blog.emerick.org

Well as you all may know, NTC / Shentel Communications is our ISP… and well, their current service doesnt live up to its “high speed” label… 100kB down? thats rubbish… a cable modem has 3Mbs down… So you ask why dont i subscribe to Adelphia’s High Speed internet?? Well i tried… Unfortunately there is a huge red warning on adelphia’s computer system that reads something to the effect that NTC provides internet to Smithfield Manner and that Adelphia cant provide their services here… So here we are stuck w/ crappy internet with no way to even get better internet access… After stopping at Adelphia we went to NTC to complain and see if we could do anything about it… After talking to a clueless tech guy, they set up a work order to come out and take a look at it and see about getting some more freaking bandwidth…

I think my next course of action will be to see if i can get NTC /? Raines Property Mangement to give a writen statment to adelphia allowing them to provide their services to us…

if that doesnt work, it looks like i will be contacting verizon or someone for a T1 line, or an OC3 :)? Then i can really run these servers…

Hmm i wonder if they have a cisco switch and if they have updated it since that latest IOS vulnerbility…

Anyways, first day of classes went well… Computer organization and architecture looks to be fairly promising and interesting… multivariable calculus on the other hand does not seem as fun and lots of work… already have homework and a quiz on thursday for that class…? These 8 am classes are going to be a struggle for the first few weeks until i get used to getting up that early…

It looks like my intro to unix class is all online except for 2 weeks we have to go to class, which is awesome, means i only have 1 class on friday and that is a recitation which i may or may not have to go to, dunno yet…

In other news, the car is back at home…? Dad should be able to fix it… hopefully not costing too much and pending more severe damage was not caused… If all goes well i should get my car back the first weekend in febuary… until then i am walking…

Well i am heading to the shower and then to bed… later…

–Jason

Well first off, i would like to apologize for the server being down… I was rearranging and organizing the cables in the rack and had to shutdown the server to do so…? Maybe i should move to a real hosting service so there would be no downtime… hmmm…

Anyways, to the car trouble…? Well i left home this morning around 10:15 or so and got gas and was on the road by 10:30…? there was very little traffic the whole way back to blacksburg, which was nice… Well upon making a left turn onto the street leading to my apartment, all of a sudden i heard a loud grinding noise, almost as if something had dropped out from under the car and was dragging.. at this point i was no more than a 1/4 of a mile from my apartment… I pulled off to the side of the road and began to investigate… look under the car, nothing hanging down… Looked at the right front tire and it was no longer aligned correctly… Whatever it is in there that keeps it aligned must have broke… so i called my dad and talked to him, and then i drove the rest of the way to the apartment with little steering control… and parked it…

Here is a link to the pictures of the tire and under side…

Well since i dont really know of a reputable garage around here, and the dealer would cost an arm and a leg… my dad decided to come up here and pick the car up and tow it back to Newport News with a trailer… So he is on his way up right now… should be here shortly…

Luckly whatever broke, broke when i was only going 10mph vs me going 70mph down the interstate and loosing steering…

But i am back in blacksburg… all unpacked and ready for the semester to start and finish… Gotta go buy books tomorrow and get some other stuff…

Well after this long day, i am going to go see whats going on around the apartment… later…

–Jason

Hope your Friday the 13th went well…

the plan is to head back Sunday morning, bright and early… its supposed to rain saturday and i dont feel like driving in the rain, plus ill need some time to pack because i havent started yet… so all day tomorrow is packing…

well i am out… later…

–Jason

Added more blogs to the blogroll that i read as well as a new category called podcasts which contains the podcasts thats i am currently listening to…

–Jason

well it has been awhile since i last posted eh?

mainly due to the fact that, well, there hasnt been much to post on…

Im heading back to school this weekend, either sat or sun depending on the weather, dont feel like driving in the rain… Classes start back up on Tuesday… have to go buy books and such… $$$$…

Got all my SSR boards soldered, tested, and ready to go for next christmas… I might build 6 more boards this summer, since i have all the parts except for the terminals and resistors and boards…? next part of the christmas light project is to build the controller… I already have the design down, just need to figure out the best way to go about building it as far as printed circuitboards vs wirewrapping, connectors for the SSRs, etc… but it will all be done before the end of the summer so it will be ready to deploy for the thanksgiving lights on deadline… also need to start designing the display, using what i have light wise (~20,000 lights) and minimizing what i need to buy… the biggest part of what i will need to buy will be solid color lights like blue green red amber… dont have very many of those.. so we will see what happens.. either way it will be good… ill keep you updated as the display becomes a reality…

Well i suppose i should start packing tonight and getting everything together and cleaning up my room… later…

–Jason

Google has released a pack of essential software… very interesting concept as google continues to impress… check it out…

read more | digg story

Took my car into the shop today and got it back today as well…? Apparently 3 seals blew out of the engine… but all is good now… all the seals in the engine have been replaced… $500 later though…? So my car is back in action… dont have to drive the truck everywhere…

Its raining pretty good outside right now… nice little thunderstorm…

Went and saw Chronicles of Narnia the other night w/ Jenn… It was really good…

Other than that, not much going… Just been chillen… Should be getting my parts to build my controller and SSRs on the 5th and 6th… Once i get the parts i will be spending a lot of time soldering and wire wrapping…
Well i am going to go… Later…

–Jason

Happy New Year everyone!

The first post of 2006…

–Jason