Gilfether.com

I signed up for Netflix yesterday so I could use their ‘Watch Instantly’ feature from my laptop. Turns out it’s some what of a disappointment, mostly because the Microsoft Silverlight software you are required to download and use is total crap. The movies are choppy, im getting around 5 fps, however the sound is ok. At first I thought it was just my computer, I checked to make sure I met the system requirements, and I did. After searching the web I discovered many people complaing about the same thing, turns out Microsofts Silverlight software just isn’t up to the task. No surprise there.

I decided to give the ‘Watch Instantly’ feature a try on my iPad, and it did work suprisingly well, though I don’t want to watch all movies from my iPad. I’d have to say that if you plan to watch Netflix from a Netflix enabled device such as a blueray player, dvd player, xbox 360, iPad or some other device that does not require Microsoft Silverlight, then this service may be ok. However I would try a different movie sevice if you plan to watch on your PC or Mac.

Chances are if you found this page you’ve encountered the dreaded Mercedes-Benz SLK 230 K40 relay problem. For those of you that are not familiar with the K40 Relay, it basically controls throttle response, fuel management, and your fuel pump. I also read some where that it has something to do with emissions, I’m not 100% sure, but I do know how to fix it!

You’ll know if you have the K40 Relay problem by the following symptoms:

• Your car is not running great, the throttle is not responsive
• When you turn the car off, you smell the faint smell of gasoline
• Your check engine light is on
• The error codes causing your check engine light are the following: P1235, P1236, P1420, P1525 (you need a code reader to determine this)

The bad news is that if you are to take your car to the shop to have this fixed, the part alone is several hundred dollars plus the labor for them to repair it and you’ve got yourself one expensive problem. The good news though, is that this problem is relatively easy to fix if you know how to use use solder and a soldering iron.

I have successfully repaired this on my own 1999 Mercedes SLK230, and it took me under an hour to do. It’s really not that complicated. The tools you need are:

• Phillips Screw Driver
• Small flat head screw driver
• Soldering Iron
• Solder
• Your hands and a little patience

Fortunately for you, I have step by step directions on how to repair the Mercedes SLK230 Relay problem in my photo gallery. Give it a visit and you can save yourself several hundreds dollars by doing it yourself!

For the past few weeks, when I booted into Windows XP on my laptop I would be frustrated because as I would type, keystrokes would be ignored for no apparent reason. There was no pattern to which keys would get ignored, it seemed completely random.

I run a dual boot system, so I also have Mandriva Linux on my laptop, which I use as my main operating system. I do not have this problem when I’m booted into Linux, so I knew the problem had to be Windows XP related.

Of course, this revelation also worried me, because I began to think I had some how got a virus, spyware, keylogger or some other nasty thing installed on my computer.

For weeks I ran all kinds of programs to ensure I did not have malware on my computer, everything from AVG antivirus, to Adaware, Spybot Search & Destroy, and all other recommendations I could find on the internet. Ever scan came back clean, and I was not infected with anything.

What could be causing my keystrokes to be randomly ignored? I started to think I might have a process or service running that was buggy. So I slowly and painfully disabled every non essential service, and started uninstalling all software. I even went as far as to start killing processes in the task manager that showed CPU usage as I was typing in notepad hoping I could catch a program that was trying to intercept my keystrokes.

Nothing worked, no matter what I deleted, uninstalled, or what process I killed the problem remained.

Tonight, out of pure frustration and one step away from wiping my Windows install and reinstalling it all, I did one last Google search. This time I search specifically for this problem on HP Pavilion zd8000 laptops. Low and Behold, I found a forum with other Pavilion zd8000 users having the same problem!

As it turns out, the faulty battery in my laptop, which died and quit holding a charge well over a year ago was the cause of the problem. The forum was filled with people saying to just pull the battery out and run the laptop off the a/c adapter only. That wouldn’t be a problem since my battery has been dead for so long I’ve been running only on the a/c adapter anyway.

After doing removing the battery, my keystrokes are back and working as normal! I figure it must be some Windows XP service that is trying to monitor the battery that is causing the keystroke hiccup (that doesn’t really make sense, but this is Windows we are dealing with, so go figure), but as of yet I haven’t found a way to solve the problem without removing the battery.

As long as the battery is out of the laptop though, I am typing like a champ!

I know a lot of you have been reporting problems with Socialite, either it is partially working, or not working at all. I haven’t abandoned the plugin, I’m just extremely busy running two seperate businesses, I haven’t had time to go in and relase a new update.

I am pleased with the popularity of the plugin, and realize I owe it to all those who have asked politely for me to support it and getting it working with the latest version of wordpress.

This weekend I plan to set aside some time to get it working again. Please bear with me for just another day or two, and I’ll get something working for everyone again.

I was reading Slashdot a minute ago, and there was an ‘Ask Slashdot’ post from a guy having a hard time finding a Linux application that can properly rip a DVD into other formats. It seems a lot of Linux DVD ripping apps are finicky and buggy and never work quite right (or don’t work a all).

This is something I fought for a while until I discovered a very simple solution, K3b. K3b is a KDE based DVD and CD burning application, but it also has the ability to Rip DVD’s to AVI. You can select which titles you want to rip or encode and let K3b do its job. When it’s done you’ll have a nice little AVI to do what ever you want with.

I use this method strictly for making backups of my personal DVD’s so the originals don’t get lost or scratched up. Remember, sharing copyrighted DVD’s with others is illegal

Your Linux distribution probably comes with K3b, but if not you can get it at: http://k3b.plainblack.com/

Today, I have finally released the first version of Socialite, a WordPress plugin to publish WordPress posts to Twitter, Facebook, and MySpace.

This first version is very much beta. It’s only been tested on Wordprss 2.7, though I think it will work on all versions starting with Version 2.3.

This plugin hasn’t been tested to heavily, so please notify me if you encounter any problems, and I’ll continue to work to get this to a stable version of 1.0.

Go download it now!

Here’s the scenario: You have a home theater system with surround sound. On the back of your stereo there is an RCA output for the subwoofer. However, the problem is that your subwoofer has 2 stereo wire connectors on the back, a positive and a negative. So what can you do? I’ve encountered this problem myself and fortunately I have a few answers for you.

What you have is a subwoofer with a passive connection. What your stereo expects you to have is a powered subwoofer that has either a built in amplifier, or a subwoofer that is connected to an amplifier.

First off, you are probably wondering if you can connect the subwoofer to the RCA output with some kind of adapter. The answer is yes, BUT the volume that comes out of the sub is so low that it is barely audible, if at all. You won’t damage anything, you just won’t be able to hear any sound from the sub and it will be useless.

The reason for this is that the RCA subwoofer connection of the back of your stereo is meant for an a subwoofer that has an amplifier either built in to it, or a subwoofer that is connected to an amplifier. Either the subwoofer with the amplifier built into it connects directly to that RCA port (the subwoofer it’s self will have a connection for an RCA cable), or an amplifier connects between the subwoofer and the stereo through that RCA port.

But don’t worry, all hope is not lost, you have two options.

OPTION A) What you could do is go to your local Radio Shack or Walmart and buy a cheap amplifier for your subwoofer. If you have money for something expensive, then I suggest just buying a whole new subwoofer that has an amp built in.

OPTION B) The other option, and the one I tend to use in these situations is to connect the subwoofer to either the left or right speaker output, just like you did for your other right and left speakers using normal stereo wire. Now you are probably wondering, if the right and left speaker are already connected to the right and left speaker connections on the stereo then how can i connect the subwoofer to one of these?

Well if your stereo is a good enough quality one that it has an RCA port for a powered subwoofer, then chances are it actually has at least 2 connections for the right speaker and the left speaker. One group of connections will be for an entire surround sound system. You will see the front left, front right, back left, back right, center, subwoofer, and possibly a few other connections.

There very well may be another two connections that are just plain old left and right stereo speaker connections, as you would see on any old stereo. You can connect your subwoofer to either the left or right one of these. You may have to play with your stereo settings to turn on those speaker output though.

This will work decently well, it will not sound as good as if you just went ahead and bought a powered subwoofer like your home stereo expects you to have. The subwoofer is built to only output low tones, thus when you connect to the right or left speaker connection, your subwoofer will only output the low tones from that connection and give you some bass, not great bass, but it should still enhance your movie watching experience.

I hope this helps!

Do americans have their own food that is unique to them?

Lately I have been eating out a lot, and when we go out it’s alway to eat some kind of cultural food such as Pho, Italian, Mexican, Thai, etc …

Now I realize that most American food is influenced by other cultures and that most ethnic resturants in America have been ‘americanized’ and usually does not bear a close resembelance to the original origin of the food. However, I’d imagine in the eyes of those not from America those food are not American enough. So if someone from another country want to eat true American food, what would it be?

Here’s my thoughts (excluding fast food resturants which are available over seas anyway):
BBQ Ribs
Any kind of BBQ (pork, beef, chicken, etc)
All kinds of BBQ sandwhiches
Mash Potatoes and Gravy
Coleslaw
Potatoes salad
A true home grilled hamburger and/or hot dog
Buffalow Wings
Philly Cheesesteak sandwich
‘Tex Mex’ (I know this influenced by Mexican food, but really is sort of a unique american food)
Grits
Deep Fried Turkey
S’mores w/Hershey’s chocolate bar, marshmellow, and grahm cracker (please correct me if this is not uniquely american)
Corn on the cob
Sweet Potatoes
Meatloaf (This I learned is uniquely American from some famous international chef on TV who claimed he had never tried it before)

I’m sure there is a lot more that I have not listed and I will continue to add to this list as they come to mind.

I rarely blog about sports, ok I rarely blog period, I know. Tonight I watched the Affliction: Banned MMA fight with Fedor Vs. Tim Sylvia. I’m a big MMA fan, you wouldn’t know it by reading my blog though.

If there was any doubt by anyone in the world that Fedor is not the greatest MMA fighter of all time, tonights fight shut up all the skeptics. He took down Tim Sylvia standing up with several punches to the head, then used a Rear Naked Choke hold to win the fight. All in 36 seconds.

You read me correctly, 36 SECONDS!

Let’s not forget Sylvia was a former 2 time UFC heavyweight champion. He’s not just your average ho-hum fighter. Fedor didn’t even break a sweat. In fact, he didn’t even look excited he won. I suspect, and this is just my personal opinion, that when he was throwing punches at Sylvia, Fedor was thinking about the resturant he wanted to take his wife too. Once he got to the choke hold, he was debating between Steak or Chicken.

Honestly, it’s like Fedor doesn’t even have to try. Did anyone see him playing poker with his training staff during the opening fights! Normal people like you and I walk out side to our cars, or take a piss in the toilet, and don’t think anything of it, its just another day. Fedor walks into the ring with 200+ pound guys and thinks nothing of it, its just like getting into his car or taking a piss. It’s all part of the average day.

I know, I sound like a fan boy, I don’t care. What he did tonight was truly inspiring. For all those who want to see Fedor lose, your day will come … maybe. Even the best fighters get old, or lose the fire inside them. The good fighters know when to quit while on top. Others (ie. Mike Tyson) seem to be too caught up in there celebrity to realize this.

I think Fedor will continue to dominate until the day he knows he can no longer compete like he does now, and will retire while on top. However, I suspect we won’t be seeing that happen for many many years.

Anyone sitting on edge for the future Fedor vs. Randy Couture fight!?

After the passing of Spot back in May, my girlfriend Emily and I decided it was time for a new companion. Today we picked up our 12 week old Bengal Cat Max (I nicked named him McLovin when Emily is not around!).

For those who don’t know what a Bengal Cat is, it’s a cross breed between a wild Asian Leopard Cat and a domestic house cat. Max is around a 7th generation, which means he is about 7 times removed from the actual wild Asian Leopard. However he retains the wild looking features and markings. Bengal cats are known for their very ‘dog’ like personalities. They are very different from a common domestic cat!