair install hasn't been an option. The other computer is also somewhat messed up, though not as bad.

Both messed up networking are connected to previous attempts to install VPN software (SecureRemote). It was largely flawed because they didn't support users with their own routers doing NAT. Largely because every IANA non-routeable ranges were being used somewhere within the worldwide network of the company, which was all NAT'd behind a single IP in Canada. Made location based (or restricted) services fun to use from work...because they would mistakenly set Canadian preferences or deny access because only US IPs were allowed.

It was particularly bad with Yahoo..which kept bouncing us over to yahoo.ca and then defaulting to only searching Canadian sites.

Anyways....wonder when I'll get cracking on trying to build the new 'box'. The off lease machine came with a 40G drive, but do I use it...or see if I have any other IDE drives around (probably too late to buy one).

The linux server known as 'box' died from the rain storm on Monday....well, the powersupply had been iffy for a while, and guess it toasted when things came back.

Sounds familiar....since its predecessor died in a similar manner....transformer blew....but that was fine, I was protected. And, then its UPS ran down...and all was quiet. It was also like 100 degrees that day....so it was pretty miserable. But, when power came back...it resumed like a good server, but the fans in it didn't. So it burned up.

Something like that probably happened to 'box'. Actually the predecessor was before 'lhaven'. The problem was I later learned that the replacement's BIOS had no disposition on what to do when power is cycled (no stay off, turn on or last state option). It always stayed off. The old 'lhaven' was a PC-AT system, while the new 'lhaven' is ATX. (post icepocalyse this problem was fixed).

So, after losing core services due to a power outage leaving 'lhaven' off....I decided I needed a new server to run these services on (DNS, DHCP, NTP). I didn't have to be much, so my then employer was having an auction of old computers....and I picked up a Pentium 75.

Wow, that's slower than the first PC I ever owned (before PC I was a Commodore person). I had acquired it with the plan to run ShareTheNet or some other Linux router thing...this was before Sveasoft and the other options became available for the WRT54GS....which is what I do now.

But, I installed SuSE on this P75 and was in business. Over the years, the hardware has changed. Actually it might have initially been RedHat, I did have a harddrive fail (they were 40G drives from ReplayTV upgrades). But, the current incarnation is SuSE 9.3 based.

Along the way there was a newer off-lease Dell that I acquired from eBay....move drive, let it rediscover hardware and make it go. Then that computer failed. So, I got an off-lease IBM NetVista from TigerDirect. Drive transplant, make it go.

By this time I was getting fancy with the stuff I was doing on it. At first it was be an internal router for my ReplayTVs, so I can sniff the progress of IVS transfers. Later it was run pulsed so that my Sprint 8703e could be bluetooth tethered. (something that I had taken for granted with my T-Mobile 7200....used tethering a lot during the first month I moved to Manhattan, KS...because I was having trouble getting Cox....missing the a few feet of coax between the pole and the box outside).

There are/were other things on here...aside the obvious of BOINC, there was ddclient and it was also the Linux box with a CD burner (for when I don't want to walk to my Windows computer and use the CD or DVD burner in there). 'orac' has a DVD burner, but I haven't used it yet.

Anyways...the question is will I get 'box' working again (either by fixing its hardware, or move the harddisk to a new machine and make it go again)....or make a new 'box' and recreate the core services. I no longer need pulsed (even though I don't have tethering ability with my iPhone, and I don't plan to pay for it....tethering is something I only do in a pinch, so I don't want to pay for something I hope to never need. At least with voice minutes those rollover, even though I hardly use them still.)

There's a certain temptation to load ubuntu and run these services, and then be able to keep the box current (more easily, it was fun building bind a couple of times....) Or hacking the system to support the new Daylight Saving Time.

OTOH, I kind of liked that the machine rather changed for something that was supposed to just be like an appliance.

Hmmm.... There is Ubuntu 8.04LTS, this is what 'orac' is running....ya, that's what I might do. Doesn't matter about the other versions of Ubuntu that I also run here and there. Having them all the same isn't an issue.

I guess it largely depends on whether I go with a different computer or fix the old computer. Both options are on the table now...since I have another IBM off lease computer on order (a ThinkCenter S51, IIRC and a powersupply [pull, untested] from eBay.) I think the 'new' computer will arrive first though. Though it'll probably be sometime before I get a new system up to the same level that 'box' was.

Oh yeah, 'box' was also an SMTP server....had moved that from 'lhaven' during its downtime following the icepocalyse. That reminds me....need to see which mail server 'tardis' and 'lunatic' are pointed at....'orac' was pointed at 'lhaven'....had found this morning that 'gumby' was stuck trying to send mail. (wallwatcher output to DShield)

Hmmm.....

My ReplayTVs that is.... Today, I canceled the rest of my ReplayTV subscriptions.

I had canceled a subscription a while back when one of my ReplayTVs died. But, I continued with the other 4 monthly units. I still have the 2 lifetime units.

I haven't watched anything that I've recorded with my ReplayTVs since that cancellation, in fact there was probably some length of time before the cancellation that I had stopped.

But, I wanted to be sure that I didn't need to go back.

Last weekend, another one of my ReplayTVs went away....it did its maintenance reboot and then got stuck in a reboot loop.

The first ReplayTV to die was the second ReplayTV that I had acquired, it was probably the first one that I upgraded to 250GB. I had first patched a 5060 to fully use its 80GB drive, but I had voided and done that for other reasons. And, that gave me the experience to go and upgrade all my ReplayTVs to 250GB. The last one to get upgraded went to 300GB (well, it first went to 160GB....using the 160GB drive from my very first ReplayTV...and then a 300 to make it close to what the others reset were....plus I was using it for OTA HDTV recording.

Anyways, the one that went last weekend was my very first ReplayTV....a 5160.

Along the way I acquired a 5040, then another 5040, then a 5060. It was supposed to stop there, but I was renting a cable SD DVR which died...so I downgraded to a regular cable box and got a 5080 with lifetime. Later I got another 5080 with lifetime. And, then in the final days of 5000s...I picked up a refurb 5040, which I then upgraded to 250G to be an additional OTA HDTV recorder. That was the only one that was post 250GB+ to have a drive fail and I then patched a new drive to go in it.

When the first ReplayTV died, I decided to go without. And, now its time to completely be free of them.

Plus I've been looking for a new TV....it'll probably be the same size as my current one, but 1080p and LCD. Apparently they don't make 50" DLP's any more...and 50" LCDs have too thick of a bezel to fit my current stand (so 46" is probably as big as I can go...though that isn't to say that I couldn't look at a new stand.) It probably will be a year or two before I take that plunge. I'm hoping that the current bulb will do that and then replace the whole thing when it gets too faded. But, one thing about new TVs...is they lack S-Video inputs. Though ReplayTV can do component....it doesn't do it very well.

OTOH, I'm planning to make the plunge into Blu-Ray before Xmas. But, I guess I'll just live with 720p....

I don't know what I'm going to do with the desubscribed ReplayTVs....not sure the logistics of trying to sell and ship them. I will probably hang onto the two lifetime units short term....thinking of playing with OTA HDTV now that things are fully transitioned, of course I might find that I still can't receive anything OTA. Guess it depends on how much interest I have in playing around....

Link: http://www.netflix.com

I was writing a comment on the NetFlix blog (about when captions won't appear in Instant....and that one of the reasons I prefer DVDs to watching in a theater is that I can have english subtitles to follow along with all the dialog. I also often turn on closed captions on my TV.....)

Anyways...I then realized I've been a NetFlix subscriber for more than 10 years now.

I rented my first DVD's on in January 1999 (shortly after the purchase of my first DVD player -- a post Xmas clearance). This was back when it was pretty expensive to rent a DVD by mail by the week, there was reasonable grace time around the rental period to allow for the post office to misplace the DVD for a week (a problem to continues to happen). Though NetFlix offered value packs to bring the average cost down. Used to be that you told Netflix when you had mailed it back, and you didn't have to wait so long before reporting a problem had happened somewhere in the return trip...or occasionally on getting the selection.

Only once did I get the wrong selection in the mail from them. Which was bad, because I didn't get the usual confirmation that I had returned that wrong selection and had to declare the correct selection as being lost. Even though I emailed them explaining what had happened. I think they have the ability to report that online now though.

Anyways, after my first two trial selections, for $7....I got a 30 pack for $141 and then a 40 pack for $162.55. During the 40 pack, NetFlix switched to its Marquee program. Which I transitioned to in November of 1999. Back then it wasn't unlimited, so I did have to pay overage fees for the first few months.

I've stayed with the same plan all this time....it did become an unlimited plan and allows instant (something I didn't get to trying until the feature appeared on my TiVo HD's

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Link: http://www.hulu.com

Today I tried out Hulu.

Because last night, the schedule bumped Life to about 3:40am. My TiVo HD didn't get it, because it apparently needed to do some kind of maintenance reboot around 3am....only it got stuck, at the just a few more moments or something like that screen.

I had to reboot it hard during lunch when I found it that way. (I was home at lunch today, because I was still un-numbing from a dentist appointment)

I noticed the absence of shows recorded last night, and eventually concluded that only one show was actually missed. Life.

So, I was thinking where can I find the missed episode... I suppose with patience, I could get somebody to send it to me on my ReplayTV. Though it would only be SD. But, then I was reading my twitter feed of the impending new release of Boxee. (It is hard to write this blog post with twitter [TwitterFox] updates popping up and stealing focus, and not giving it back)

The NetFlix feature sounds nice, but it isn't available in the AppleTV version....so I'll stick to waiting for that from TiVo.

But, it did talk of improvements with its Hulu support...and I decided it was time to check that out. First I quickly popped over to the site to see whether it would be possible to get the missed episode of Life. Then it was off to work, with it as something to try when I get back home.

Well, it turned out to be a reasonable experience. It was 16x9, not as good as HD. And, the commercials were tolerable (and interesting and relevance). It only paused once (not including when I hit pause to answer the door and get my food delivery (I think she was cute, but I just took my food....)

Now I know what to do the next time my TiVo or cable company let's me down, eh?

Last time I pulled the trigger on upgrading my DSL, I was just hoping to get them to bring me up to the speed I had been paying for (originally they said I could only get 1.5m/384k, and they did deliver that for the first month....when after a storm they then locked me down at 768/384. And, no amount of calling or emails, would make them think to let me back up.)

When I had last looked, both tiers were offered...but I was pessimistic, so I only ordered the 3.0m/512k tier. But, since sync rate is almost always this rate now....and DSLreports tools suggests that 768k upstream is possible. And, should be able to get another 1-1.5m on the downstream. I had started wondering if I shouldn't have gone for the higher speed.

Then the Roku NetFlix player was announced, and that seemed like something I would want to have. Which would make the need for more speed that much more desirable.

So, I had drafted a plan to get the NetFlix player last month and upgrade my DSL last month. Only as time went on, and reviews of the NetFlix player came in....my interest faded. The lack of subtitles or CC capability in the player is a big negative.

Especially since I've been catching up on my TV recordings, and the big thing I miss is that they weren't recorded with CC enabled. Of course, I suppose it might have something to do with the fact that some of the people behind ReplayTV are now behind Roku. Though to be fair, part of the lack of CC on my ReplayTV recordings is the transition to digital....

Anyways...I was online today to check my account information....couldn't remember if I had seen the bill or not. Decided to go ahead and order the upgrade to see how close to 6.0m/768k they can actually deliver.

I'm more likely to be holding out for the LG/NetFlix combo device now....than the Roku. Even though the LG device is apparently no more capable than the Roku for NetFlix. But, I've been wanting Blu-Ray since the beginning, and now that its the winner...it might be time to finally pull the trigger on that. Guess it'll depend on whether NetFlix streaming improves....and whether I see enough Blu-Ray now to justify it.

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Link: http://www.zektor.com/hdvi5/HDVI5.html

One of the things I had grumbled about was now having to switch inputs on my Zektor HDVI5 more often than usual.

Namely, going between my two TiVo HD's. The other two devices, my DVD player and the Cox HD DVR, were getting little use. Like, I'm only watching on DVD a weekend...if that. And, right now I check the Cox HD DVR now and then to remove stuff it has recorded, because it is duplicating stuff that I'm now getting on my TiVo (one of the them anyways). I originally scheduled the shows because I wasn't able to get them via Cablecards, but Cox has since made all the HD channels here available that way.

I could remove the scheduling I suppose, but that's more time on the box than I want. Perhaps sometime before the start of the fall season, I'll sit down and figure out the distribution of what I record where. Kind of like the spread of channels over the many ReplayTVs I've been using.

Should be interesting to see what my ReplayTV usage becomes in the fall.

Anyways...back to what input switching problem, it dawned on that I can reprogram the switcher to select the input based on a different remote. Though I didn't want to change all the buttons, and there didn't seem to be a way to cycle through inputs...so I hadn't looked much further.

It then occurred me that I could temporarily juggle remotes to program so just input 1 and input 2 are triggered by some other IR code, that corresponds to the respective TiVo HD's. Better yet, while checking the manual...I can only change the IR codes that I want.

So, I mapped the TiVo button of #1 to input 1, and the TiVo button of #2 to input 2. Sure, the switcher is going to reselect the input every time I hit the TiVo button. But, it seemed a safe button that would switch inputs without disrupting things on that TiVo.

Especially, since it is preference to hit the TiVo button for the input I'm going to before I switch to the input. That way I won't get blasted by whatever Live TV that the TiVo might be playing.

At some later date, I'll probably think of what button on the other devices (Cox HD DVR and Momitsu V880N DVD player) to be the input selection for that. But, back to my TiVo viewing.

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Yesterday, I mourned the death of one of my ReplayTVs. I accepted it fairly quickly, since I use them less and less (due to more and more stuff on HD and having a TiVo HD).

So I've set about removing it from my setup (can't seem to get to ReplayTV to remove its subscription...guess I'll try again or call on Monday).

After mulling things over....I decided that I would get a second TiVo HD.

I went to tivo.com and ordered a refurbished TiVo HD with month-to-month service, threw in a glo Remote...and checked out.

But, it timed out before giving me an order confirmation. My cart is empty, but no email of the order either. So, did it complete or not?

I tried calling the sales number...but the call won't go through.

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Sometime early this morning, one of my ReplayTV's failed. Looks like the harddrive big the dust.

Guess if it doesn't start working on its own soon, I'll just see about unsubscribing it. I still have my other 6 ReplayTVs...and I hardly use any of them now since I'm more in HD.

What I might do now, is see about buying another TiVo HD

Off to figure out what I've lost and see if I want to bother getting those shows back....

I mentioned that my URC-6131 was failing...the main annoyance was the PVR Menu button. It was getting harder and harder to get into the Replay Menu on my ReplayTVs.

I searched around online to try to find a new URC-6131 (forgetting at first that it needs to be modded to do JP1 reprogramming). But, no luck. I decided I would take a chance try the 6131n. Found it in numerous places.

But, as I was looking at whether to buy or bid....I saw an auction listing that mentioned that the 6131n for sale had been modded for JP1 programming. Oh ya....the 6131 that I had was modded for JP1...that means I should be bidding on this one.

I marked it for future bid....

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