Stop Vista rebooting automatically!

Ever sit down to your computer which had some stuff running only to find you’re at the login screen (and not just the screensaver password prompt screen)?  Did you lose some work?  I have! No easy option to change this, but it IS changeable. Great blog post here about it: http://softwarex-nz.blogspot.com/2008/01/stop-vistas-update-auto-reboot.html Thank you!

Great Canon 40D shots without computer processing

OK – call me lazy. Tell me I’m not getting the full benefit of my Canon 40D digital SLR camera. Yes I know about RAW files, curves, unsharpening, HDR, etc. But sometimes, well, most of the time, I just want to take pictures and have them look great on screen and printable at anything less than a HUGE print without loads of, ok ANY, computer ‘post processing’.

Little point and shoot digital cameras in decent light situations (i.e., outdoors) take great pictures in most circumstances. But they’re still slow, cannot do shallow depth of field, often don’t have a very wide angle field of view, and to me at least, are generally irritating (except for their size)! Once you’ve seen the quality of pictures and enjoyed the flexibility and range of options and control with an SLR, it’s hard to go back. I know, I tried. Got tired of lugging the Canon 20D and lenses around, sold the lot. But less than a year later, I was ready to throw my Canon point and shoot camera in a fire pit.

Read more

U.S. gas prices – thank you environmentalists

Sooner or later I guess this topic was going to get mentioned here.

U.S. gas prices have doubled and more in the past couple of years.  It must be hurting millions of people directly (getting to and from work or school for example), and hurting many businesses too, which must deliver things and have things delivered to them and so they must raise prices on everything in turn to make up for it.  It seems the U.S. government has totally distorted how it reports inflation because gasoline and food prices alone are skyrocketing.  Maybe the drop in house prices is counteracting that some!

The politicians are arguing over causes and remedies, but while they do NOTHING, quietly, millions of people are driving a little less, maybe trading in the old clunker or big SUV for something much more efficient, sales of hybrids have skyrocketed, and the American people are being very sensible about all this.

We’ve all heard it’s ‘greedy oil companies’ that are the cause but that really isn’t the case – they process crude oil and refine it, etc., and pass along the costs they must pay.  Now global demand for oil and gasoline has been climbing and is projected to climb a great deal more as prosperity increases in China and India in particular, as they hold almost half the world’s population!  U.S. gasoline consumption has not increased significantly in decades.  Increasing overall demand puts upward pressure on prices if supply is not increased.

Read more

Arthur C. Clarke, sooner or later it was bound to happen

[amazonify]0451457994:right:product:thehigginswebsit[/amazonify][amazonify]0553287893:right:product:thehigginswebsit[/amazonify]Arthur C. Clarke, writer, visionary, and scientist, born 16 December 1917, passed away on Tuesday 18 March, 2008, at the age of 90. To quote the opening line from one of my favorite books by Clarke – Rendezvous with Rama – “Sooner or later it was bound to happen.” Arthur C. Clarke wrote so eloquently, … Read more