if (blog == "dead") { goto:
http://elmeranta.fi/blog
};... that is all. :D
Wednesday, April 19, 2017
Monday, September 22, 2014
When mounted disks become directories and eat your drive space...
I'm currently running a Centos 7 machine on which I'm running Windows 7 in a VMWare Player.
When I mount a 1TB TrueCrypt encrypted disk, which mounts in the /media directory, and share it on the Player (as a "shared folder" in settings) it works normally.
But what happens when you reboot the machine and no longer have the TrueCrypt disk mounted?
The Player still uses the /media directory as a shared folder. It took me a couple of boots to figure out why my 50GB /root partition was filled to brim (it had 14MB free) - all the Windows 7 backups were made into the folder, which was no longer the expected 1TB external disk...
So, unless you are mounting that TrueCrypt disk automatically with a keyfile, you better have a good memory and always manually mount it after every boot. I had a couple of power outs because of electrical installations, which the UPS could not handle and my memory concerning machines I'm used to being "leave running and forget" isn't that great anymore. Thus, "hilarity" ensues...
When I mount a 1TB TrueCrypt encrypted disk, which mounts in the /media directory, and share it on the Player (as a "shared folder" in settings) it works normally.
But what happens when you reboot the machine and no longer have the TrueCrypt disk mounted?
The Player still uses the /media directory as a shared folder. It took me a couple of boots to figure out why my 50GB /root partition was filled to brim (it had 14MB free) - all the Windows 7 backups were made into the folder, which was no longer the expected 1TB external disk...
So, unless you are mounting that TrueCrypt disk automatically with a keyfile, you better have a good memory and always manually mount it after every boot. I had a couple of power outs because of electrical installations, which the UPS could not handle and my memory concerning machines I'm used to being "leave running and forget" isn't that great anymore. Thus, "hilarity" ensues...
Tuesday, May 13, 2014
Shadowrun: Dragonfall
The DLC for Shadowrun Returns is in many ways better than the original release.
Better campaign, more immersive, new building blocks for the dev kit, easily 10-15 hours to play depending on your playstyle.
All in all, very nice. Especially if you can find it "on the cheap"; while it was on sale for 9,90 - a friendly "trader" (you know those guys that sell stuff like TF2 collectibles for money on the market) sold it for less than 5 eur...
Better campaign, more immersive, new building blocks for the dev kit, easily 10-15 hours to play depending on your playstyle.
All in all, very nice. Especially if you can find it "on the cheap"; while it was on sale for 9,90 - a friendly "trader" (you know those guys that sell stuff like TF2 collectibles for money on the market) sold it for less than 5 eur...
Friday, March 7, 2014
On FreeBSD...
FreeBSD for noobs, note to self:
After install run:
# portsnap fetch
# portsnap extract
... otherwise most of your port installs will fail because dependent files are already newer versions.
Why this isn't handled after the installation automatically, is beyond me. Of course, so are many other things (like why port startup commands must be added to rc.d / rc.conf manually).
Oh, and note 2:
zpool will only allow "clean" unpartitioned disk to be added as spares (naturally). So, if for example, a previously failed installation already partitioned a disk for UFS or ZFS, you need to manually nuke the paritions.
Then you can easily add it as a spare with (adding disk ada3 to pool "zroot"):
# zpool add zroot ada3
After install run:
# portsnap fetch
# portsnap extract
... otherwise most of your port installs will fail because dependent files are already newer versions.
Why this isn't handled after the installation automatically, is beyond me. Of course, so are many other things (like why port startup commands must be added to rc.d / rc.conf manually).
Oh, and note 2:
zpool will only allow "clean" unpartitioned disk to be added as spares (naturally). So, if for example, a previously failed installation already partitioned a disk for UFS or ZFS, you need to manually nuke the paritions.
Then you can easily add it as a spare with (adding disk ada3 to pool "zroot"):
# zpool add zroot ada3
Tuesday, January 7, 2014
Holy Happy New Year Batman!
Oops!
It's been a while...
What's funnier than a bunch of squirrels in a bag?
Just Cause 2 (from 2010) with the free multiplayer mod (from 12/2013)!
It's been a while...
What's funnier than a bunch of squirrels in a bag?
Just Cause 2 (from 2010) with the free multiplayer mod (from 12/2013)!
Friday, April 26, 2013
(Cheap) laptop gaming
So what kind of gaming laptop can you get for around 450 euros? Apparently a decent one if you're lucky.
Last month I ordered a Fujitsu NH532 laptop that was on sale in CDON for 449 EUR.
Specs:
- i7 3630QM (2.4GHz, 4 cores & HyperThreading)
- 8GB memory (2x 4GB DDR3 1600@1333MHz)
- GeForce 640m LE GPU, 2GB memory, with 17" 1600x900 non-glare matte display
- 500GB 5400rpm HDD (Toshiba) / Blu-Ray writer
- Windows 8
Decent enough, with a GPU that can actually play some current games.
So what's the kicker? The GPU, while "just" an LE model, overclocks around 90-100% for the core. Yes, that means that you can run the stock 500MHz core at 900-1000MHz (personally I have settled for 950MHz core / 1000MHz memory).
Just install Nvidiainspector and make a bat-file, while running either 310.90 or the new 320 drivers (anything between those cannot be overclocked).
That means this little cheapo laptop can run Guild Wars 2, for example, around 27-28fps in a window, and way past 30fps full screen with med-high settings (I run post processing at medium because I hate some effects it has) - with FSAA enabled, textures and animation on high, reflections on, etc, etc.
So after installing a cheap 128GB Kingston SSD I had in my old Ubuntu laptop in it, I'm more than satisfied.
Last month I ordered a Fujitsu NH532 laptop that was on sale in CDON for 449 EUR.
Specs:
- i7 3630QM (2.4GHz, 4 cores & HyperThreading)
- 8GB memory (2x 4GB DDR3 1600@1333MHz)
- GeForce 640m LE GPU, 2GB memory, with 17" 1600x900 non-glare matte display
- 500GB 5400rpm HDD (Toshiba) / Blu-Ray writer
- Windows 8
Decent enough, with a GPU that can actually play some current games.
So what's the kicker? The GPU, while "just" an LE model, overclocks around 90-100% for the core. Yes, that means that you can run the stock 500MHz core at 900-1000MHz (personally I have settled for 950MHz core / 1000MHz memory).
Just install Nvidiainspector and make a bat-file, while running either 310.90 or the new 320 drivers (anything between those cannot be overclocked).
That means this little cheapo laptop can run Guild Wars 2, for example, around 27-28fps in a window, and way past 30fps full screen with med-high settings (I run post processing at medium because I hate some effects it has) - with FSAA enabled, textures and animation on high, reflections on, etc, etc.
So after installing a cheap 128GB Kingston SSD I had in my old Ubuntu laptop in it, I'm more than satisfied.
Wednesday, March 27, 2013
Max Payne 3
Late as ever, one would think this 2012 title would be patched already.
I mean it's a Rockstar title for F's sake.
Nope - I've broken it at least twice. Once so bad my save/restart point ended with me just dropping off the world into emptiness (well, it changed to orange before it changed to a black limbo) and forcing me to start the whole level from the beginning.
While it's fun to follow the adventures of Max The Fumbling Alcoholic Nervous Breakdown (tm), the immersion is somewhat broken when you run into an enemy "boss" that is glued to a location so forcefully that rolling and dodging behind him prevents him from turning around and shooting at you. (I'm talking about you, the armored, helmeted machine gun guy in the corporate lobby!)
And how to make the game limbo?
Easy; just go past some pre-programmed place and the game slowly, slowly, slowly starts to go bonkers on you. First you'll notice everything loading slowly (the memory is probably running out because the game is not releasing resources which you already went past and won't ever see), then 90% of the enemies just won't load. And finally the game can't load anything fast enough to keep you "afloat" and you'll end up falling through the world.
And all this because I jumped a railing in a warehouse instead of going through a "control room" and triggering an event where you'll shoot a dozen guys across the hall.
Sheesh. I mean... Rockstar? Really? Rockstar Bangladesh? Rockstar Nigeria? Who made this game?
Maybe you should give it back to Remedy, at least we Finns know how to make working scripts... :P
I mean it's a Rockstar title for F's sake.
Nope - I've broken it at least twice. Once so bad my save/restart point ended with me just dropping off the world into emptiness (well, it changed to orange before it changed to a black limbo) and forcing me to start the whole level from the beginning.
While it's fun to follow the adventures of Max The Fumbling Alcoholic Nervous Breakdown (tm), the immersion is somewhat broken when you run into an enemy "boss" that is glued to a location so forcefully that rolling and dodging behind him prevents him from turning around and shooting at you. (I'm talking about you, the armored, helmeted machine gun guy in the corporate lobby!)
And how to make the game limbo?
Easy; just go past some pre-programmed place and the game slowly, slowly, slowly starts to go bonkers on you. First you'll notice everything loading slowly (the memory is probably running out because the game is not releasing resources which you already went past and won't ever see), then 90% of the enemies just won't load. And finally the game can't load anything fast enough to keep you "afloat" and you'll end up falling through the world.
And all this because I jumped a railing in a warehouse instead of going through a "control room" and triggering an event where you'll shoot a dozen guys across the hall.
Sheesh. I mean... Rockstar? Really? Rockstar Bangladesh? Rockstar Nigeria? Who made this game?
Maybe you should give it back to Remedy, at least we Finns know how to make working scripts... :P
Score: 6.5
(Bugless it would be 8 - Remedy would've probably made it into a 9 game.)Thursday, February 28, 2013
On Android kernels...
I installed Semaphore 2.9.4 on my SGS that has CM10 (ie. Jellybean / 4.2.2) - I don't there's going back. Everything seems so much smoother now.
And I love the 1% increments in overclocking settings, among other things.
And I love the 1% increments in overclocking settings, among other things.
Tuesday, February 12, 2013
Long time no blog...
Wow... What's been happening?
Not much, really.
On the gaming front I got into Guild Wars 2 for a bit, then got fed up with it's downward spiraling economy, then tried the free version of Star Wars: The Old Republic and actually got a month's sub scription after a couple of free months. (Yes, the story is OK, the game itself very "so-so" MMOG).
On console front; still have to complete Hitman: Absolution and Assassin's Creed 3 (not to mention an old used copy of Max Payne 3 I haven't even put into my PS3 yet).
I wish I had more time, but between work, kids, etc I barely have time to do "more important things" like build myself a new NAS;
old one is a 10TB (5x 2TB w/RAID1 and rsynced backups) FreeNAS server with a X2 3800+ CPU and 1GB RAM that sorely needs replacing so I bought a i3 3225, an Asrock B75 mobo with 8 SATA connectors, 8GBs of RAM and a new WD RED 3TB drive to facilitate the transfer.
I'm still undecided on the OS - I'm open to Open Indiana (pun intended) or FreeNAS or NAS4Free (I actually installed an Ubuntu 12.10 and cloned my, err... "other" server there, but I'm not too happy with it - I feel 12.04 LTS is better, but it lacks the easy encrypted install that 12.10 has)...
Not much, really.
On the gaming front I got into Guild Wars 2 for a bit, then got fed up with it's downward spiraling economy, then tried the free version of Star Wars: The Old Republic and actually got a month's sub scription after a couple of free months. (Yes, the story is OK, the game itself very "so-so" MMOG).
On console front; still have to complete Hitman: Absolution and Assassin's Creed 3 (not to mention an old used copy of Max Payne 3 I haven't even put into my PS3 yet).
I wish I had more time, but between work, kids, etc I barely have time to do "more important things" like build myself a new NAS;
old one is a 10TB (5x 2TB w/RAID1 and rsynced backups) FreeNAS server with a X2 3800+ CPU and 1GB RAM that sorely needs replacing so I bought a i3 3225, an Asrock B75 mobo with 8 SATA connectors, 8GBs of RAM and a new WD RED 3TB drive to facilitate the transfer.
I'm still undecided on the OS - I'm open to Open Indiana (pun intended) or FreeNAS or NAS4Free (I actually installed an Ubuntu 12.10 and cloned my, err... "other" server there, but I'm not too happy with it - I feel 12.04 LTS is better, but it lacks the easy encrypted install that 12.10 has)...
Friday, July 27, 2012
Spec Ops: The Line
Just ordered Spec Ops: The Line.
If the plot is as good as they say (very "Heart of Darkness"), then it's going to be a different kind of cover-based shooter -ride.
Play Asia has it cheapest (Xbox 360), surprisingly (in UK PS3/Xbox versions are both over £32, in PA just over 20 eur, 24.85 with postage). Sadly the PS3 version costs $5 more.
If the plot is as good as they say (very "Heart of Darkness"), then it's going to be a different kind of cover-based shooter -ride.
Play Asia has it cheapest (Xbox 360), surprisingly (in UK PS3/Xbox versions are both over £32, in PA just over 20 eur, 24.85 with postage). Sadly the PS3 version costs $5 more.
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