RIP to the laptop

Recently my laptop died of accute graphicus boardatis burnum.

After 2 and a half years (just after the end of the warranty - thank you Mr. Murphy!) my ASUS A7Sv stopped working.
For some time I could observe that it could get extremely hot, and the fan was always at full speed.
My suspicions fell on the graphics board, so I dig up a little.

Seems like lots of people have been complaining of burned NVIDIA 8600m (my graphics board). Apparently it is a chipset error extending to some models (http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1028703/nvidia-g84-g86-bad).

Now I have a very big brick (17" Wide to show how big), just because of a single component. How i miss a good desktop board swapping...

As a temporary solution I'm using another laptop that is missing a monitor (I still don't know how my brother managed to break it!), connected by VGA to my old (old, old, old) 14" CRT with very dark images (it can make eyes hurt...).

Now what to do for a new machine?
A new top-of-the-line laptop that might suffer the same fate (as another reference to Mr. Murphy)?
A notebook that can barely run any of the software I use?
A desktop that I can't carry around (yes, I have a lot spare time away from home where i could use a computer)?

When to come a laptop with swappable graphics board?


P.S.:
After toying with my ASUS (I tried to evaluate the possibility of swapping graphics board), I lost the use of the monitor (it's filled with stripes of several colors, but it's better than the black screen I had before), but i can use an external monitor.
I don't know much about electronics, but it seemed like the board had two cores for graphics. Maybe that other core is responsible for the output to the external monitor...

Didn't try for much time, but maybe I could end up having two 'half' laptops.
First it's better to buy a cooling pad.

My Arduino Hello World!

I finally got to try out my Arduino.
I decided to follow the 'Array' sample, on which Arduino lights up some LEDs in a sequence.

So, I altered the source a bit to make my 'Hello World' as a 'KITT Sequence'.

I know it's not much but it's a start...

Configure Multiple Magento 1.4.x Websites on same server

It took a while to do this, as I know too little about Magento or Apache, but here is what I did:

- Create websites in Magento Admin (remember the codenames as they will be used later);
- Create Stores and Store Views to each website (you will need them for the final test);
- Configure {{Base_Url}} for each website ([will complement with images])
- Create hosts to your servers' IP address on your DNS Server (ex.: sample1.com, sample2.com);
- Access httpd.conf to create a VirtualHost for each Website (ex.:
#IP:PORT as in 'NameVirtualHost'
DocumentRoot "c:\wamp\www" #Location to www or alias folder
ServerName sample1.com #Server's Domain Name for the WebSite
SetEnv MAGE_RUN_CODE "base" #Website/store codename
SetEnv MAGE_RUN_TYPE "website" #website/store

);

Now you should be able to access each frontend on each address.

HTC Desire Android 2.2 OTA

I finally received Android 2.2 for my HTC Desire.

As no upgrade will run perfectly (must be a Murphy's Law), here are the problems i've encountered:

- Google Contacts updated automatically, removing all data saved to phone only (a.k.a. private). Should have saved that data as merged contacts;
- Google Market seems slower (probably just to much users at the time because of the upgrade, or slow wi-fi).
- Google Market no longer shows list of apps installed before the upgrade (but they still work, and can be updated/removed if you search for the app) (after installing new app, the full list was restored);
- My Calendar (offline) was removed. Couldn't find a way to create another;

Generally i haven't noticed any differences, besides a few new apps (Flashlight, Location Picker, Hotspot Wi-Fi) and improved UI (Application Manager).

A Saga

Como estava tão entusiasmado quando escrevi o post anterior sobre o Android...

Entretanto surgiram as férias e outros possíveis projectos e lá se foi para último plano.
Para além disso o portátil queimou, por isso as condições de trabalho agora não são as melhores

Há que arranjar um tempinho para voltar a 'subir ao cavalo'!

LEDs

Surgiu-me a oportunidade de comprar uns LEDs de alto rendimento a baixo preço.

Com 12€, lá vêm 500 azuis... O que fazer agora com tanto material?
O que gostava era de construir uma matriz para programar um jogo, como se vê em tanto tutoriais.

O que falta? Tempo e paciência...

Primeiro Teste

Já chegou o Arduino.

Andei a ver o kit, e tentei fazer um simples circuito com um LED, um potenciómetro e um transformador ligados na breadboard.
Depois de algumas dificuldades lá consegui que funcionasse.

O LED tinha mais ou menos brilho de acordo com o potenciómetro (nível 1 superado).

Agora há que passar para algo mais complexo, até queimar componentes ou vir uma ideia brilhante que me faça programar o Arduino.