Overclocking PIII’s, Day at FG

Over the past week or so i have been experimenting with some old hardware that i have had lying around the house. I have 4x  Pentium III 666Mhz computers which i obtained from my parents work a while ago and have pretty much collected dust over the months. So since it is almost hard rubbish time again (free stuff!!) i am trying to decide if i should get rid of them or not or possibly sell them or something. Anyway back to the point i have been trying out some overclocking and managed to get my test one from 668.2Mhz to 733.3Mhz which gives me a about a 9% increase. I would have liked to do more because it was running very stable but the motherboard i had doesnt not allow you to change much like the core voltage and the multiplier so i could only adjust the FSB from 133 to 147. maybe i will be able to get something better out of the hard rubbish

Today me and Natty spent the afternoon at Fountain Gate because we had nothing better to do really. We had a look at cash converters and pretty much proved that everything that comes from there is stolen. eg. a car amplifier with all the wiring just cut off, obviously it was pulled out in a hurry. Some stuff was overpriced and worth more than retail but other stuff was cheap as like power tools. We also saw a cheap Behringer lighting desk and there were also multiple mixers varying from shit to half decent. We then moved onto the main shopping centre for a look and then down to Bunnings, JB Hifi, Supercheap Auto (where natty bought a car batter tester which i hear broke before he could use it) and then onto Auto pro where we found you could get a tape car head unit and speakers for $10!! wot a bargain. I bet it was high quality stuff though. We then came back to my place and played Wii Play and Rayman Raving Rabbids.

So all in all not a bad day

Catchya Later

- JD

1st Driving Lesson

Well yesterday i got my L-plates after about a month of waiting. I wanted to get them on my birthday but mum was too lazy to book it in on the right date. Anyway the test was really easy. I scored 94% which is 2 questions wrong. Id done a few practice ones online so id seen most of the questions before. only a very small percentage of the people at VicRoads are Australian and it took them 2 goes to spell my name right and all the had to do was COPY it from the form i had to fill out.

Today i had my first drive with dad down at Casey Fields. Down there it is mostly dirt and gravel roads so i didn’t get to go much faster than about 40km/h. So we worked out a circuit that had a variety of right and left hand turns and give way and stop signs. It all went well and by the 3rd lap i pretty much had most things sorted out. It doesn’t help that my bros car (1990 Nissan Pulsar) is way out of alignment in the front which he will have to get fixed coz u have to hold the steering wheel at about the 11 o’clock position to go straight. Hopefully I will get to go for another drive this week because my parents are on holidays so they can take me whenever.

Until next time

- JD

Edrington Concert

Today me and monkey were down at Edrington to do lighting for their concert which is on tomorrow night. The day was pretty much a bludge. The lighting rig is pretty much parcan galore with a few borrowed fresnels because Edrington has very few of its own lights. The new hall at Edrington has some really stupid stuff. They have a whole desktop PC set up just to control the temp of the air con, there is a talkback socket on every second wall (eg there is one right under the mirror where makeup is done, theres a heap of them that will never get used) , fire extinguishers behind locked doors with the sign on the outside of the door, and an exit sign that is nowhere near an exit. The house lights have their own sheet with all the abbreviations for the switches and turn turn off the houselights for the concert you need to press seven buttons. The rig is a pain to focus because it is like Newlands where the bar lowers so u have to eyeball it to get it right. Also the patching panel and dimmers have been put under the stage which is like a bloody maze. But other than that it is a pretty good hall for what it is designed for.

Whilst at Edrington we were treated like royalty and it was totally different to what we were used to there. We were asked if we would like tea or coffee and the art teacher who is normally really strict on supplies and cleaning up let us just have some metho and a cloth to clean the profile and she even cleaned it up for us. We are also invited to dinner tomorrow night before the concert. It was a good chance to catch up with staff members that we get along with and haven’t seen in a while. So all in all it should be a good concert but theres like 20 acts so it could go forever.

- JD

Yr 10 ‘Leadership’ Camp and X Country Relays

Thursday and Friday saw the annual Yr10 ‘leadership’ camp. Which really involved nothing to do with leadership at all. We were down at Phillip Island adventure resort (same place we had yr6 camp). The camp was pretty lame and our group didn’t even get to do the good activities like the giant swing and the crate climb because we weren’t there for long enough. On Thursday night we had a disco and karaoke night which was really bad. The girls didn’t turn up until there was only 25mins left because of their guest speaker. Friday was time for more activities and then off to home. But it also involved a bag check which took 3 hours because someone had their ipod ’stolen’. So all in all a pretty average camp that didnt live up to its intended purpose.

Now this morning i am a bit pissed off because it was cross country road relays in Bundoora which took ages to get to. I was forced to run a 3km time trial by myself because the other members of my team were no-shows. It went alright and i was quite happy with my time but thats not the point. If people are going to pick a sport for school then they should at least bloody turn up so that it does not disadvantage other members of the team. School sport is compulsory and there is no reason whatsoever to not be there especially when you have said to the coach that you are available to play. Hopefully heads will roll on Monday. Well done to the U16 boys who won their race by a very convincing margin.

- JD

Tech Update

Well as something a bit different i have decided to do a tech update

Firstly the worlds largest TV, made by JVC, is now available for retail. It has been on display before but not as a retail model. The screen size measures 110inches, it weighs some 330kgs and it will set you back US$53k. This image size is comparable to many projectors on the market. (just look at the size of the thing compared to the remote). Full article available HERE on engadget

It seems that we like all things wireless and it now becomes a necessity such as mobile phones, radio, networking and internet. Researchers have found a way to power a 60W globe wirelessly from a few meters away. There is definitely a good chance for further development in this. The full article is HERE on Ars Technica.

Well thats all for now
- JD

Weekend and V-Tech Rampage

Greetings

On Saturday i had cross country. It was a very muddy track and you had to stomp every so often to get the mud off your shoes otherwise they would get too heavy. Haileybury was against heavy weights Scotch and Xavier. We beat Scotch but narrowly went down to Xavier by 4 points. The good thing though is St Kevins drew with MGS leaving a good chance to win the premiership if we beat Caulfield and St Kevins in the final two rounds. Once home from Geelong i had a rest and did some homework. On Sunday afternoon i went to the football and saw St Kilda take on Geelong. The Saints played like shit and the umpiring was just as bad with the controversial hands in the back rule.
Today i had school. Double Geog, Electrotech, Double Science, English and Geography. I eventually got my History done throughout the day and it took me forever to print in the library because the computers are so slow and take forever. English was a waste of time where we spent the lesson talking about mobile phones for some random reason and had to write i story that involved a mobile phone.
I also saw a link to this game on overclockers.com.au today. Yes, this game is in bad taste but it intrigued me and i had to try it out. It is a flash game about the Virginia Tech Rampage and it is quite controversial it can be found HERE on the newgrounds site.
Well thats it for now. Happy Gaming
- JD

St Margs Deb / Geog Field Trip

Well ive been pretty busy in between posts

On Saturday night I had the annual St Margaret’s Yr10 Deb Ball. The afternoon kicked off when we got to Bella’s house to have photos and about half a million photos later to catch the limo. The limo was pretty cool it was a stretch Ford LTD, one of the other groups had a stretch Ford Territory which was pretty cool. When we got to the venue we had a while to practice and refine our dances. That didn’t really help me and my partner Kim coz when we had to do them properly for the actual performance we screwed the waltz up at 2 or 3 different points but it was all in good fun. Other dances included the progressive jive, 3 step and samba. The main meal was ok but the deserts were pretty damn good I had a really nice orange cake. After we had finished the evening we had free reign of the dance floor and the DJ got going. We had an awsome time and then at about midnight we left to go to the after party which was being hosted by Kim. By this time some of us were pretty stuffed but still had a good time. It was a fantastic evening and I eventually got to bed at about 3 for some well earned sleep. Hopefully ill be able to post some photos of the evening soon.

Today, still tired from the deb, I had a geography field trip which started in Berwick so i got on the bus there and got to have a bit of a sleep in.  The whole purpose of the trip is about Human Environments and the green wedge and the rural urban fringe.  After starting at Berwick we moved onto Officer, Cardinia and Moorabbin. We then had lunch at south land and while we were there we saw Robert Harvey who is and AFL legend that plays for the mighty Saints. After lunch we went onto Toorak and looked at some of the massive mansions and then onto Docklands. We then made our way back to school in time to catch the early buses. It wasn’t too bad of a day and was better than having English and double Science.

Well thats about all I have to write for now and I’d better start some maths homework and my history outcome.

Until next time                – JD

House Performing Arts

Well today was house performing arts so from recess onwards I was helping set up some lights and stuff for that. I managed to get out of history(thanks to James, you legend it was so boring) and science in order to help but decided to go to maths in period 5. Performing arts kicked off at lunchtime with drama which was themed Monty Python which was pretty good but got boring towards the end. Sholto Black (my house came 2nd). Next up was house dance and there were some really crap ones like Castlefield and Rendall which hardly involved any form of dance at all. Sholto got jibbed in this as it was clearly better than most of the others but only managed a miserable 7th. There was also a heap of complaints about the projector screen and how people couldn’t read it and they wanted it fixed but its a bit had when whoever made the damn power point used a black background with dark font.  House music was a bit better and some houses were quite good Rendall’s song about Watto was good but I think Sholto was the best with our lead man Kog, we don’t find out the results until tomorrow but I think we will definitely be up there.

school and the undoable ‘wyatt knot’

Greetings,

Yet another boring day at school, double maths was funny as at the moment we are studying factorising and i was sitting next to jack and it was rather entertaining when he was unable to factorize the quadratic trinomials. I also had english, geog and science. and after lunch i had PE where we were in the weights room trying to build nice bulging biceps and then maths tute which is practically a spare.

At lunch in the hall we had to take down the bar that we use to hold up the cyc because we need it for house performing arts and Castlefield (thanks for the correction James) took our other bar. Iain and Christian had funny undoing their knots that held it up as it as known as the “Wyatt knot” and is a bitch and almost impossible to undo.

Tomorrow i have cross country relays at Coburg which will be a bit different. its a 4×4km race which should suit me a bit better than the usual 6km and from the looks of things Haileybury will have some pretty strong teams and be in medal contention.

Well thats all for today, – JD

Bday, school and forgetful teachers

Post #2

Well today was a bit different, it was my birthday. I didnt really want much in the way of present but i did get a new watch which is a nice Nike running one which will be very good and for both cross country, aths and casual running. Its really cool u can store 30 of your previous run times and then look as them later and compare, it also does intervals and many other things. I also got a tool kit which will be handy for my DIY and when i decide to “tinker” with things.

Today was a pretty normal day at school, although throughout my classes i received many birthday txt’s. Wednesdays are a crap day coz i have like every subject. Double english was pretty average so was science math and geog, but history and electrotech remained interesting. One funny thing that did happen was our maths teacher forgot she had class and was 40mins late. Maybe the marshal will give her lines or a Friday because he was going to chase her up about it. We also got the curtain back for the hall which had a tear put in it last week, unfortunately i wasn’t there to see it go back up but im sure it was had work as it weighs a ton.

Well anyway thats about it for now, until next time – JD