indyz

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Everything posted by indyz

  1. indyz
    Halfway between Chicago and Milwaukee here. It was $1.73 a gallon for regular unleaded the last time I filled up. Down to $1.69 the last time I drove past the "cheap" gas station.
  2. indyz
    "Eye of the Tiger," (of course) and the Run Lola Run soundtrack, especially the Reinhold Heil "Running" tracks.
  3. indyz
    Seriously, though, you might want to consider taking it to a repair shop or somebody who is knowledgeable about Macs. A shop will probably charge 30-50 dollars to look at it, and it might end up only costing you a new hard drive ($100-$200) to have a working computer again. A friend who knows a bit about computers might be able to do the same thing for only the cost of the drive. Also, check to see if it's still under warranty. Probably not, but you never know.
  4. indyz
    I guess I'm just naive for giving the benefit of the doubt, then. Or maybe I'm just tired of the "skydivers can do no wrong" attitude that seems to pervade this sport. Edit to add: That sounds like a troll. Sorry about that. I'm just frustrated that every time there is some conflict between skydivers and the world outside of the sport, it seems like knee-jerk reaction is to assume that the skydivers are right.
  5. indyz
    Is it the new style iMac (LCD screen on a swivel arm) or the older style? If it's the new style, use a fingernail to flip down the white plastic cover in front of the CD-ROM tray and look for a small hole in there. Then stick a paper clip in it. It will probably take some force to get the disc out. If it's the old style, I have no idea. Really though, unless you are comfortable taking your computer apart, it sounds like it's time to send it in for service. Try to find somebody that will do data recovery on your old hard drive. Then, learn to make backups on a regular basis.
  6. indyz
    Or somebody could be running a genuinely dangerous dropzone. It's happened before, and some say that it's happening now in a certain mountainous state. The experienced jumpers might know enough to stay away, but that won't stop the students from rolling in. Being on the news might be what it takes to get one of these places shut down. I'll wait to see the video before passing judgement.
  7. indyz
    Last time I said that, I earned my first deleted post. Beer!
  8. indyz
    Depends on the company. I would expect a company rolling in profits to be able to afford a nicely designed site. I wouldn't expect a skydiving company that is just getting started to have the cash laying around to hire a professional web designer, or to have the skills to do it themselves.
  9. indyz
    It depends on the "serious physical and/or perceptual deficiencies." The is at least one totally blind skydiver who does solos.
  10. indyz
    Yeah, it's almost like Kallend just came out and said what town was in the background.
  11. indyz
    MPlayer here As for DVD burning, I have no idea. I do know that it's possible, though.
  12. indyz
    You want MPlayer. It's a bitch to set up, but once you get it working it plays DivX, QT, WMV, MPEG, and more.
  13. indyz
    Even though I'm pro-Linux, I don't buy the "it crashes less" thing. Total system lockups are extremely rare on both Linux and Win2k. In fact, I would say that X Windows has locked up my computer more than Win2k in the last year. In terms of crashes that don't require rebooting (apps eating it, etc), I think that they are about equal.
  14. indyz
    I've been running the same Debian install for 3 years now. It's been getting more and more rickety as I jury-rig more experimental crap into it... It's time to put her down. I backed up my home directory. Tommorrow I'm gonna give format and reinstall. Seriously though, even though I use Linux every day, I haven't installed fresh since before the 2.4 series kernels. I helped a friend install RedHat 8 last night and I was very impressed. I'll probably give it a shot this weekend.
  15. indyz
    I had something like 50 jumps. Lew Sanborn saw me all geared up and with nothing to do, and invited me on an 8-way. I was surprised that he, along with many of the more experienced jumpers on the DZ, wanted me on their jump. Bunch of firsts there: First 8-way, first time wearing lead, first time floating on anything bigger than a two way. I had been having trouble moving around before because I was using a jumpsuit that was to big for me, so I was working as hard as I could to keep up with the formation and didn't have much left to move. With the lead, it was almost too easy to move. I kept over-shooting and orbiting the formation. Finally I got lined up on my slot and starting driving in. It was perfect, except I was going a little too fast. When I tried to slow down, I went low but didn't lose any horizontal speed. The harder I tried, the lower I went. Right under the formation. It funelled, I was embarrased.
  16. indyz
    February Parachutist, page 14. It looks like Istel is not jumping.
  17. indyz
    I can't think of any good reason to copy your OS to an external drive. I also don't have the instructions on front of me, so I could be seriously misinterpreting something.
  18. indyz
    Build your own! I'm slowly collecting the parts. A used G4 450 processor, matching refurbed motherboard, and power supply will end up costing about $400-500. Take your pick of graphics cards. A used ATI Rage AGP can be had for $15. Basically everything else is commodity parts: memory, hard disks, monitor, keyboard, mouse.
  19. indyz
    Extreme simplicity. The menu pops up with a right click. 4 virtual desktops. No background because I usually have something on top of it anyway. Desktop2 shows some open apps. The buddy list has been blurred to protect the innocent
  20. indyz

    Tetrahedron

    indyz replied to pkasdorf's topic in Gear and Rigging

    One day at the DZ the winds were light and variable, so the DZO pinned the wind T to indicate the landing direction. The winds kicked up, the T wasn't unpinned, and an entire load took downwinders. Lesson learned, always check the windsock as well as the T.
  21. indyz

    Love Songs

    indyz replied to misskriss's topic in The Bonfire

    Buddy Holly - True Love Ways - Lyrics
  22. indyz
    See the post by HH here.
  23. indyz
    Weekend of the 28th is Winter Expo at Skydive Chicago. Looks like plenty to do even if the weather sucks. Be there or be... uh, somewhere else, I guess. Anyway, I'll be there on either Saturday or Sunday. Sunday night is a concert in Wrigleyville. Metro, 7 pm. I have no idea who is playing, but a friend invited me.
  24. indyz
    Going from camera to VHS to DVD is a waste. It will actually result in less quality than VHS and more expense for the customer. VCRs aren't going away anytime soon. I would wait on producing DVDs until you can do the operation totally digital: digital video from the camera, edit in a computer, and burn straight to DVD. Even then, it's impossible to burn a DVD that will work in all DVD players.
  25. indyz
    I'd recommend using TMPGEnc (and the Quicktime plugin for it, it necessary) to convert, and then Nero to burn. Nero can convert the files itself, but it takes forever and you can't adjust the conversion at all. Also, the version of Nero that comes free with CD burners will only do regular VCDs. You'll have to shell out for the full version of Nero to burn SVCDs.