Why I want to ditch Micro$oft Window$ in favor of Linux. (Post No. 30)

     I've often mentioned in the past that I want to ditch Microsoft's Operating System, Windows, in favor of Linux. Sure, some may think I'm making myself a scary individual by ditching something where command lines aren't used all the time in favor of something where I could be using command lines a lot more often, but Windows started having Command Line Interface thanks to the Linux subsystem (possibly a good idea to probably install subsystem on a 10/11 system idk) so I doubt it's much of a point for me to ramble on about why I want to ditch Windows in favor of Linux, and then actually just write a list of reasons for me to do it:

1. I have long prided myself on doing things which are legally, morally, and ethically right. Take away 1 (or more of those) and I don't want to do it so much anymore. 
2. I've become far more paranoid about hidden surveillance-ware in all Windows versions post-7. True, I can turn those features off, but that also means I may not be able to play Minecraft Bedrock, or Indivisible for example. 
3. If I want to build my own custom say... Windows XP computer - then I probably will do so, but only for the purpose of playing Monopoly Tycoon in mind. I'm not going to say, publicly distribute an ISO containing the actual OS, or even a Norton Ghost image which will extract the XP image (similar to a recovery CD) on the Internet for just about anyone to download.
4. When Windows 2000, XP, Vista & 7 were the newer Windows versions - all four versions of those Windows actually had near infinite customization options. XP being especially similar to 95/98. Now, 8.x - 11 you need to download software unless you want to customize just the window color & wallpaper on the PC desktop. 
5. Linux can be customized a near infinite number of times. Like literally, I even used a desktop environment which looks like Microsoft Windows 3.11 for Workgroups, which I think such a customization is possible (if you know how to do it.) 
6. Microsoft Internet Explorer for Windows sucks. (And Edge sucks too!) 
7. Gaming has only become the prime reason why Windows still is considered useful. This is why macOS and Linux also is trying to keep up with Windows' relevance.
8. If I want to set up a new PC for my own use - I never want to factor in a Microsoft License cost, which I believe that the License Cost is a License, and Not a sale. 
9. Despite my use of Anti-Virus in the past, I have used Microsoft Anti-Virus in Windows 10 & 11 and that is for the purpose of removing malware from my system. Microsoft Defender Anti-Virus, however, cannot protect me against government surveillance of my IP address. 
10. I cannot honestly say that I like Windows 10. 
11. I do however like Windows 11. So much so, I'm going to likely just make that the last version of Windows I absolutely use. 
12. OK, I take back what I might have poopooed Edge for. I can use Edge on Linux, and I may consider doing that, however I don't have a Linux PC active atm. I may just want to use that for the Zoom PC I plan on setting up. 
13. I dislike the design of Zoom for Microsoft Windows. Like, why have the space bar on my keyboard be used for "temporarily" unmuting myself if I have something to say? I mean, it's not like I forget to unmute myself if I have to unmute/mute myself should I need to mute. Either have it so that it's either mute or not muted. 
14. I've probably said enough about how the Windows start menus (of all versions post 7) have had NSFW things done with Linux (or Android) app menus. So, I'm just going to not say anything further about the default UI design. Considering there's not any need to, anyway. 
15. I'm sure there's probably some gripe I have with Windows that can or cannot be addressed or even fixed by Linux.
    

 

A Rant About Gran Turismo Games (Post No. 29)

     So, you probably were expecting another "Quest For The Packard Bell Post" now. Nope. I literally don't have anything else to talk about relating to that at the moment. Instead, I will be addressing something else which has been around almost as long as those computers from the 90s. The Gran Turismo games franchise. 

    Thus the title of today's blog - "A Rant About Gran Turismo Games." 

 

Part I: Introduction to Gran Turismo (as a Franchise)

  The year was 1997-1998. Young Nathan back then didn't know as much as he did now. He probably may have been somewhat more proud of his country as opposed to view it as intellectually challenged. He was introduced to the Sony PlayStation 1, and the concept of Demo Discs. Some of his favorite demos to play were Ridge Racer Type 4, Tomba!, Hot Shots Golf, and Gran Turismo. Sometimes he still plays those very demos today on PlayStation 3 and sometimes using emulation - which means at first, ePSXe, and then when his PC called the "Claymore" by him as a network name became old news, he turfed it in favor of RetroBat.

 

   But back to the 90s, where computers probably weren't all that powerful anyway. And maybe if emulation was a thing on them, they could maybe emulate games from the Atari 2600 generation - Super Nintendo Generation (probably need working example of vintage hardware from that era to test that theory.) But enough about emulation for a moment, and back to Gran Turismo. 

 

   Now since Young Nathan didn't live in Japan, the speeds on the speedometer were in mph as opposed to km/h, and the music was actually by some bands that he probably would never really listen to the music until he got older. He never won a race, probably just generally being an idiot on the track, and most of the cars he used for first car most of the time would've been the 1993 Honda Prelude, which although is an OK choice for a first car, isn't exactly a screamer, since it would later be replaced as a first car choice by Adolescent Nathan's revisiting Gran Turismo 1 using the MA70 Toyota Supra and probably for the foreseeable future and the entirety of the rest of his adulthood, MA70 Supra being the car of his initial choice. Being replaced only by the Supra (Turbo) '93 in Gran Turismo 2, which is the exact same car.

 

   Of course there were some mysteries in the Gran Turismo 1 game that Nathan would also never really fully uncover until adulthood if maybe ever. Is the NTSC U/C where the Gran Turismo hologram label only black the only one that Sony Computer Entertainment America sold? What would the Japanese and PAL versions be like? (Even though it would be redundant to be playing the exact same game, but probably released for the Japanese and European markets?) And, most importantly- What's the deal with the 1967 Chevrolet Corvette Stingray 427 Coupe (C2) being as one of the selectable cars in Arcade Mode in Gran Turismo 1, but boot up the game in Simulation or Gran Turismo mode, it's essentially nonexistent? 

 

   Well, I guess I can discuss some more about Gran Turismo - I mean, I can't say much about Gran Turismo 1 anymore, since, I've played this game and replayed it so many times already, that I can't say anything else here that I'll probably reveal later in the rant part of this blog. Time to move on to Gran Turismo 2.

 

    My first experience playing Gran Turismo 2 wasn't with the full version, but again, with the demo. I used to think that the car had "760" as a default on the speedo or tachometer, but really, I didn't know any better as the speedometer was digital, just like back in Gran Turismo 1. Also, the turbocharged cars the game demo let me pick sounded like squealing swines. The year was circa 1998-1999. I however would be playing the full game later, and little did I know it would be blowing me away compared to Gran Turismo 1. Of course, it was considerably more limited than when I had played Gran Turismo 1 at first. Only through a later playthrough I realized that in order to unlock literally anything on Disc 1, you needed to first beat the game on Disc 2. 

 

    Of course, this generation of Gran Turismo would be the last where I play pre-release (or, alpha, beta, whatever) if you will demos. We're moving onto the generation of Gran Turismo games where my first experience with them wasn't me buying a disc that contained the game demo - but one where I jumped in almost immediately to the real game. 

 

Part II: The No-Demo Era

   The year was circa 2005-2006. Maybe 2007, I don't remember. I somehow for the first time had amassed $150 of my own money and I went to the then Future Shop in Halifax and purchased a Sony PlayStation 2, (Slim model) and a copy of Gran Turismo 4, the entire game. The graphics were better - only thing wrong however is that I couldn't save the damn game because I forgot to buy a memory card for my then-new Slim PS2. 

 

   At around the same time I had played Xbox in Saint John, in my sister's basement, primarily playing Project Gotham Racing and the demo version of Fuzion Frenzy. Probably a few years after the fact of me buying a PS2 I would be buying my XBOX, although it would be modded to play NES and Famicom games, and Sega Genesis and Megadrive Games. (Actually, Megadrive is what Japan and Europe called the "Sega Genesis" here, so it's literally the same - as what Super Famicom in Japan would be to North America and Europe's Super Nintendo.) 

 

    Gran Turismo 4 (once I finally did manage to get a memory card) proved to be a game which blew away 1 and 2. True, some tracks from 1 & 2 would be forever gone, like Special Stage R11 or Red Rock Valley for instance, And of course there were some cars in the game which couldn't enter races (These cars also can't participate in 2-Player games either, which tbh is kind of lame) But, despite the game's flaws in my opinion & experience, the redeeming qualities were the fact there were a set of 4 secret black cars that I could have up for grabs should I amass 8 1/2 million credits - (but they only appeared every 100 days - which is something Older Adolescent Nathan to Young Adult Nathan didn't really know very much about. It was only after getting the Hewlett-Packard laptop with Windows Vista he really discovered all those things.) 

  But, in Nathan's opinion, in agreement with some of the leading game journalists' at the time opinions --- Gran Turismo 4 would be the absolute peak of the series of Gran Turismo games. The question is, what would the next generation after this be like? Would it improve? Go downhill? I guess all I could say apart from this is - the only other game I would have gotten of the PS2 era, Gran Turismo 3 A-Spec which had some changes over 2 (Like the removal of High Speed Ring, fuck you Homestar Runner) kind of just was the afterthought. 

Part III: The Beginning of The End

   And speaking of a previously-asked question, I thought that as soon as I snapped up my PS3 in 2009 from the now-defunct department store in my local neck of the woods Zellers, I assumed that one of the very first games I could snap up with my then "shiny-new" PS3 console would be Gran Turismo 5. It wasn't. It was only a short while later I could find the game Gran Turismo 5: Prologue, which kind of felt more like a downgrade vs. Gran Turismo 4 and a potential call-back all the way to Gran Turismo 1.

   I mean, I was a little disappointed at first that this game wasn't some massive improvement over 4, and I was willing to Kijiji my PS3 (almost) at the time and go all the way back to 2 and only keep it around to probably play the games from GT1-GT 4 until I guess the PS3 ultimately ended up having operational failure. However, this didn't happen. Why? Because in time, the "real" Gran Turismo 5 came to the Sony PlayStation 3, and it really blew me away again... Just like Gran Turismo 1 did to Younger Nathan all those years ago - when the TV standard was Standard Definition, and the only time anyone watched anything on a big screen, was when they went to the local cinema to see the newest Hollywood blockbuster. 

 

   So, we might as well just rip the band-aid off, and address that "final" elephant in the room, Gran Turismo 5 - Release version, since there obviously is no "Prologue" in the title. 

 
   Ah, yes... Gran Turismo 5. I was going to eventually address this game at some point. I mean, I know that it seems like I'm probably being unfair to later & later & later games in the Gran Turismo franchise by then just deciding to become an older gentleman just yelling my head off at the clouds and then probably willing to just be stuck in the past enough, to basically shun all modern life. Like I know I've made a meme about shunning modernity and embracing tradition, or perhaps I've used the meme about rejecting modernity and embracing tradition, but I feel, when it comes to Gran Turismo - I'm all about rejecting that Modernity and respecting that Tradition. 

    Driving a Porsche on Super Speedway of some kind in Gran Turismo? Well, I don't think I would, because that would just be driving a Porsche on an oval. I mean, a road course would work - although I don't think I'm terribly interested in trying, since I have a low hope of getting hold of a PS5 and a copy of Gran Turismo 7, and actually putting the playtime in to get the Porsche in the game. Of course, I only was playing the PlayStation consoles until I left the console war battlefield for the PC Master Race. 

    The PC Master Race at first with the Katana and Windows 7 Ultimate in 2015, The Claymore and Windows 10 Home (without my knowledge or approval upgraded itself to Windows 11 Home Insider Preview) as well as Ubuntu-Linux (latest LTS version)  from 2020 - Spring 2022, a few brief months with the MaximusII from 2021 - sometime in 2022 when the scrap PSU just drew power but the computer wouldn't come on. And as of present the Acer Nitro 5 which I call the "RedEye" and Windows 11 Home. (Although I really wish I had reverted it to 10, or at least changed the license to Pro on this PC.) 

Conclusion: Emulated Releases I have actually tried out - And A Thought on a Topic Which I should probably end up saving for another rainy day

   Well, I have tried Emulated releases of the Gran Turismo Games, particularly 1, 2, and 4. Similar to the play order of the real games. I mean, in the U/C region, I would probably have played both 1 & 2, as well as the respective PAL releases. As for 4, just like before - however I didn't do much with PAL as apparently the South Korean release with the Hyundai Click Racecar which literally took all 10,000 of my credits to buy exists and took my interest. (Spoiler alert: It's not worth it. You'll never make your money back from buying the Hyundai Click unless you have a ton of patience and are willing to grind last-place finishes driving the stupid thing until you START-SELECT out of Retrobat and not like pressing START to pause a game in Super Mario World, and then SELECT to exit back to the map after having completed a previously beaten level, but Start+Select pressed at the same time as in the manner of exiting Demo Discs for the Sony PlayStation 1, particularly some demos that do not exit you back out to the demo menu after a certain condition has been met - like in the case of the Demo for the Next Tetris, having completed three games in a row, or for after playing for five minutes.) 

    This now brings me to the last thought I will be writing in the journal known as a "blog" which will for the present time be up and may be taken off and archived at some point which is getting closer each day, and archived in records, in the future. Why I said I would want to leave the Windows world and switch to Linux for at the bare minimum things that would be useful in a world where meetings aren't necessarily conducted with every attendee being in person - but Zoom videoconferencing be used somewhere as part of the equation.

Another Filler Post. (Post #28)

     At this stage of the game, you obviously know that Quest For The Packard Bell will indeed be returning. When? Well, when I feel like talking about when in history I felt more proud of my country - (Yes, I did at some point if you're wondering - but I certainly don't feel as like back then now. And I doubt I ever will be...again.) 

     The point is, is that I'm probably not going to "COMPLY" to the village idiot who is anti-humanity, saying that we need to share more things and people need more friends. I mean, sure, everyone needs friends. But by the same token, I believe that I would much rather be someone who goes for quality over quantity of my friends. Like, I've heard of the Dunbar number where there's only a limited number of friends that I can only have before I can only interact with people with just basic good manners and showing them basic respect, (Which does include giving them the time of day, be it morning/noon/afternoon/evening/night) and then a whole lot of people I can only randomly interact with, by saying, "Well, I am just playing something on my tablet because the bus wi-fi sucks." I mean, the "BUS" Wi-Fi or local public transit wi-fi has to be the least encrypted Internet access out there. Perhaps showing my senior citizens VPN commercials may help them to understand why I would rather hide my IP address from the government. 

    I'm also not going to "COMPLY" to the so-called "enlightened loon" that is pro-humanity, because compliance, is often looked upon the same as obedience and submission to power. 

    I mean, sure, some may say, I probably enjoyed not being ill for three years, but it's not like I've used the three years to exactly be face-masked. I've been cautious about going out, and if I thought that I didn't like human interaction at first, and by "human interaction" I mean, face-to-face human interaction --- then, I suppose you could say now, the thought of actually going somewhere where I could personally interact with someone in person again after only having a computer screen separate our interactions. If I could, I'd probably just take all my fast-food meals to go, and not sit in the restaurant and not have to worry about the "DO NOT COMPLY" loons. I know that I'm probably being unfair to people who claim that I shouldn't be writing stuff like this, but I can't take it anymore. 

   Sure, failure does provide an opportunity to learn, but what if the "failure" in question has the lesson offered, "It didn't work the umpteen times before you tried to do this or that. So, if you try again this time, what makes you think that the result will be different?" I mean, the worse the odds, the more likely you will be to end up failing. 

    Some may say that I haven't given things I have written off as "FAILURE" a sufficient chance. But I say to those some people, "I held out for a good version of Microsoft Windows after having used 10 for 2 1/2 years. Microsoft gave me 11, which is OK, but it can never be another good version like Windows 7. Face it, the good times are over and probably will never be returning ever again." 

Quest for the Packard Bell - Chapter XII : (Post No. 27)

 Quest for The Packard Bell

Chapter No. 27

I. DESPISE. MODERN. INTERNET. 

  The only thing in particular I'm going to talk about is the Twitter Blue verification. I mean, I'm already cash-strapped month-in, month-out enough as it is; so I don't need to cough up an $8.00 a month for 12 months, ($8.00 for 1 month is $8, $8.00 for 2 months is 16 dollars. $8.00 for 3 months is $24.00. $8.00 for 4 months is $32.00, $8.00 for 5 months is $40.00, $8.00 for 6 months is $48.00, $8.00 for 7 months is $56.00, 8 dollars for 8 months is 64 dollars. 8 dollars for 9 months is 72 dollars. 8 dollars for 10 months is 80 dollars. 8 dollars for 11 months is 88 dollars. 8 dollars for 12 months is 96 dollars.) 

   Well, I know that some people say that I should rely on cash - however, the question is, in time - provided no global cataclysm that makes all physical cash worthless happens within the short term, my question is, what should I use cash for? Toilet paper? You know, for toilet paper when the actual toilet paper my parents have seemed to be able to do nothing but hoard ever since the Coronavirus Pandemic (COVID-19) broke out back in 2020. 

   Now, you probably may be scratching your head and wondering what shitting on the modern Internet, and questioning the validity of the point of functioning in a cashless society have to do with anything?
Well, ever since the COVID-19 pandemic, I've become more increasingly hesitant to conduct business in brick-and-mortar stores. Especially during the yo-yo period of where first masks were not really required, (but social distancing was) and then the period of time where face masks were required (excluding if you were eating/drinking stuff), and then later gradually many of these mask rules essentially disappeared, (although in certain instances, they still need to be kept because y'know, some healthcare scenarios do genuinely need to have them there as the square footage of procedural rooms are small enough where infection could infect the unmasked.) So, I doubt I'm going to be particularly chompin' at the bit to continue to have some cash transactions, and try to mainly conduct most (if not all) of my business that I do need to actually do using cards of one sort (or another.) 

  (Also: I've often said that at a time in the future, if I could find enough worthless metal coins, I would likely just have them be turned into floor tile, provided I have epoxy. Don't know why. I guess it's just because I saw some cool picture on the Internet about it, and question why someone didn't spend the coins, but after learning why, I gained a new respect for some people's on this Earth's resourcefulness.) 

   The truth is, I'm clearly on the side of "not going for that Twitter Verification." and I'm probably aware of certain ways to do it for free. Like perhaps one way is probably spamming being a fan of a certain game over and over. However, I'm feeling a bit hesitant to do so; since if I did, I could be attracting some attention from certain people that I've often thought not very highly of - (Possibly due to the fact I've been told I need to go outside into the great outdoors and touch grass. Really feel it with my hands. Do it for a good long time. And of course the minute the grass starts feeling soft under it, Probably hope it wasn't dog turds I was touching.) 

   I mean, money is money, and I can't afford to spend exoribitant amounts of moolah on stuff which I don't see the point of. The fact that I have stubborn old parents that probably would prefer I keep my spending in the past to a certain degree doesn't make me happy either. Of course, I made the mistake of freaking out about an impending apocalypse (see: global cataclysm.) I'm going to probably have to put some money in my PayPal account not because it's reliable or some shit like that - but rather, I'm actually going to be putting it there, because I don't have a physical wallet with money right now. In fact, I will likely put a small amount of money in my account right after I finish writing this blog. Why? Well, probably because I want to throw my pre-paid credit card away. In fact, I realize I have two of these such cards in my posession, so I'm going to check them both, transfer what little is there off of them, and then chuck them in the bin once I finish doing that.

Quest for the Packard Bell - Chapter XI (Post No. 26)

 The Quest For The Packard Bell

Chapter No. 11

Why Did I Even Decide That Looking For A Computer That Prehistoric By Today's Turbo-Processed Standards Was A Good Idea?

(Yes, I'm aware that 'puters back in the day also had a turbo mode switch which I thought it would make them go faster... But, that was likely due to the fact I was a kid and not very bright.) 

     (OK, that picture actually has nothing to do with what I was planning on writing. But, I also believe that I would be taking it in a direction somewhere.) 

     Now, some may think that I'm just being an old man for real yelling at clouds, resisting progress every step of the way and dragging my feet in the ground and absolutely being an asshole and shitting on games from the modern era which if I just so much stopped looking at the past for a minute, I would realize that a lot of modern games were just as good, in case, probably even better than a lot of the games I played as a lad - whether I was taking a trip down Memory Lane, or discovering a previously undiscovered classic from what I truly view to be the "Golden Era" as far as I'm concerned as games go.

    Maybe a good idea for a moment is to stop arguing that I shouldn't want to be doing much of my work on an OS such as Windows 3.11/95 for even a little while, and then look again as to why I want to be going back to the past - in terms of technology in the first place.

1. Modern Games in Steam (a lot of times) - have DLC Or, why 2010 and later lil shitz' are impatient about things which back in my day would've just been unlocked after a certain condition was met - now instead of simply unlocking for free in the software, you have to download it off the Internet. Some games probably have enhancements that you can download off the Internet, that after buying them off of their digital store, you can opt to download all the DLC immediately anyway, to make a game which was supposed to be considered a real "full" game more somewhat complete anyway. 

2. Even Console Games 2010 and Later have DLC - This is probably because a lot of cases that games released for systems 2010 and later have DLC anyway. Although, some games after 2000 locked some of their cars behind "Download Walls." 

(I'm looking at you Porsche Unleashed!)     >:(

 (No image available of what I was complaining about specifically. So have this Gen Z Ohio meme.)

3. Ultimately, Many of the 1990s games generally had a sense of more "hopefulness" than a lot of the games released now:  Well, it's true. I mean, sure, there may have been some exceptions, like DOOM, particularly the OG DOOM, which probably would be set in somewhat more modern times like now, or when we're actually supposedly going to leave Earth and go to Mars, anyway. But games like Chrono Trigger, or Secret of Mana, or Illusion of Gaia on the other hand, have more hopeful themes than games released in the modern era and likely will continue to have released into the foreseeable future, provided the apocalypse doesn't happen on January 1, 2023.

And I'm serious too. It wasn't until FOX released Family Guy originally in 1999, that apocalyptic humor was on the TV, and it would probably be not until 2009 or later that apocalyptic plots would really take off in games. Like, apocalyptic plots such as simply trying to survive a nuclear holocaust in Fallout, and I already know that there are probably very many games that are released in the modern day which I already know if I tried to name them here on this blog page, I'd feel my head start to spin. 

I've said it before in the past, and I will probably continue to say it again, and again, and again until I turn blue in the face and I sound like an absolute fucking broken record. I was only interested in the games released from 1977-2006, but only smaller numbers of titles as we get closer & closer to 2006, I was only interested in the games released from 1977-2006, but only smaller numbers of titles as we get closer & closer to 2006.

But, I never will say no to playing Minecraft, and Overwatch is a little stupid hard - even though I figured out the controls. Now if only I could figure out how to git gud enough to go faster in the actual gameplay. 

My point is, having a computer that just goes a singular ding after a series of three or four shorter dings is nice and all, but most of the games with the exception of Minecraft don't really do much to hold my interest. Also, modern Need For Speed games with cop game-over mechanics, I will not be registering my own personal tag (I probably may have addressed this in an older blog post - probably saying why I don't want to pick up games like Need For Speed Undercover/Most Wanted, or even Carbon again.) Oh wait. I did. If you want to read my old blog post again, then -
If you want to look at the list of "Games I probably won't be picking up again for the foreseeable future," which literally has games that I won't be picking up again until maybe after the next blue moon, but even then I ain't sure... ...click on the prior sentence. 

If you want to know why I chose to shit on modern games a lot of times in favor of more retro titles, just follow this link. 

I mean, despite my negative attitudes about a lot of more "modern" titles, I personally don't believe I have much of a reason to perhaps take an anal evacuation all over games that are more contemporary in release, that is, without being absolutely convinced that I would be needing to. Which I am convinced. I mean, some of the games for consoles from the generation of the PlayStation 3/Xbox 360 forward, I've noticed that they are a lot of the times shovelware. Some games from PlayStation 2/OG Xbox era are also a little guilty of this, but personally, I've pretty much been hard pressed to find a game from the older era that would be guilty of being shovelware as opposed to a game that would actually have some replay value, than I would've from the "newer" era.

 

I̵̧͙͙̪̤̖͚̱̜̋̒̉͂͂̿̿ ̸̧̛̻̐̄̽̌̏̅̏͒͂̑̓̓̀͜͠R̸̨̡̜̰̝̳̝̻̣̉̅̍̐̊̂e̷̛̬̟̮͒́̊̋̓̅̅́̒̾̆̐͝g̸͇͐͑̈́͐̄̋͂̇̈́r̷̨̨̩̮͖̤̬̻̠̠̤̒͆̌̔̿̏͌̕͜e̴͍̽̊͑̍͌̐̚t̶̨̪͎̟̣͔̠̘͉͙͙̖̫̎̀͜ ̵̖͖͚̱̯̺̣͋̔̈̉̄̾̓͂̈̕͠H̸͙̟̗͈̱͍̼͉̦̱̺̖͕̼̄͂̾͑̍̽̊̈́̈́͌̄͊̀͝ͅa̴̼̍͗̚͝v̵̲̥̻̯̠̤̟͂͌ì̶̘̮̯̠̗͈͚̘̫̐̿̿ņ̵̘̣̱̩̺̺̼͎̜̍̓̕g̷̢̛͙̥̣͖̬͙̺͕̉̍̈́̈́̑͋͆ ̷͍͖̙͈͈̱̙̹̿͆̈̽̌̑̆̏́̾̎̽̒ͅͅĪ̸̢̨̼͇͔̪̌͜n̵͚͍̝͓̎̔̔̇̓̒͒s̸̥͆̓͒̑͊̒̕͝͝͠t̴͈̬̹̰̟̜̜͍̓̆̀̽̄̂̾̚͘͝a̶̙̻̦̠̭̞͇͔̬̫̗͋̈́̒͜͜ļ̸̛͔́̊̽̋ĺ̷̡͔̮̜̰͙̙͔̿̓̽̊͘é̸̢̙̳̫̦͚̼̣͈͕̤̈́̇̈́͐͝͝d̸̢̥̺̬̮͕͎̗̖̲̾͆̑̑͌ͅ ̷̢̢̛̣̬̯̯͖̞͔̮́̓̓̿̎̀̇ͅZ̵̛̞̮̈́͑͘̕͘ơ̷͉̩̈́̔̀͑ö̶̖̖̙́́̒m̸͇͗͋̂̀̓͘ ̸̢̢̩̣̳̟̮̅̊̊̊̽̈͛͑̚͜͝ơ̸̲̩͇̜͐̏̔͑̍̉̔͑̈́̀̍̃̕͠n̷͉͙̭̬͚̋ ̴̨͉̙͈̹̖̞̩̔͌͋͑̾͌T̵̢̤̦̗̱̰͚̹̘͕͋̀͊̚h̷̨̢̛͉̯̖̱̮̣͓̼͓͙̑͊̄͛̍̂́̀͝ͅi̸̮̘̾͝ș̴̡̛̛͇̮̺̞̬̣͇̪̆̍̌͋́͊̓̿̌͌͜͠ ̸̢̢͖͍̜̙̭̪̭̹̟̱̍̿͜P̸̨͉̬̖̖̞͓̈C̵̢̗̠̜̘̗̗̲̬̭̫̬͐̉͑̐̏͋͝.̴̧̭̲̦̥̬̤̖̬̾̍̊̈́̊͝ͅ.̴̝͎̙̼̬̦͇̯̙̳̘̈́̎̊͋͛̉͆͘͜͜ͅ.̷̻̯̮͉͚͓̔͆̋ (Post No. 25)

    I didn't want to install Zoom on my Acer Nitro 5, "The RedEye" as I've called it.

    Using this computer (Acer Nitro 5) for ZOOM, for Watchtower meetings, is similar to driving a Porsche 911 to the Kingdom Hall. 

      I would rather just drive a bland Hyundai, Kia, or Toyota to the Kingdom Hall. Keep the German luxury cars out of the Kingdom Hall Parking Lot!

     Anyway...

     I will use Ubuntu-Linux (Linux version) of Zoom in the future exclusively. For Watchtower meetings.

Account Deletion, Fall 2022 (Post #24)

     Quest for the Packard Bell will be returning, but I've decided that I will not be doing another "Free Parking" post like I had previously. I cringed with every word that I typed, and I believe that it's time religion soon became as invalid an argument as whenever one of Seto Kaiba's opponents tried to make an argument against his "screwing the rules." 

      So, instead I'd like to just get the obvious elephant out of the room, and say that my "latest" casualty for account deletion - SirNateTheLion's account as created earlier this year. 

     Now some may wonder and be scratching their heads as to why I would be scrapping an account that hasn't been in service for even one year as of the present date - (November 6, 2022). But unfortunately, due to the changing of hands of Twitter, and some probably tbh needed firings, the two accounts that I have been admin over as of recently will soon be leaving and be put on the silver memory stick. 

   It's a sinking ship, it really is. You have three choices to deal with this situation. You find everyone you want to save, and tell them to get to the lifeboat. You abandon ship and jump into the sea, which btw I hope you can swim, and hope your stamina's enough to get to civilization. Or, you just go down with the ship and be plunged into Davy Jones' locker. Again, not a religious sermon, as this will never have been my intent from the start (which it should never under absolutely any circumstances be.) 

   I've talked long enough at this point. 

Just go join the Discord server, if you still want to hear from me, I don't even care anymore.

 

Quest for the Packard Bell - Chapter X: (Post #23)

 Quest for the Packard Bell

Chapter X

Free Parking

  On the one hand, I'm feeling a little bit braindead and literally want to put someone on blast for then saying that a peaceful world might not be as free as it seems. Like, every form of paradise has its price. There never was, and there never is going to be, any such thing as a free lunch where nobody has to pay anything, because even if money and currency cease to exist as concepts - other ways of payment will become the new standard in time. Namely, the standard of divine obedience, to the point where no one will be allowed to make the same error in judgment that Adam and Eve had made in the Garden of E'den. 

 

  Now, before you worry this blog is becoming a religious sermon, and start wanting to help me pack and have my ass run to that outport I've often said that I would move to to spend the rest of my life in should any irrecoverable damage be inflicted upon my character reputation, my intention is not to bring "religion" to this argument or discussion. In fact, quite the opposite. My intention with this series of blog posts, as well as blog posts past and present, have they been in Nerdz In Space (defunct blog), Ramen Pirate (defunct blog), or any of the past computer build blogs (Project Claymore & Emulation Station Mini-Build are also defunct blogs), is to present interesting perspectives on stuff I'm generally interested in, while "religion" and its turning back the clock on societal process little hands are kept as far away from the words on the screen as I possibly can keep them. 

 

  This is probably almost as bad as some of the new "Berenstain" or "Berenstein" bears (For years, I still am unsure of the spelling) books being published that have religious themes in them. I mean, I don't think I will buy them. Also, if I get given them for a gift, no sooner than I have them taken out of the gift box, I will not be putting my name anywhere where there is a "This book belongs to" cover. In fact, they will remain in the gift box, or immediately be taken to an used book store, while I say, "Out of this house!" at first, and then, "Out of the car!" when I make it back to the town where the book store is, while I still carry the book, but only doing it three times in the parking lot until I'm absolutely sure I'm out of the car with it. "Out of my life" I will only say when I make it to the book store and trade that book away for something else that in the very Marie Kondo spirit that I will believe brings joy to my life instead. So, if anyone decides I need something for a gift, don't give me any "Berenstain" or "Berenstein" bears books. I'll appreciate it if you don't give me any such thing for my gift.

    In fact, I've often felt that despite what my parents might say, whether I do/don't need certain things, I already have a feeling I'm probably going to be spending a lot of the months going forward to where my month-end bank balance is going to be equal to 0. I mean, when I go for coffee at my somewhat more local to home going west-bound from Kingston/Greenwood area Robins Donuts, (Which is the Brooklyn St. Market in Middleofnowhereton), I have managed to spend less than $10.00 on what I get there, on average.) This means if say, I want to buy a pallet of Amazon returns someday in the near-ish future, my budget should supposedly have just a little bit of wiggle room despite my need of doing a "Bread-and-Milk" run. I mean, Grocery Items like that, despite how crazy inflation has become now, can't be all THAT expensive.

     Now, some may be scratching their heads and wondering why I don't want to use Windows 11 in the first place. Well, while it's good & all being able to emulate games from the Atari 2600 era all the way to the Sony PlayStation 2 era on here directly using the frontend called Retrobat (I wouldn't try Xbox games, and I am talking about OG Xbox - after a while the scrape just quit working on it mysteriously [?]) Windows 11 is the absolute latest in the CeMeNT Windows architecture. 

 

    Many features from Windows NT 4.0, CE, Windows 2000 and XP, as well as Vista, and in some cases 8 and 8.1 (I think HomeGroup died with Windows 7), have persisted to Windows 10, and even in some cases right up into Windows 11. True, the sound that plays whenever you boot the computer up from cold (which should not be done more than once or twice a day), is a nice, welcome touch, but one of the greatest flaws of Windows 11, (apart from the Windows Store, but I've pretty much also ripped it enough a new asshole that I don't need to anymore) is that it pretty much bloats just as much (if not worse) than Windows 10. I had to tell the computer to remove Windows Update cleanup files plus a few other garbage collection data. I could have indeed taken some of the files that were in my own personal "Downloads" folder directory off the computer too, however, I don't have a USB-plug-in only hard drive with enough free space at the moment (and not serving another purpose) to do that. I guess when my Dad goes to Wal-Mart (and takes me with because I assumed that his nearly 76-year old brain can't process the concept of external storage beyond flash drives maybe) I'll probably buy myself a hard drive, and pick my Dad's hard drive myself so that he has to do the minimum amount of thinking as absolutely possible. 

 

    Oh, and another thing? NTFS is a terribly inefficient filesystem. I mean, the storage on this computer supposedly is 256.0Gigabytes, but, the actual reported capacity by Microsoft Windows is somewhere in the ballpark of 237. So, I'm wondering where did the other 19 Gigabytes go? I suppose it could've been pre-allocated to the manufacturer's recovery partition (A Hewlett-Packard laptop that I got from the then in-business in Canada Future Shop did something similar.) but I still cannot help but feel somewhat ripped off. I have used Linux before, and during the OS setup, it's often reported 100.0% (sometimes 1% more) of what was reported on the internal hard drive's label. 

 

   Not that I'm suggesting everyone go back to FAT16 or FAT32. (I'm not making that 2.0Gigabytes be the limit for local storage on hard drive.) Technology has evolved since the 1990s. Quite a lot. We did gain quite a lot over the years - but I can't help what think about what we lost. 

 

    Such as: 

 

- Program Manager being the default Windows UI environment (From Windows 98 onwards - possibly worth doing a little bit of research on that later.) 

- The Storm (VGA) color scheme - (From Windows Vista onwards. There are ways to add that back to other versions of Microsoft Windows up to the present, but most people never pick that color scheme.) 

- CD Drives from computers (Meh. If I need to have that capability back, I can always just use an external one.) 

- Real-Mode DOS (Not a terrible loss, I think it probably may be possible to emulate "some" of that using DOSBox - but I also believe that I may be needing to do some research - probably due to Millennium Edition having DOS mode completely removed.) 

 

    And newer is never always better. Even when things circumstance in this world are compared between old vs. new. 

Quest for the Packard Bell, The: Chapter IX - (Post No. #22)

      I'm planning to explain to my rotten old parents the reason why I pretty much elected against using my new computer, which I call my "RedEye" to run Zoom, & give them enough basic techno-jargon to get by in doing. They aren't going to go be purchasing dirt cheap used PCs which have seen heavy use in the corporate environment before, and flipping them and selling them for a loss of about 50% or something to people that genuinely need to have them, I think when I don't have such a strain on my personal budget sometime in the future, I may resume doing that. I'm the science officer of the family, and they don't realize that their roles aren't to be the science officer of the family. If everyone was a science officer, then who'd be Kirk, Sulu & Scotty? Don't answer that question. 

     But, that's probably why you're not here. To hear me insult my parents' intelligence. You're here because I am making another chapter out of the seemingly never-ending (but not getting any closer to victory) quest for the Packard Bell.

Quest For The Packard Bell,

Chapter IX:

Kijiji Ads

    To those ladies and gents outside of Canada, Kijiji is basically our country's version of Craigslist. Except there's likely less weird ads on Kijiji as opposed to Craigslist, and less people have druggies be the responses or something. 

   Previously during the worse part of the 2020-2021 COVID-19 Pandemic, I've attempted to source Packard Bells thanks to a Kijiji ad. Why? Well, they aren't exactly special computers, considering the model range I was trying to go for myself, the ones in question being 1994-95 at the absolute oldest, and 1996 through the entire duration of that model year at the absolute newest, unlike some "other" 90s computers which would probably have computed absolutely quicker than the Packard Bell IBM clone, and probably have sold far less than IBM PCs and all clones across the specific manufacturing board, probably due to the fact their sticker price would've been at around the same price as a Porsche 911 or Mercedes-Benz car, probably one that would've been considered "lower-end" and not one with an AMG engine option. 

    And, of course, I guess I had sourced my Packard Bell, and I thought victory was close. Too bad my example (which I had got) only had a couple of CD drives and no hard drive caddy whatsoever. But then again, I didn't think it was a problem. Sure, it had a Dallas chip battery on the motherboard that probably was absolutely dead, which I didn't consider a problem (I would probably just figure out how to get it replaced with a coin-cell instead since Dallas chips aren't really worth fixing), and my plan at that particular time was to use a 2GB CF card, to use Microsoft Windows 3.11 or 95 on, on top of MS-DOS, also having as another option, have a CF card somewhat larger than 2GB to use Corel Linux on, since I have yet to figure out how to get that ancient Linux distro to run on anything. I have made some progress in that department, and some may question why do I want to run such an ancient OS, but my answer to that question is "Why not?" Considering that Windows 10 is basically a mixed bag of reliability of a running OS, depending on what computer I run it on. It either runs like an absolute clock unit, or like a dog, total garbage, and essentially someone who would be trying to run a marathon with probably little to no training, and having had absolutely nothing but a diet of McDonald's.

   And Windows 11, isn't much of an improvement over 10, but the fact it is an improvement over 10 does indicate that some steps have been made in the right direction. 

   I guess, another thing is that I've become increasingly paranoid over the fact that I've been told that "the end of the world is going to come at any day now," and that I shouldn't spend time trying to build an empire in this world. I mean, from the earliest year of my childhood I could somewhat reason coherently, to my tenth birthday, I basically unquestionably lived like that could be happening. I never took motivation seriously the thought that I could be a thirty-something male railing against everyone older than him's authority in one way or another and having tried to rebel against his parents from his twenty-first birthday to right now, and knowing that despite his best efforts to not be smothered anymore, he basically wants to be more independent from his parents - of course, that wouldn't happen because they fear that the same thing that happened to all three of his elder siblings priorly would happen to him. Well, they chose to make their own decisions and they were all bad. What makes my parents think that they know best and I shouldn't be allowed to have my ideas be put to the forefront? 

   But enough complaining about parental stupidity for a second. In fact, I'm going to stop complaining about this for the entirety of the rest of the blog. I mean, I shouldn't be stressing myself out over this, especially when I am feeling just a tiny bit under the weather from a flu shot I had received last weekend. I think just this morning, all the feeling in my left arm came back, so I guess that indicates that I'm on the mend. 

   So, does this mean I'm going to abandon the "Quest for the Packard Bell?" Well, not entirely. However, I feel someone probably shouldn't put any of the money I may have received from sale of unneeded supplies that I doubt I'll ever use into Envelope #2. In fact, if I learn someone put it into Envelope #2, I feel like I'm going to be somewhat disappointed.