Compute!

Well, it's official! I'm a student again!! I've set up a little page on my CSE account that shows my classes and timetable. Until today my schedule wasn't completely nailed down, as I was unsure if I could get into the Experimental Robotics course. However, I talked to the lecturer today and he signed the paper that got me in!

I'm typing this up on my new computer that I built. I had a few missteps on the build (this is the first one I've done in 5 years!) but I've cracked the case a few more times and got everything in its right place. I decided to go with a cheap processor and then overclock the heck out of it. I got the Intel e2160 which is supposed to run at 1.8GHz, but I've got it cranked up to 3.0GHz!! The whole thing cost about USD $650 and I’m very happy with it.

All of the CSE computers are Linux, which means I had to do some work to set up a work-from-home environment. I wouldn't even think of installing Linux as the one and only OS on my machine; I'm a Windows man through and through! I have plenty of copies of XP Pro lying around from the MS days, so I installed XP rather than buy Vista. Actually, even if Vista was a free option, I would have still gone with XP for my dev box... Vista is nice for fun and pretty things (we've got it running on our laptop) but I certainly don't want to deal with compatibility issues while I'm working on projects. Switching back to XP wasn’t too rough, but I couldn’t deal with the electric blue color scheme anymore. Fortunately I found the Zune color scheme released by Microsoft which I absolutely love! It looks similar to Vista, but it has some orange highlights that really make the GUI pop.

To deal with the Windows vs Linux issue I installed cygwin with X Server, but I quickly realized that this solution just wasn't going to cut it. So I downloaded VMWare Player and an image of the Ubuntu 7.10 distro of Linux. I downloaded and installed a bunch of dev tools and now I’m ready to go. I have my VM up almost all the time and I often find myself browsing the internet or checking email from it because I was already there doing something else. The experience is flawless, I don’t experience any slowdown or any other problems (except the Linux UI, ha!) Virtual machines have always impressed the hell out of me, and now I finally have reason to use one!

So, yeah, I’m having a good time immersing myself in computer land. My classes have been pretty interesting so far, and I’m excited to get going on some projects!