Wednesday, December 10, 2008
More on Hard Drive Upgrade - 1 Question Answered.
I read that if I attempted to use the old, or cloned hard drive in another system, it wouldn't work. The cloned image is specific to the computer hardware system it originated on. Still, it would be interesting to try.
Tuesday, December 9, 2008
Amazon One-Click Order Gotcha - Got me...
If you see an item on Amazon.com that requires you to put the item in your cart to see the price, DO NOT out of curiosity click on one-click ordering, and assume that just because they didn't give a verification of your order that nothing happened...... And if you DO click on it, you had better check your account and email quickly, because you don't have much time to cancel the order.
My $220 order will be going back out to Amazon via UPS pretty soon......
My $220 order will be going back out to Amazon via UPS pretty soon......
Hard Drive Upgrade and Cloning
Time had come to retire my secondhand hdd. It was filling up quickly, with precious little room to spare. I chose a cheap Seagate 7200.10 w/ 250G of space to replace the little fella. I also wanted to clone my old disk to the new one. The whole pc is aging, but I want to get a little more use out of it before I try my hand at another build.....
I had never replaced a hard drive with a cloned new one before, so I began the adventure.
First, my new $55 (w/ free shipping from NewEgg) hd was OEM - just the drive. That was okay, I knew I had a SATA cable somewhere, and a baggie of screws. I had heard about Norton Ghost and some other cloning utilities. Well, as you may already have noticed, I am rather a cheapskate (thank my german heritage). I was not about to pay more than a couple of dollars for software, and didn't want to wait. But - AHA! Seagate has a utility on its website called DiskWizard, a free hdd utility that also does cloning, based on Acronis, a respected software program.
Here goes.
1. Downloaded DiskWizard to old hard drive.
2. Installed SATA hard drive. Stupid screw holes did not line up, and a little bending was in order. Found the power connector for the SATA drive, and connected it, and connected the SATA cable to the disk and the m/b. Too bad m/b only supports SATA 1. (mk8-939 Mach Speed Viper)
3. Case closed, boot up. Hmm- where is my new drive??
4. I found that I had to go to rt click on My Computer >Manage >Disk Management. There it is!
Right click on the box for the new hd and initialize.
5. Another right click, this time in the box showing the new drive space, and select new partition, primary, and use others as default (tho I did change volume name to something more descriptive). Aaand.. it worked! I made the drive active here.
6. A quick check shows my new drive, (as 'E') and I can write and read to it!
Rebooted here just for the heck of it.
7. Clonage begins! Running DiskWizard. At this point I see I could probably have used DiscWizard to install the new hd. Either way, we are good here. I continue on to cloning tool, and follow the steps.
8. Another reboot :) DiskWizard does its magic. Be patient.
9. Success! And the screen requests to press any button to close down.
10. On my next reboot I del into the bios, and make the new, bigger, better hard drive the one I want to boot from (after the CD drive), and bravely go on...
11. Woohoo! Magic happened! I am now working on the new Seagate drive, and the change so far, seems to be ah... seamless.... It is now the C drive, and my old drive has become the E drive.
This was much easier than I had anticpated. I love when that happens :)
12. It remains to be seen how I would use the other drive. I guess I will save it as backup for a while... Will windows question my upgrade? Would I be able to just put the old hd in another pc and access my programs as well as my files? These questions will be answered in time I suppose. For now, my time has to be spent elsewhere.
I had never replaced a hard drive with a cloned new one before, so I began the adventure.
First, my new $55 (w/ free shipping from NewEgg) hd was OEM - just the drive. That was okay, I knew I had a SATA cable somewhere, and a baggie of screws. I had heard about Norton Ghost and some other cloning utilities. Well, as you may already have noticed, I am rather a cheapskate (thank my german heritage). I was not about to pay more than a couple of dollars for software, and didn't want to wait. But - AHA! Seagate has a utility on its website called DiskWizard, a free hdd utility that also does cloning, based on Acronis, a respected software program.
Here goes.
1. Downloaded DiskWizard to old hard drive.
2. Installed SATA hard drive. Stupid screw holes did not line up, and a little bending was in order. Found the power connector for the SATA drive, and connected it, and connected the SATA cable to the disk and the m/b. Too bad m/b only supports SATA 1. (mk8-939 Mach Speed Viper)
3. Case closed, boot up. Hmm- where is my new drive??
4. I found that I had to go to rt click on My Computer >Manage >Disk Management. There it is!
Right click on the box for the new hd and initialize.
5. Another right click, this time in the box showing the new drive space, and select new partition, primary, and use others as default (tho I did change volume name to something more descriptive). Aaand.. it worked! I made the drive active here.
6. A quick check shows my new drive, (as 'E') and I can write and read to it!
Rebooted here just for the heck of it.
7. Clonage begins! Running DiskWizard. At this point I see I could probably have used DiscWizard to install the new hd. Either way, we are good here. I continue on to cloning tool, and follow the steps.
8. Another reboot :) DiskWizard does its magic. Be patient.
9. Success! And the screen requests to press any button to close down.
10. On my next reboot I del into the bios, and make the new, bigger, better hard drive the one I want to boot from (after the CD drive), and bravely go on...
11. Woohoo! Magic happened! I am now working on the new Seagate drive, and the change so far, seems to be ah... seamless.... It is now the C drive, and my old drive has become the E drive.
This was much easier than I had anticpated. I love when that happens :)
12. It remains to be seen how I would use the other drive. I guess I will save it as backup for a while... Will windows question my upgrade? Would I be able to just put the old hd in another pc and access my programs as well as my files? These questions will be answered in time I suppose. For now, my time has to be spent elsewhere.
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Time to Ditch Time-Warner Cable
Yahoozers!
U-verse is coming next week! The big package, with all premium and DVR. We are also stepping up our internet speed.
U-verse is coming next week! The big package, with all premium and DVR. We are also stepping up our internet speed.
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Tuesday, July 15, 2008
Arrests! At last!
27 charged in heroin network that authorities say led to 5 deaths
By JOHN DIEDRICHjdiedrich@journalsentinel.comPosted: July 15, 2008
Twenty-seven people from Milwaukee, Chicago and Waukesha County have been charged with being part of a heroin ring that authorities say led to 11 overdoses, five of them fatal, according to federal court documents unsealed Tuesday.
The ring is similar to one charged in 2006 and 2007 that reached from Chicago through Milwaukee and into Ozaukee County, where at least four people died from overdoses. In that case, 16 people were charged and most have pleaded guilty.
In the current case, many of the suspects and victims came from Waukesha County, specifically the Village of Pewaukee. Because people died, the defendants face between 20 years and life in prison if convicted. All but one of the suspects is in custody and that person is being sought.
Village Police Chief Ed Baumann said he was shocked by how prevalent heroin was in his community.
"The questions are unanswerable," Baumann said. "They are the same questions Ozaukee County had. How did this group of kids get hooked on this poison? I don't know."
While five people died, the total might have been higher if not for life-saving medical procedures, authorities said. In four of the other six overdoses, a drug called Narcan was used to revive the users, several of whom were not breathing.
Dubbed "Operation Lake Effect," the investigation started in early 2007 when Milwaukee police pulled over Lonnie L. "G-money" Johnson, 31, who is identified as the Chicago-based supplier of the ring, according to a 70-count criminal complaint. Authorities already were working with informants on the ring, which was already being traced into Waukesha County, it said.
Last August, Valerie Luszak came to a house at N. 18th and W. Nash streets in Milwaukee to use heroin and died when she injected the drugs, the complaint indicates. Louis Brown told police he wrapped Luszak's body in a sheet and dumped it in a garbage cart where it was later found. Luszak's age was not listed in the complaint.
In December, law enforcement found Joshua Carroll, 26, dead from an overdose in a Town of Waukesha home. Friends said the heroin had come from Milwaukee.
In April, Luke J. Bandkowski, 28, of Genesee, was charged in Waukesha County Circuit Court with first-degree reckless homicide in Carroll's death. According to a criminal complaint, Bandkowski is accused of supplying heroin to Carroll in December. An autopsy showed that Carroll died of "opiate intoxication." Bandkowski is also charged in federal court.
Investigators learned that heroin was brought into Milwaukee every couple weeks and distributed through a network operated by Jermaine J. "Main" Stewart, 24, the complaint indicates. The drug was distributed to certain areas of Milwaukee, sometimes by couriers on bicycle, and users from Waukesha County would come into the city to buy, it said. Some of those buyers would then turn around and sell the drug to support their own addiction, according to the complaint.
Because the case has been charged as a conspiracy, all members would be culpable for the overdose deaths and face the stiff penalties if convicted.
On Feb. 21, Jeffrey Topczewski was found dead in a Muskego home by police, the complaint says. His age was not listed. Then on June 6, Andrew Goetzke, 19, was found dead at a Pewaukee home.
Finally, on July 3, David Knuth, 25, was taken by friends to the Aurora Healthcare parking lot in Pewaukee where he was found by police, the complaint said. He later died.
Earlier this month, Waukesha County Deputy Medical Examiner Kris Klenz said there had been four overdoses there as of June 30. Previously, the most heroin deaths recorded in the county came in 2006, when there were three.
James F. Bohn, assistant special agent at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, said the purity of heroin sold on the streets has increased over the past 10 years, making it possible for users to snort the drug instead of injecting it. That has eliminated some of the stigma formerly associated with heroin, but it remains highly addictive, regardless of how it is used.
"Heroin is not a recreational drug," Bohn said. "Once you use the drug, you are on that path."
U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic said the investigation is ongoing, noting that in both the Waukesha and Ozaukee cases, the source of the heroin was traced back to Chicago.
"The source of the supply remains under investigation," he said.
Biskupic added that both cases show that heroin is not a Milwaukee problem, but a regional one.
"Law enforcement knows drug dealers aren't concerned about city borders," he said.
My God... They knew it was deadly, yet they continued using and letting their friends use. This drug is evil...
By JOHN DIEDRICHjdiedrich@journalsentinel.comPosted: July 15, 2008
Twenty-seven people from Milwaukee, Chicago and Waukesha County have been charged with being part of a heroin ring that authorities say led to 11 overdoses, five of them fatal, according to federal court documents unsealed Tuesday.
The ring is similar to one charged in 2006 and 2007 that reached from Chicago through Milwaukee and into Ozaukee County, where at least four people died from overdoses. In that case, 16 people were charged and most have pleaded guilty.
In the current case, many of the suspects and victims came from Waukesha County, specifically the Village of Pewaukee. Because people died, the defendants face between 20 years and life in prison if convicted. All but one of the suspects is in custody and that person is being sought.
Village Police Chief Ed Baumann said he was shocked by how prevalent heroin was in his community.
"The questions are unanswerable," Baumann said. "They are the same questions Ozaukee County had. How did this group of kids get hooked on this poison? I don't know."
While five people died, the total might have been higher if not for life-saving medical procedures, authorities said. In four of the other six overdoses, a drug called Narcan was used to revive the users, several of whom were not breathing.
Dubbed "Operation Lake Effect," the investigation started in early 2007 when Milwaukee police pulled over Lonnie L. "G-money" Johnson, 31, who is identified as the Chicago-based supplier of the ring, according to a 70-count criminal complaint. Authorities already were working with informants on the ring, which was already being traced into Waukesha County, it said.
Last August, Valerie Luszak came to a house at N. 18th and W. Nash streets in Milwaukee to use heroin and died when she injected the drugs, the complaint indicates. Louis Brown told police he wrapped Luszak's body in a sheet and dumped it in a garbage cart where it was later found. Luszak's age was not listed in the complaint.
In December, law enforcement found Joshua Carroll, 26, dead from an overdose in a Town of Waukesha home. Friends said the heroin had come from Milwaukee.
In April, Luke J. Bandkowski, 28, of Genesee, was charged in Waukesha County Circuit Court with first-degree reckless homicide in Carroll's death. According to a criminal complaint, Bandkowski is accused of supplying heroin to Carroll in December. An autopsy showed that Carroll died of "opiate intoxication." Bandkowski is also charged in federal court.
Investigators learned that heroin was brought into Milwaukee every couple weeks and distributed through a network operated by Jermaine J. "Main" Stewart, 24, the complaint indicates. The drug was distributed to certain areas of Milwaukee, sometimes by couriers on bicycle, and users from Waukesha County would come into the city to buy, it said. Some of those buyers would then turn around and sell the drug to support their own addiction, according to the complaint.
Because the case has been charged as a conspiracy, all members would be culpable for the overdose deaths and face the stiff penalties if convicted.
On Feb. 21, Jeffrey Topczewski was found dead in a Muskego home by police, the complaint says. His age was not listed. Then on June 6, Andrew Goetzke, 19, was found dead at a Pewaukee home.
Finally, on July 3, David Knuth, 25, was taken by friends to the Aurora Healthcare parking lot in Pewaukee where he was found by police, the complaint said. He later died.
Earlier this month, Waukesha County Deputy Medical Examiner Kris Klenz said there had been four overdoses there as of June 30. Previously, the most heroin deaths recorded in the county came in 2006, when there were three.
James F. Bohn, assistant special agent at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, said the purity of heroin sold on the streets has increased over the past 10 years, making it possible for users to snort the drug instead of injecting it. That has eliminated some of the stigma formerly associated with heroin, but it remains highly addictive, regardless of how it is used.
"Heroin is not a recreational drug," Bohn said. "Once you use the drug, you are on that path."
U.S. Attorney Steven Biskupic said the investigation is ongoing, noting that in both the Waukesha and Ozaukee cases, the source of the heroin was traced back to Chicago.
"The source of the supply remains under investigation," he said.
Biskupic added that both cases show that heroin is not a Milwaukee problem, but a regional one.
"Law enforcement knows drug dealers aren't concerned about city borders," he said.
My God... They knew it was deadly, yet they continued using and letting their friends use. This drug is evil...
Sunday, July 13, 2008
What Now
A sad start to the season of sun. Two young men down. Too much alcohol and drugs, and their promise and lives are gone. Smiles and energy, and then stillness. Both friends of my children. One of them I knew.. As kind-hearted a young man as you will ever have met.
These events strike closer to home than you can realize... How can our country allow such a free flow of heroin as we are seeing in this community? These two deaths are far from unique. There is a plague in this country that needs to be addessed.... We send young people off to a war at the cost of billions... terrorists are murdering brazenly at home under the guise of a killer drug.
Anyway.. It does not help to dwell in sadness and loss, though it is hard to tear away.
They have returned to the earth from which we all came. If there is a heaven, they will find it.
These events strike closer to home than you can realize... How can our country allow such a free flow of heroin as we are seeing in this community? These two deaths are far from unique. There is a plague in this country that needs to be addessed.... We send young people off to a war at the cost of billions... terrorists are murdering brazenly at home under the guise of a killer drug.
Anyway.. It does not help to dwell in sadness and loss, though it is hard to tear away.
They have returned to the earth from which we all came. If there is a heaven, they will find it.
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