A friend recently asked me:

How can I transfer large files, bigger than a 1.44 disk will hold, from my old computer to my new computer?

And my amazing answer is:

There are a few ways, none of which are amazingly cheap AND easy at the same time. But there is at least one good way.

These days, one of those USB keychain drives is probably the best way, assuming both computers have USB ports and win98 or better. In that case, buy a $40 keychain drive from Fry's or similar, which should be 32 or 64 megs or so, and use it like a big fast floppy. Insert it in the old PC, copy the files to it, remove it and connect it to the new PC, and then copy the files from it. Then erase the files from the USB drive, remove it from the new PC, and repeat the process. This is by far the easiest method.

There is a completely facinating article about an experiment the Center for Democracy & Technology performed about spam. They basically spent a few months creating a few hundred email addresses and started using them selectively around the Internet, including popular web pages, web-boards, USENET posts, and other places where it is thought spammers harvest email addresses.

The results are somewhat surprising, but it seems the best thing you can do to prevent spam is to list your email address as something like warren at warrenernst dot com whenever you leave your email address somewhere like a discussion board. People have no problem reading email addresses like this, but it aparently fools the email address havester robots that spammers like.

Obviously, the War in Iraq is going pretty well for us Americans right now, so sure, it is a little hard to say "I am against the War in Iraq." That said, I am against the War in Iraq. I am pleased that "President" Bush seems to have lucked into a victory against an impoverished third world country, but I don't think he should have committed forces there in the first place, given the pathetic body of "evidence" the world was shown. (BTW, show me some real evidence, and I guarantee you world opinion, as well as my own, will change.)

That said, I very much support our troops, the vast majority of whom are so poorly paid it is pathetic. How much do I support them? I'll put my money, and your money (provided you are a taxpaying U.S. citizen), where my mouth is with this next suggestion:

So I was reading the news on Google (which by the way, is really great, as it lists stories from all sorts of different newspapers with different agendas), and it had a few stories which revealed that Saddam Hussein's son has a palace filled with drugs, booze, and porno. Like millions of dollars of the stuff. It sure must be nice to be a dictator's son.

Anyway, also found on the wall of smut were several prinouts of "President" Bush's fun-loving twin daughters, Jenna and Barbara. Don't beleive me? Then read all about it here and here.

A friend of mine recently asked me a question regarding Microsoft's Product Activation scheme with regard to Windows XP and motherboard replacement:

I have XP pro and have hade very little problems with it.  The issue I face now is a new MB/CPU upgrade, along with a new video card.  The whole "activation" thing and the limit on hardware changes is what I'm coming up against.  Even though I'm only changing 4 items (MB/CPU/RAM/VID) it will look like many more (built on audio vs. SB Live, different chipset, ramdac, USB controller, NIC, etc)  I have been surfing the web for about a month for white papers of anyone who had experienced the same thing and coming up empty.

The other day when "President" Bush, Prime Minister Blair, and those other two giants in the diplomatic community, Prime Ministers of Spain and Portugal, were giving those televised speeches on that tiny island in the Atlantic, it hit me.

The Spanish and Portuguese Ministers sure sounded dignified, intelligent, and like they actually had a clue, I thought. If course, it wasn't them I was hearing. It was their translators. The ministers themselves could have sounded like they came from their respective countries' redneck backwater section, and used expressions similar to "those folks in Iraq" in their speeches. But their translators "converted" their speeches, on the fly and in real-time, into dignified and intelligent English.

A friend recently asked me:

When I powered up my system this weekend, the power supply fan started started noisy. (I know it's noisy, because if I put in a thick piece of paper and then pull it out, it's smooth again for a while.)

My question is: How serious a problem is this? I checked Google Groups and people are talking about worst case scenarios. (Total motherboard fried, devices fried, etc.)

Now, really how serious is this problem?

Right now, I'm going shopping for either a new power supply or a new case with a new power supply. (If I can get a new steel case with multiple fans [side and top], I'll spend the extra bucks.)

A friend of mine trying to connect a Palm-enabled PDA with a USB cradle to a Windows NT 4 computer wrote me asking:

Here's the problem. My only high-speed internet connection right now is from work, where they're running Windows NT 4.0 which, as you probably know, does not support USB. I've been searching for a serial-to-USB adapter or cable, but I can only seem to find adapters to plug a serial device into a USB port, not the other way around. First of all, can it be done? Secondly, is it only possible by going through three or four adapters, cables, converters, gender switchers, etc.?

So suppose you have a CD Rom Disc (or is it "Disk"?) with a crack in it. Can you still keep using it?

Better not, if you value your CD Rom drive.

I just replaced a CD ROM drive after a CD with a small crack in it was inserted and used. Apparently, there was a loud "crackling" noise as the disk spun up, and everyone present could plainly hear debris rattling around after that. Of course, the drive door wouldn't open any more, probably because little bits of CD shrapnel were jamming the gears and such.

What happened, you ask?

You may have heard that Dell (and perhaps other computer companies) are doing away with floppy (a.k.a. 3.5" diskette) drives. Is this such a hot idea?

Well, for now (March, 2003), I say it is a completely stupid idea, but it is a step in the right direction. How are these two different opinions possible?

First, let's go over why it is stupid. As of now, floppy disks are the only sure fire way to boot a PC that has a failing/failed/wonky hard drive. Now I can hear the peanut gallery mumbling something about "bootable CD's," so let me ask you something. Do you know how to make a bootable CD? I didn't think so.

Bootable CD's are not that hard to make, but you need a CD Burner to make your own, need a system that supports bootable CD's, need your BIOS set to boot off of a CD, and you should know how to make them yourself. Or some genius should market low-cost, emergency boot CDs. (hmmm...)

So why is this a step in the right direction? Mostly because floppies are a dumb, ancient technology that should have been killed years ago, but there was no great alternative to emergency boot disks. With Dell getting out of the floppy drive game, other outfits will follow suit to save $1 on new PCs to compete, and then the race will be on to make a better booting mousetrap.

There are already some technologies are are on the cusp of working for this. There's external USB and FireWire drives. There's solid state "keychain" drives that plug into USB ports. There's bootable CD's. There may be others on the way, and now there's a reason for someone to invent them.

This is not without precedent, BTW. Apple killed the floppy drive with new computers a few years ago, and bootable CD's are all over the Mac world, and the Mac's "BIOS" can boot off one by holding down the C key on the keyboard when powering up. Simple.

Apple also forced a paradigm shift away from serial, ADB, and SCSI ports into USB in one fell swoop by making machines without any of those old ports. Suddenly, vendors had to make USB equipment, and before you knew it, there was good USB stuff all over. And now no one misses the old ports.

The same can happen with "the next floppy." Killing it in new computers will force something better to come along.

Still, that won't be for a while. So in the meantime, spend the extra $20 to get a floppy drive with your new Dell (or whatever).

We'll talk about what to do with all your old floppies later. Really.