Tag Archive | Linux

2012 October

Oct9

Hi Everyone,

This month brings with it, packing and a new creation of sorts.  Building a forum of my own.

After such a sad start to the month as in my earlier post, I needed something to dive into that didn’t need too much effort.  I’m also involved with another forum right now.  FoxyRoxyLinux Distro now in development.  When released it will be amazing.  More on that another day.  After thinking about it for a bit, I thought why not have a  play in creating one for myself.  One way to increase my knowledge on forums is becoming the founder of my own. Best way to learn more is to stretch what I already know further and  just do it.

Being an Admin of a couple of forums is one thing.  Being the founder and having complete control is the only way to really increase my knowledge.  I can experiment to my heart’s content, until I’m satisfied with the look.  I don’t want the confines of another persons rules. 🙂 If I screw it up then it’s my fault. I’m also in the process of packing getting ready to move it’s nigh impossible to concentrate on any one thing for too long.

I’m hoping it will add another dimension to this website. It;s just for a bit of fun. Right now while I’m madly packing up my house to move in December.  I required a small challenge to take my mind off packing and other recent events.  I needed something that I didn’t have to think to hard to put to-gether.  Once the basis is up I hope to make it something worthwhile.

Not really worried if it doesn’t work as it’s FREE 🙂 and a bit of fun.

There are a couple of other candidates and they offer a little less in some areas and a little more in others. Mainly I wanted a Free Hosted service with No Ads.  This is very hard to find.  At present http://www.Freeforums.org do offer for 5 users with no Ads.   I’m not sure how long that offer is valid for.  Anyway it’s where I have begun.  The other potentials are http://www.forumotion.com and http://www.proboards.com.  the latter two have Ads for everyone on the Freebie.

Good or bad we will soon find out. It’s an experiment in progress and you can browse without having to sign -up.  However if you wish to post you are then required to register.  Registration is free. You can look at it here. If you have any ideas or suggestions let me know. I’m still tossing up between http://www.forumotion.com and http://www.freeforus.org. I will do side by side for a while to decide. Plus for forumotion better formatting.
If you have never been on a forum it’s a great place to gain information.  Gain knowledge on areas you need help in or help others who have issues you have the answers to.  Pretty much there is a forum for everything these days.   You are as anonymous as you want. Or be whoever you want.  If you are shy it’s a great place to strike up friendships in a safe environment.  All forums I’m involved with to date are safe.  This is true for most forums and if you are careful to obey the rules and not be silly with your information you won’t have any issues.

Please remember not everyone is genuine on forums.  So why do it well for me it’s another way of expressing myself and what I love and enjoy doing.  If you have a peek you can read more on why I decided to go ahead with this.  I have made some wonderful friends who share my common interests.  If this doesn’t work out I’m still part of a team on other forums where I can still have fun. 

If you get a message saying it’s unavailable sorry. Right now I’m doing some construction work.  Browsing could be unavailable.

This will only be a temporary issue. https://i0.wp.com/smileys.emoticonsonly.com/emoticons/c/construction_worker-3506.gif

Cheers

Kazza

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Puppy Linux Distros: Lupu 528 and Saluki

Jun30

Image representing Boxee as depicted in CrunchBase

As per last months update I did start working ohttps://kazzascornerstop.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/think2boutside2bthe2bsquare.jpg?w=300n my Ultimate HTPC and began experimenting with different flavours and versions of the Mint operating system.  Their new release Mint 13 was looking good, but seems that the two don’t like to play well together. After wasting endless amounts of time and energy or so it seemed I became a bit disheartened and left it to sit and ponder for a while and think outside the box for a solution.
While researching for a fix related mainly to booting issues I spotted a review of the latest Puppy Linux Distro Lupu 5.28.  Then looking into this a bit further I found a video review of the Puplet:Saluki.  Wow.
I originally learnt about the Puppy Linux Distro, while looking for an alternative to Windows. In the end my kids were sick to death of me preaching Puppy Power to them and I suppose at some stage I let the interest wane due to other areas that required my attention.
Well I’m back with the same passion if not more for Puppy Power. This https://i0.wp.com/fundablog.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/640px-Puppy_linux_5.3.0_Slacko_puppy.pnglittle Distro has come a long way since I first used it. Even then it was pretty amazing. Well now I would call it a fully fledged and polished system to replace whatever desktop solution you have going now. Be it Windows/Mac/Unix or whatever Platform you now use. Puppy can do it all and it’s completely free!  Anyway enough of me telling you about it.  Go here for the latest flavours downloads and information for The Puppy Linux Distro.
So this month and probably July I will post about a few select Puplets and their Official Releases. Ideally which one is the best solution for my needs etc.
I have had some success with some of the releases of Puppy Linux using Portable Linux Apps on the above. If you arehttps://kazzascornerstop.files.wordpress.com/2012/06/puppylogo.jpg?w=300 after a lightning fast all-inclusive and free OS then stay tuned for my progress. I have found some of the links for the Portable Linux Apps don’t work.  This is a bit of a pain, however doing a search on the web you can usually find a link that works.
Till next month.

Cheers from
Kazza’s Corner

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How To Guides: Installing LinuxMint 13

May31
  1. Get Yourself Familiar with Linux Mint 13:
  2. Equipment Checklist: System requirements:
    • x86 processor (Linux Mint 64-bit requires a 64-bit processor.
      Linux Mint 32-bit works on both 32-bit and 64-bit processors).
    • 512 MB RAM (1GB recommended for a comfortable usage).
    • 5 GB of disk space
    • Graphics card capable of 800×600 resolution
    • CD/DVD drive or USB port
  3. Plug in any Internal/External Hardware: Graphics Cards,
    DVB-T Cards, Memory, USB External Connections etc.
  4. Download LinuxMint 13.
  5. Burn the Image to a DVD using a DVD image burning program.  Free image burning software.Nederlands: Beeld van Gparted voor een standaa...
  6. Ensure your PCs Bios is Set to Boot from Your DVD Drive.  This is Often the Default.
  7. Get familiar using the live DVD until you feel comfortable using it.
  8. Click Install Icon on Desktop.
  9. Follow the Prompts until everything’s installed.
  10. Reboot your system.
  11. Install any Additional Drivers if available.
    Menu/Control Panel/Hardware/Additional Drivers Choose Recommended & Activate.
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Linux Mint 13 – Gets Back to Basics

May26

Hi Everyone

Well finally Linux Mint 13 has done an about-face and decided to go back to the original Desktop foundation.
Hooray is all I can say. It’s not that I don’t like change. I love a streamlined desktop with all the buttons handy and not have to dig and search for them.
I want my desktop slick and fast.

Gnome 3 while quite beautiful seemed bogged down and  memory hungry by comparison to it’s predecessor.

Here’s a great article on the PCLinuxOS Magazine site.

For those of you interested have a look at what the Gurus at  PC World have to say.
More reading here from another perspective.
Gnome 3 This is the end it seems.

If you want to know more about Linux Mint 13 Maya I haven’t tried 13 to date. (will be very soon).

Okay now I’ll be honest, I love to build and tinker with various hardware & software. Currently I’m running Linux Mint 11 & 12 in all blends on various PCs & laptops. Along with my new project building my Dream HTPC unit.

I plan to upgrade to Mint 13 has long-term ongoing support.
I’m happy to hear that.  Well I’m off to experiment 🙂

Have fun.

Cheers

Kazza’s Corner

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My Perfect HTPC – Home Theatre Personal Computer

May21

Hi Everyone,
welcome to my new project.  Building the perfect HTPC that suits my needs and that of the family.  I think the builds I have gone for are not necessarily the fastest nor the most beautiful. However the aim is to see how cheap I can build a reasonable unit as compared with current Media players for sale out there in the market. This is actually not so easy to do here in Australia. Why you may ask, red tape I suppose.  We can import some but not all parts, motherboards and cases from places like: Amazon. & NewEgg. They both have fabulous  cases but they do not ship all available direct to Australia. NewEgg don’t ship anything at least they didn’t last time I checked. To buy a decent build quality small box you will need to spend at least $80 plus.

My pictures of the units I have built so far are to follow at a later stage. For now I will say I was able to find some pretty nifty looking small boxes for a reasonable price scrounging through the net but the quality is just so so.  The One I love but it’s really not a micro PC is a Thermaltake. The most expensive of all of them so far. That’s for later too! Overall none of them cut the mustard for what I wanted to build in the end.

After 3 creations and many rehashes of hardware lying around. I was pretty happy and so began testing out various software and researching hardware for a colleague as his new toy wasn’t performing as per the specifications.  Reading up on the Thecus N4100EVO   it seemed pretty impressive.  Sadly the price he picked it up for was no longer valid and so I decided to wait for it to drop in price again. As they always do. While on the hunt for information for the Thecus I spotted this little gem: HP Proliant N40L MicroServer
Initially I was only wanting to upgrade my current Iomega Server. Having 4 2TB drives and many others attached to my
Astone Media Players  networked throughout the house. It was time to have a slicker setup.

With a bit more reading I found it for a great price $220 at times it is lower according to what I have researched. This included 2GB Ram and a fairly useless 250GB drive.  Plus more as per the first link: 250GB drive and memory will come in handy somewhere I’m sure. Even though this model has been around for a while, I still could not have achieved the build quality nor the motherboard, drive and memory all included for the $220 it initially cost me. If I had tried to build this it would have ended up costing more than $300. I can put 6 drives plus into it. I have increased the RAM to 8GBs apparently 16GBs can also be achieved.  I added a video card which I had lying around and will update with the models of these items a bit later.

Deutsch: XBMC Screenshot

Why this server, well the plan is to set it up as a fully fledged HTPC with XBMC or Freevo thinking it will be XBMC. So the original plan for it has changed after understanding the N40L is capable of. I have already been using XBMC  successfully with one of the HTPCs I previously built running Linux12. Linux 13 is now out & available. (UPDATE) LinuxMint 13 now installed.

What  you need  to do this: An understanding & some knowledge of Linux and or be keen enough to travel a rather steep learning curve. Why would anyone want to do this: For me it’s fun, and I hate with a passion proprietary software which is so restrictive it shackles my creativity. All of the software I use to do this is Free and that’s a bonus when being creative in case of stuff ups.

HP ProLiant N36L mainboard

Sadly I’m off to a bad start: A faulty Mini SAS cable and I am awaiting replacement of it.  I have found some wonderful forums and websites dedicated to doing similar things. Once I get my unit up and running I can share exactly what I’m up to with my build. Enjoy the links:

TekForums Setup guide: This is a must read.  He has done a fabulous job.
Reviews: News and what’s happening.
Reviews: Installation guides for windows.
Home Server Shows Forum for Proliant Microservers photos & users experiences for modding firmware and more.

Hope this is enough to wet the appetites of the interested.

Cheers

Kazza’s Corner.

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