So where have you been Coach Al?

I had planned to take it easy the last few weeks. This is the only time of the year when there aren't a lot of big high school athletic events. Most teams are just practicing with games and matches just starting now.

So, what happens? I have 3 computers in the house, 2 of which are devoted to my business. One of those computers does 90% of the work. That computer died. I was able to remove the disk drives and copy them onto a giant external drive so I didn't lose any data. But, as anyone who has gone through setting up a new computer knows, there is a lot of work to do.

Just shopping for a new computer takes time. I bought a close to top-of-the line Dell which was delivered in a few days. I decided to get lots of memory, but only one huge disk drive (500 gig). Everything is very easily expandable. I just ordered another 500 gig internal drive. My plan is to have all programs on the C: drive, all data on the D: drive, and another 500 gig external drive for backup.

Another thing I learned through this challenging time is that USB external drives can not be plugged into a USB hub with other devices if you want them to perform well. I couldn't understand why my USB drive was just moping along when that same drive really hummed on my older, slower computer. When I read about how USB 2.0 works, I realized that I had about 8 devices already plugged into the hub and they all were competing for bandwidth. So, along with the 500 gig internal drive, I ordered a PCI USB 2.0 card. I will only plug the external drive into this card, nothing else, so it will have it's own "pipe". I don't expect the external drive to run as fast as the internal ones, but it should now be useable as a backup drive and occasionally for processing.

Currently I'm doing all processing on the internal C: drive. It's very fast but I don't like to mix programs and data on the same drive. As soon as the drive arrives I will move all data over.

I also hope to rebuild my dead computer. It is still very useable, at least it will be if I can get it running again.

I have done a few jobs in the last month to tell you about. Be back soon, I hope.

Coach Al