Windows Live Writer

As I’ve previously mentioned, my blogs are hosted and written on Google’s Blogger platform.

This post is something different; I’m writing this using Windows Live Writer to see if it’s any easier, if it has any advantages over using the Blogger web site. 

Sure I can insert a smiley face but when would I need that in regular blog posts?

I can insert a table / grid	like this…
	but I don’t think I’d use it much

There are lots of plug-ins available for Live Writer too, but most don’t seem to add much more than you can do on the blogger web site.

There are more font options available… Comic Sans, Calibri, Jokerman and many more options you don't get on the web site.

I can even insert a map…

Maybe I will just keep Windows Live Writer as an option, depending on what I want in a particular blog post.

Change the blog look

I've had this blog for a few years now, so I thought it might be time for a change.  I'm using the free Blogger platform from Google, so there isn't as many options as some of the paid blogging hosts, but they still have several templates to play around with.

So, as I fine tune the look of "Simon Says Blog", here's one last look at the original layout... 

Dawn photography

It was a really hot night last night (over 30 degrees C until after 2AM) and I couldn't sleep, so I decided to go and photograph the sunrise.  For the first time I shot in RAW so I had the best chance of getting some good colours in Post-Processing.

Here's the end result on Flickr...

Twitter

Today has been my biggest day on Twitter since I joined several years ago.  Including re-tweets, I tweeted 43 times today.  My topics varied from the passing of cricket legend Tony Greig, interacting with a guest on ABC News24, a very healthy "discussion" on the safety of B-Triple trucks, photography re-tweets and linking to a YouTube video of my kids.

All these tweets today took my total number over 1000, but I still call myself only a casual user of Social Media.

Twitter are slowly rolling out the ability to view all of your twitter history.  When it's available to me, I'll be really interested to look back at what I posted in my early days.

@simonyeo

Christmas Lights

I went for a walk last night with Mandy, Brad and Karla to have a look at the local Christmas Lights some local residents have put up on their houses.

 I took my trust Nikon along to try and get some nice shots.  With a highish ISO setting and wide aperture I was happy with the results.  There's a small street where everyone is right into their Chrtistmas lighting and lots of people walk through in admiration.  I'm really happy with this shot which not only captures the extensive display of lights, but also the community atmosphere of this normally quiet Pakenham street.

Home Brew PC

Back in 2003 I ordered a desktop computer through Dell, and specified the contents as high as I could.  Back then a Pentium4 with Hyper Threading, a huge 1GB of RAM and a second hard drive with a whopping 80GB extra storage was a really good system.  Over the years there were upgrades to the graphics card, memory and hard drives.  The old Dell served me well, until a few months ago when it finally died.

It was time for a new computer.  I thought about a laptop, but I already have a Netbook and iPad, so any portability concerns were covered.  Also, the storage capacity of laptops are generally limited to a single 2.5 inch hard drive, and the potential for future upgrades of other hardware is limited.  I looked at Dell desktops again, but they don't seem to allow as much customisation as they did 9 years ago.  Dell also seemed pretty pricey for what you get.

Looking at various hardware vendors, I realised I could build a PC exactly the way I wanted much cheaper than the major brands, and still allow room for future upgrades so that this computer will last many, many years.

I hadn't assembled a computer from scratch before, 

but having performed numerous upgrades and repairs to friends and families computers over the years

 (as well as my old Dell), I was confident in the build.

The heart of my system is the Intel Core i5-3570K, 

it is unlocked if I decide to go down the over-clocking road and incorporates the best Intel graphics.  

I'm not a big "gamer" so I'm hopeful that I wont need a dedicated graphics card, 

but if I do the motherboard has the slots needed.

I've purchased two Seagate hard-drives for the new system to give me a total of 5TB of storage.  

The 2TB drive is partitioned to keep the Operating System separate from everything else, 

this will allow for easy re-installation when needed.

Building my "Homebrew" computer.

First-up in the build was installing the power supply into the case.  

I chose a modular PSU to minimise the amount of unused cables in the case.

Next, it was time to fit out the motherboard...

...with CPU, cooler...

...and RAM memory.

With the basics now fitted to the motherboard, it can then be screwed into the case...

...and it's time to start plugging in.

With a computer that can now competently handle video, 

I've installed a Firewire card so I can download home videos.

Almost finished, install the drives... 

...and tidy up the leads with cable-ties.

Time to fire-up the new machine and install an Operating System.

With the public release of Windows 8 only a month or so away, 

I didn't want to buy an obsolete O.S, so I've installed the "Release Preview" for now.

Finally I need to get all of my old data onto the new machine.

With the HDDs removed from the old Dell machine, 

my "NexStar" adaptor can connect to both SATA and older IDE drives, 

sending data to the new PC via USB3.

Swim Club Web Site

My boys, Josh and Brad, are in the local swimming club and both swim in the squad.  For the next 12 months I've been elected to be Club Secretary. The first job for me in this role was to re-register the club's expired web domain and set up the web site.  Being a small community based club, there's not much funds for a professional site, so I've used Google's blogger service to set up a free blog style web page.  All we've had to pay is $25 for two years registration of the domain name.


So here it is... www.cardiniapiranhas.com.au